G400 & MS 6167 - Green Garbage?

[osmanb]

Hi All,
I've posted about this before, and several times on AMD Zone. I've got the following setup:

MSI 6167 w/Athlon 500
SB Live!
Matrox G400 Millenium (Vanilla, not max)
3Com Fast Etherlink XL (3c905b)
IBM Deskstar 7200 RPM 13.5 GB HD

Ever since I got the machine (last November) I've had random hardware lockups, in one of three varieties:

1) Starting a D3D application, the system locks up, with looping sound and frozen screen. (UT, for example). Sometimes I can Ctrl-Alt-Del to reset, but usually I end up hitting the power switch.

2) During normal use (ie, using Netscape) the screen suddenly becomes a garbled mess of green lines and random pixels. Again, I usually have to hardware reset. This doesn't happen often, but when it does happen, it usually comes in spurts. (A few times a day, then not again for a week.) After rebooting from this situation, scandisk usually finds errors in the boot sector of the drive.

3) At boot, when Win98SE is about to load, I get a garbled mess much like the above, but based on the windows logo. This happens after having done nothing to my system, other than shutting it down normally. For these, I have to go run scanreg and restore an older "fixed" registry, even though that does nothing, since I can then re-restore the newer "broken" registry and everything works again. Sometimes, restoring doesn't help, and I have to try a few times before it boots. (This also led to my resintalling Win98.)

So, what I've tried thus far:
- People suspected my generic, 250w power supply. I'm now using an Antec PP303x.
- People suspected my generic PC100 128 MB RAM. I talked to my system vendor, and they sent me a different brand stick.
- I most recently tried forcing AGP1x, AGP2x, and disabling bus mastering. None of those worked. (Actually, they seemed to make it worse.)
- I've fiddled with the memory timings in BIOS, setting them to the least-aggressive options.
- Many people have suspected IRQ problems, and I have spent more time than I can count trying to get things in IRQ slots they'd like. Currently:
05 - SB16 Emulation
06 - Floppy controller
07 - ECP Printer port
08 - CMOS/Real time clock
09 - (Not listed in Win98) ACPI Controller
10 - IRQ Holder/AMD 756 PCI to USB
11 - IRQ Holder/SB Live!/3COM 3c905b
12 - IRQ Holder/Matrox G400

(I'm using a USB mouse, but I've also had a PS2 mouse.) Before anyone suggests it, there is NO way whatsoever to get these three cards to all occupy DIFFERENT, GOOD IRQs on this motherboard. The SB Live always steals 10 or 11 before the G400 can get it (even if I install just the G400 first, then add other cards). I've tried both PCI devices in EVERY combination in all the PCI slots. This is (sadly) the best arrangement of IRQs I can get. ACPI can not be turned off in BIOS (except in older revisions of the BIOS, where the option doesn't actually do anything, and still nothing will take IRQ 9.) Also, there is NO support whatsoever in BIOS for reserving IRQs for specific devices/slots.

I'm at my wits end. I've tried anything and everything I can to stop these irritating (and at times work-disrupting) problems, but to no avail. Does anyone have any more ideas? Could it still be RAM? Should I just toss the 6167 and get a better mobo? I bought the system complete, hopefully the vendor will cooperate with a more expensive solution, but I know there are people with this setup, and no problems. Help!?

-Brian

[Quicksilver]

osmanb writes:
<<So, what I've tried thus far:
- People suspected my generic, 250w power supply. I'm now using an Antec PP303x.>>

These are great PSUs...no problem here. PSU probs almost always include random reboots.

<<- People suspected my generic PC100 128 MB RAM. I talked to my system vendor, and they sent me a different brand stick.>>

Any idea what they gave you? Look at any IC on the DIMM and copy down everything. Should be about 3 lines of stuff.

<<- I most recently tried forcing AGP1x, AGP2x, and disabling bus mastering. None of those worked. (Actually, they seemed to make it worse.)>>

Noted. Good thing to try.

<<- I've fiddled with the memory timings in BIOS, setting them to the least-aggressive options.>>

Ditto.

