AMD64 3200+ ASUS K8V-SE Deluxe - Problems....

dlove_rm

Hello all. Ok, decided I should just start a new thread here as I am having a problem.

My system breakdown is as follows:
Asus K8V-SE Deluxe Motherboard
1GB RAM (Advanced - but is certified with MoBo and tested on it)
AMD64 3200+ CPU
ATI Radeon A-I-W 9800 Pro Video Card
Audigy 2 Sound Card
Maxtor 200GB SATA Hard Drive
Maddog cd-rw/DVD Rom drive
Maddog 12x DVD +/- RW drive
and some other misc components.

I am trying to install XP Pro on this machine. Periodically I get a Checksum error, and when I get some of this stuff worked out, I have a the latest BIOS to try and flash.

But when I do get the system to boot up and Windows to begin the install, I hit F6 to load my SATA driver, it finds it and then does the install, it gets to a point that says "Setup is starting Windows" and it hangs there EVERY time.

Where am I going wrong in this? Should I focus on the BIOS issue first and then work on the rest? I need some pointers here.

THank you,

Tex

Start with flashing the bios and make sure you have the boot sequence set right. Lots of boards are having probs booting off the sata drives without bios updates and you would definatletly want to do it BEFORE not after you install an OS.

Checksum could be memory but its probbaly your cd itself or the drive your putting it into. I have had several dvd drives that would not let me install from there for example. Try plugging in ONLY the cd/dvd combo drive and make sure its on the end of the cable and its set to cable select etc...

Tex

Jimborae

Check inthe bios also to see if has a performance mode setting. If its set to turbo then your're overclocking everything & memory may not be able to take it. I have the K8V deluxe, not se but i think the bios is simmilar.

dlove_rm

Hey all - I managed to flash the bios last night and solved that problem. I had issues today getting the SATA to work, found out where the ASUS drivers were (wish they would put that crap in the manual) - and got them loaded, but Windows XP hung many times at the "Setup is starting Windows" screen - and then once past that and into the XP install - I got the errors "Could not install DISKDRIVE", "Could not install CDROM" and "Could not install BATTERY". Later into the windows install I got an error about the "System" (indicating the System Icon from the Control Panel) had failed to install properly. Now, when I boot, I get the XP Splash Screen, a Login request, then I get given a green background screen and nothing else.

Im thinking a 3rd install of XP may be in order (3rd times the charm) but does anyone have suggestions on how to prevent this in on the next try?

THank you,

Jimborae

Have you checked the bios settings cos it does sound as though your memory is crapping out & have checked the media as tex suggested?

Tex

Set the bios to safe defaults and disable any non needed stuff for the install. Of course the best solution rteally would be to make an unattended install with all the chipset drivers included with teh XP install probably also.

Disable ultra dma on both the cdroms just for the install and do try and disconnect the slave for the installation. You can always hook teh stuff back up but its barfing bad on your media. Either its memory, a bad cd, or one or both those dvdroms are screweing with each other. If you have alwasy been using the same drive switch and use the other one this time.

tex

dlove_rm

Since I have no IDE hard drives, both DVD's are masters on their own IDE Channels. I have NO slaves connected. And the cables are properly connected to reflect this connection. So, your feelings are it is either a BIOS setting, flaky memory, bad DVD/CD Drives, or Bad Media. Is that correct?

I have run MemTest on the memory, it always passes. Even though it is not one of the brands that is listed in the manual - the manual is also a year and a half old and hasnt been updated in a long time. Ironically it also only lists the most expensive brands of memory on the market today which I know is not truly needed for this system. Even the website admits other brands will work. This memory has been fully tested and has proven to work - so the "flaky memory" concept does not hold alot of water with me here. So far I have had numerous issues with this build and every one of them the finger has been pointed towards memory and memory has not been an issue for a single one so far.

Sorry, my soap box is over there, just tired of same old excuses. I fully believe this to be as simple as a BIOS setting that is not quite right. I can Load Default Settings and reboot and the system will believe I am overclocking something. What could be overclocked in the default settings when running a 3200+, DDR 3200 400Mhz memory, a 9800 Pro 128MB video card? Not much in "default" would overclock any of that.

Yet, turning off the Promise Raid stuff fixed MOST of those issues. Now I get no errors with BIOS during boot, its all WINDOWS errors I am getting now. XP completed its install but with errors and now I cant get windows to load completely.

Want to blame that on flaky ram also?

Thank you,

Tex

Sounds like you don't need any help.

Good Luck Ace

Tex

dlove_rm

Hey all, I'm sorry, I need to apologize for my last post. I was getting ticked off after 4 days of building this machine and 3 motherboards and constantly hearing memory memory memory. I'm really sorry and I do appreciate all the help you all have given.

I wanted to give everyone a quick update and I will post something more extensive later. I found 2 things that I consider to just be wrong about the "Default BIOS" settings. #1 and most importantly to me, the Default turns on the RAID and Promise and Fasttrack settings. The problem with this is that if you are not running IDE, then Fasttrack (which does an IDE scan on the Promise IDE devices for Raid Arrays) cannot find ANYTHING. Also if you choose not to use RAID for your IDE devices it will error out as the PROMISE port is not in use and no arrays can be found. This has a default dump of not installing the BIOS. This is not a smart thing to do and these RAID settings should be turned OFF by default. RAID is a conscious decision a user should make at setup time and if they want it, then they should turn it on.

