G400 Lock up problems

[Skywalker]

All,
I've got the OEM version of the 16MB G400 (non max). After rebuilding my PC, installing the drivers from the CD and DX6.1 etc etc the system locks up after 10-20 mins play of games. All is fine when running apps, just when playing games.

Dell Dimension XPS P2/300, 128Meg Dell RAM, 8GBB IBM HDD, G400, SBLive! with V2.1 Liveware.

Until the rebuild last Friday, I had a 32meg Savage4 card and no lock ups at all.

If anyone can help it would be much appreciated!

thanks

Skywalker

[Phil MURC]

uh oh...
.
rumour had it that there were a number of OEM boards being produced from 'stolen' G400 chips. Maybe one of those has filtered it's way through to you?

There again - that's a little bit presumptious - but I know of no 'lockup' problems at all on G400's so far - anybody else?

What game/app does this happen in and is it totally time related? If you instantly reset your machine - does it work for another 20mins (this would discount heat as a problem) or do the problems compound?

There's some clever people hang around in here - give them more info and you may get a result (one way or another)



------------------
Phil (MURC's G200 : WWW.G200.COM)

[Markus Selchow]

Could be the harddrive ... what model is it ?

------------------
Cheers,
Maggi

Asus P2B-S @ 112MHz FSB * Celeron300A @ 504MHz
Heavily boosted by the Millenium G400 32MB SGRAM DualHead

[Skywalker]

Guys,

Thanks for your replies. The initial games are Rollcage and Dungeon Keeper2. An interesting thing is that if I tell either game to use 32bit colour, they lock up a lot sooner.

The card is pretty cool to touch, not even warm to be honest.

Hope to god it's not the stolen chip syndrome as I've now tried out 5 of the Next Gen graphics cards. The Xentor TNT2 locked up my PC as well. The CL savage4 did not however, but it was nowhere near as good as the G400.

I DO know that I have an LX chipset, not sure of the exact HDD model, I'll check tonight.

[enKoDed]

Hi Skywalker. Another thing to make sure of is that you have the latest Dell BIOS for your motherboard. A09 is the latest, and can be obtained from the www.dell.com web site. It has been rumoured that the A09 has better (proper) support for AGP x2. It's worth checking out.

[paulcs]

Your LX chipset may be the cause of your problems. Apparently, the board isn't supplying enough power to the AGP slot. This is a known problem with early implementations of the chipset, and the fix is ugly. Asus's solution involves soldering.

Some motherboard manufacturers have agreed to repair the board, although this involves going without a motherboard for a few weeks.

If this is your problem, you might want to consider upgrading to a BX board.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[Skywalker]

I've been using the A09 BIOS for quite a while now.

I can't afford to upgrade the motherboard, what a pain in the LX!