<<- Many people have suspected IRQ problems, and I have spent more time than I can count trying to get things in IRQ slots they'd like.>>

What physical slots are your cards in? My 3COM 905 is on IRQ9, which appears to be the one you should aim for as well. Have you tried pulling both the 905b and the SB and reserving IRQ11 for ISA in your BIOS then reinstalling the NIC, reboot, check IRQ (hopefully 9), reboot, switch IRQ11 back to PCI? (Assuming the 6167 can...I'm running a K7Pro)

And to be honest, I think IRQ sharing is only responsible for the D3D lockup, if at all. I can tell you that a very similar setup runs great on a K7Pro.

Oh, and just to check...try reseating the G400. Make sure it is snug--sometimes this is the answer...

Report back with your findings. Sadly, these things are a tedious process of elimination.

g'luck!
--QS

[osmanb]

Thanks for the reply,

I have tried reseating the card (I spotted that a while ago in a similar thread.)

Counting away from the AGP slot (and starting at 1) my 3COM and SB Live are in 4 and 5 respectively. I did spend a while trying to get ANY card to take IRQ 9 under SOME circumstance, but I think it's a problem with the 6167. I can reserve IRQs for ISA, but that's it. And if I do that (ie strip it down to just the G400, then re-add cards) as soon as I put the SB Live back in, it takes over whatever the G400 had (usually 11) and kicks the G400 back onto 12 or 5.

I have never, in any configuration, had any device on 9 other than ACPI controller.

In fact, even when all devices but the G400 and SB Live were in, it still didn't get 10 or 11. The SB Live took one of them, and the USB controller (I think) took the other.

-Brian

PS: Just realized I forgot to mention the DIMMs. I'll rip the case open and let you know. (Thanks again!)

[This message has been edited by osmanb (edited 15 March 2000).]

[osmanb]

QS:
I just pulled the DIMM. I'm not sure what's what, but all the chips have the following markings:

---
9946 1-1
MT 48LC16M8A2
TG -10 8
---

And the board itself has 'B6786RC' on the opposite side. (It's a single sided DIMM). The vendor (Axis Systems) told me they use Hitachi, Samsung, and one other brand (can't remember) of RAM. Does this shed any light?

-Brian

[xippo@work]

I had the same problem but it went away when I did a hardware upgrade. I upgraded the case which had a 300 watt ps and the mainboard. Since you have changed the power supply which resulted with no success, I could only lead you in one direction, your mainboard. I am thinking that your mainboard might not be able to provide enough or correct power to your cards/cpu resulting in lockups. I was experiencing exactly the same problems as you are describing. And as you know, the green stipes/lockups happens only when you cold boot your computer system just as Windows has finished loading. This to me seems that it is a system power problem of some sort. And yes it would happen several times in a row, maybe locking as soon as the system started, or when you start UT, or even by starting Internet explorer.

I do know the problems you are going through and it seems that I am the only person that has made my way through it. I like you did everything immaginable to resolve it. It just so happened that when I upgraded the problem went away (now about 3 months).

The mobo I was using was a Soyo SY6BA+ and I switched to a Abit BE6-II. The Soyo mainboard by no means is a shoddy board (I am using about a dozen of them here at work) but I have had no problems since I did the upgrade. I am now using the board in another system with no problems (but not with a G400 card in it).

I hope this helps in some way.

Good luck.

xippo

[This message has been edited by xippo@work (edited 15 March 2000).]

[xippo@work]

Just to add.

It won't be memory problems. When I was trying to fix the lockups, I did switch the memory with sticks from work - no success.

Reloading windows fresh from a reformatted hard disk - no success. Memory timings, agp port settings, irq settings, driver loads and reloads, bios flashing, card reseating and shuffling - no success. I tried it all.

I however never did get your problem #3, on the windows logo screen. But otherwise everthing that your describing, I went through. What can I say, maybe I got lucky when I upgraded but it hasn't happened since.

xippo

[osmanb]

Hmmm. Thanks for the info. I don't know how likely it is, but I'll look into getting Axis to replace my mobo with something else. (Though I'm not sure which of the K7 boards I'd want right now...) Thanks again.