#2 was a more difficult one and it was (in all honesty) simulating a "flaky memory" situation. The HyperTransport settings has a memory / CPU Speed setting that by default is set to 800Mhz. I may be wrong (as I often find I am) but hello, is DDR PC6400 ready yet? I mean, 800Mhz DDR? Not DDR2 - dont have dual channel DDR on this MoBo as it doesnt support it, but DDR with a clock speed of 800Mhz is not an appropriate Default setting. I lowered this to the 400Mhz clock speed of the Memory and the machine was able to reboot, install windows, and be "perfect" for me all day. Those are the two main BIOS settings I recommend changing.

Now I changed many others, but mostly disabling COM ports, and on board audio and etc. Nothing else of consequence.

But again, I need to apologize for my previous post as frustrations were just driving me and I went off on the wrong people. For that, I am very sorry everyone.

I am happier now as my PC is up and running. I have a few more drivers to install as the Ethernet driver that shipped on the CD does not install. In fact it hangs the system and freezes it. So I am hopeful that ASUS or the Marvel company has new drivers for it. But that is the last of my worries. I need to install my Audigy2 drivers, but that should be no big deal.

Again, I am sorry one and all. But for the record, and I have to emphasize this, I am using something called "Advanced Memory" from the Advanced Memory Inc. and it is working just fine with the AMD64. All of my problems were BIOS related it seems. Now perhaps some other form of memory might have not forced these changes on, I cannot swear to this, but the BIOS seems to be the point of my problems today.

Again, (I keep saying that and not ending this already), thank you all for your help in the issues I have had.

Thank you,

Tex

OK and for the record I have four 64bit amd machines in my house running right now. Two dual opterons in fact. I have only done like 7 AMD64 systems though for friends or customers but I have built thousands of PC's in the last 20 years and I'm basing my advice on that cumulative knowledge.

I'm typing on a MSI neo via based AMD64 3200+ system with two sticks of 512mb pc3200 geil. And the advanced chipset section in my bios has setting for the hypertransport stuff (LDT STUFF)and its set to 800mhz and 16bit both ways. I think thats what your modifying but.....Thats what you want it to be with pc3200 hopefully. But there is a catch 22.

Others have had probs and had to back it down to 8bit one way or the other even with very expensive memory and mine isnt. Try keeping it on 800mhz but back it to 8bit one way or the other.....But with the memory controller on the chip there seems to be a huge variance of what works for one guy and even the exact same memory and cpu on the same motherboard and he can't run the same memory settings. Because each cpu is a tiny bit differant. This isnt a exact thing and every cpu varies a little also. Hopefully this gets gel'd out as the chipsets and cpu's become more mature.

I have a asus opteron system and if it uses the same ethernet driver I can send you that but I can't stress enough that you should almost never use whats on the included floppy's and cd's as they are out of date by the time it hits the streets.

Try the asus website always for the latest bios and drivers.

And ..... Nice to have you back and running dude! Gotta be a load of your back. I know it can be very frustrating at times.

Cheers!

Tex

dlove_rm

I have downloaded the drivers from Asus - same results - it just hangs the system during install.

I have downloaded the even MORE recent drivers from Yukon (the NIC manufacturer) and they have the same result - they just hang the system.

I have even broken the file down and gotten the INF and SYS files and tried just removing the device, letting XP detect it and then pointing to those files on floppy. It hung the system.

Ironically now, when I boot up, in safe mode it tells me the NIC is perfectly installed. In normal mode right now, I get a splash screen then I get no screen and the system just hangs there. This is WIERD.

Strange things they do a happen when ya build from scratch. I havent done this in a couple years, and now I know why.

Thanks,

Tex

Make sure you have APIC enabled and its set to version 1.4 if you have that option.

Either an IRQ or the address range is probably jacking with other cards or devices. Often you can get it going by removing other sound, video , usb etc... and booting clean to XP with the NIC disabled and then rebooting and ONE by ONE reinstalling the other devices. The NIC first obviously.

You may also have a setting to "clear escd" in the bios in the plug and play section usually and this tries to let the bios justle around the devices and the irq's etc.. before you boot. When things get screwy and you want to clean up old residue this is a great option. Just like clearing the bios with the jumper after you flash is a good decision

bionicatomicuk

I also have the Asus K8Vse deluxe except it is the wi-fi edition that it it includes the Asus wirless network card.
Otherwise the setup is as follows
Athlon 64 3200+ S754 1MB
2 x corsair 512mb DDR
2 x Seagate SATA 120gb HD's in raid 1 set up
Lite-on cd/cdrw writer
GeForce FX5700 DVI VO 256MB
Terratec DMX 6Fire 24/96 sound card with fron panel expansion box.
Win XP Pro fully updated

I had no problem getting XP loaded and the system ran fine until I tried to install the sound card. I disabled the on-board sound in the BIOS but the card jsut doesn't work at all in any of the PCI slots. The on-board sound is definitely disabled as I tried speakers in it and got nothing , than I enabled it in the BIOS and they worked OK. Disabled it in the BIOS again plugged the sound card in again but nothing. To prove the card was OK I put it in another PC I have and it worked fine. So the Asus board seems to be the problem. Have emailed Asus UK technical desk 3 times but had no response at all. What a surprise!