-Brian

[osmanb]

Hi,
I was just re-reading you reply, xippo. You said that you only had the problem after a cold boot, once windows was done loading? Actually, mine goes green after I've been using it for hours sometimes. It's quite random. And then, on subsequent warm reboots, it will continue to happen. I'm so confused...

-Brian

[xippo@work]

Oh boy. Now you got me confused too. I thought we were having the exact same problems. Well then I would take my advice with a grain of salt.

The more I think about it, it definitely may of happened while my puter was running for a while. I do remember that within the last month of the problem happening that all my lockups were happening only on cold boots; but you got me thinking now. I do remember my puter locking lots of times in the middle of Lan game parties, but I don't remember if it was the green stripe problem or something else. I least from what I can remember my system did lockup or crash quite a bit more often before I did the upgrade. Just randoms lockups in UT and Q3A game crashes for no reason. My puter is extremely stable now.

It still could stand to reason that a poor mainboard component might be causing your problems. I have read way too many articles on why not to purchase a cheap mainboard because of the components used in them. Not saying that your mainboard isn't good quality, but one somewhat faulty capacitor could make a difference. Today's cpu's put alot more strain on the mainboard for power requirements.

I don't know what to say now.

I hope you find your solution. I know how frustrated you must be.

Good luck.
xippo




[This message has been edited by xippo@work (edited 17 March 2000).]

[osmanb]

Yeah,
I just got e-mail from someone that had a near identical setup from the same vendor. They had the EXACT same problem, and called the vendor, who is now using FIC SD11 boards instead of MSI 6167s. Apparently, they will RMA the board, so I'm going to try and get a new (different brand) board. Thanks again for all your help...

-Brian

[xippo]

Hey, sounds good. I hope everything works out.

xippo

[Quicksilver]

Oh no. Sorry I didn't get a chance to contribute again, but hopefully this warning will get to you in time: Avoid the FIC!!! I have had many, many problems with all I've come actoss.

If you aren't too burnt on MSI, the K7Pro [MS-6165] is a great board. Very stable. And if you're lucky, overclockable.

If you haven't already, visit the <a href="http://amdzone.pcstats.com/categories.cfm?catid=2">AMD Motherboards</a> forum at AMDZone. Tons of real-world info over there.

Best of luck.

[andrei]

But if you get the FIC SD11, be sure to take the 1.8 revision . You can't do bios overclocking on it though.

It's funny, but this is the only board reccomended by AMD for the 850, 900, 950 and 1000 MHz Athlon.

AMD Athlon™ Processor Recommended Motherboards

Or you could always get a board with the KX133 chipset

[osmanb]

Thanks for the extra info. I haven't talked to my vendor in person yet, and nothing has been done, so I'm still open to suggestion. I don't really care about OCing anything, I just want my system to run stable (I've got a 500).

I'd REALLY like one of the new KX133 boards, but I doubt that my vendor will do the swap... If they even have any. If they did, I'd probably be willing to pay extra to swap for one... Oh well. I can hope.

One of my biggest problems with the MSI6167 is the lack of IRQ controlling options in the BIOS. There is essentially no control over what IRQs go to which slots, which makes getting a good IRQ for the G400 impossible. I'd only go with another MSI board if I thought that would no longer be true...

Thanks again for the advice,
-Brian

[Wombat]

osman,
It's not impossible, just tricky. If your G400 ends up on IRQ4 (like mine was) or such, then change that interrupt in the BIOS from PCI/PnP to Legacy ISA. Then the G400 can't land there. Now mine it on IRQ9.

-Wombat


------------------
MSI-6167 w/ Athlon 500@750 (thx Greebe!), 128MB Crucial PC133, G400MAX,SBLive!-MP3,Pioneer 10x DVD, Phillips CD-R, a hard drive or two, and a Sony 420GS. Running RH6.1, and Win98 (when I have to).