Has anyone got any ideas or should I ditch the board and get another. MSI seem to be producing good boards these days and the latest Platinum NEO board looks OK.

Help!
Bionicatomicuk

Jimborae

Which bios are you using? With the latest asus bios I cant use my scsi card in any of the pci slots as its not detected. I have to revert to an older bios in order for it to be detected.

Tex

With the memory issues you might also check shorty's thread about losing his love for socket754 or something like that as it had some key memory related info relating to changes in the steppings of the chips and how they reacted to differant cas levels in the memory spds. That making a couple manual over rides of the default settings was needed or a later stepping of the cpu with some memory.

Tex

dlove_rm

I actually had no issues getting my Audigy2 card setup. I had to find the original CD's as the downloaded drivers wouldnt find any SB cards in the system. But with the CD's - no problem at all setting up the Audigy2. Wow - first time I got to be the one saying no problem here.

I will be enabling the APIC (since I think it is turned off) and then trying the NIC install again. I hope that is all it is. I like for the simple stuff. But I am more afraid it is a conflict inside the system - and I am even more afraid it is a conflict with my ATI vid card. if so, the ATI stays.......we shall see.

Tex

APIC affects the HAL thats running on XP and you would need to install or do a repair install of XP to get the benefit.

Tex

dlove_rm

well the APIC was already turned on - I just enabled the 2.0 for it - but still the same results. I am just gonna go get a PCI NIC card today and plug it in and let it go I think. I have the old memory and motherboard to return to the store today anyway, some store credit and a new nic card and Keyboard and Mouse for me in exchange. Sounds like a winner to me.

Thank you,

Shorty

Im going to for the sake of clarity here.. point you towards this thread..:

http://www.short-media.com/forum/showthread.php?t=16520

I've been using A64 (Opteron & Athlon 64) since I tested an Opteron rig last May at MSI's headquarters in London. I even spoke and met an AMD rep at ECTS in September last year. Both times, I had long conversations over memory and it's effects in the A64 platform as a WHOLE. Im not making it up to find a weak point or to find an easy way out. It's that simple. The on-die controller is the most sensitive part of the whole shebang.

I bought my own Athlon 64 setup in January. When it just starting to emerge as a platform.

Regardless of if the memory passes memtest, it doesn't matter.

My TwinMOS memory passes memtest in the K8N and the Gigabyte boards.

Windows won't function or install on either board.

Trust me on this, I have a stick of 256mb Kingston here. That works in the K8N flawlessly. You do the math on this.

We are only here to share our experiences and suggest ways to help. That's what I've been attempting to do in both this thread and the other that I was replying to you in

bionicatomicuk

Jimborae wrote:

Which bios are you using? With the latest asus bios I cant use my scsi card in any of the pci slots as its not detected. I have to revert to an older bios in order for it to be detected.

I am away from home at the moment so I'll check theBIOS when I get back tomorrow. I should have added that Device manager recognises the card or at least says it is working properly. The drivers are Terratec's own from the CD supplied with the card.

Bionicatomicuk

Jimborae

bionicatomicuk wrote:

I am away from home at the moment so I'll check theBIOS when I get back tomorrow. I should have added that Device manager recognises the card or at least says it is working properly. The drivers are Terratec's own from the CD supplied with the card.

Bionicatomicuk

Well if its being shown device manager then it's probably not the bios more likely to be driver or irq related

bionicatomicuk

Re the BIOS question my BIOS says AMI BIOS 08 00 09 dated 9th Feb 2004. Strange that as the Asus web site says:-
v 1001 5th Feb 2004
V 1003 20th May 2004
Doesn't seem to tie up.

Have downloaded latest Terratec WDM driver but it makes no difference.
The sound card worked on my other PC which is basically
AMD 64 3000+
Gigabyte GA-K8VNXP board
otherwise same as new machine.
Itworked OK using the drivers supplied on the CD with the card.

Anyway I am going to try an MSI board which I have seen.
Bionicatomicuk

agentnic

Hello All! I wanted to add that I'm having the same issues and have almost the same exact setup as you guys. After the windows load screen, it just hangs. I've tried to disable the "Promise" Controller and I still get the same thing. I can't boot fine into safe mode, however anything else hangs my system.

lindstr0m1

My Computer
Asus K8V-SE Deluxe Motherboard
1GB RAM
AMD64 3200+ CPU
ATI Radeon A-I-W 9800 Pro Video Card

i hooked everything up but when i turn on my computer it will ether start up and show the amd athlon setup then it will just turn off after a minute or so not sure whats wrong my motherboard didnt come with onboard video card so i put my ATI Radeon in and it will only start up right once in awhile but then turn off again when it shows the screen if someone can help plz do!