CPU causes RAM problems?

I upgraded from an Athlon XP 2100+ to an Athlon XP 2700+, and I was having serious trouble with random restarts and "serious error recovery" messages. After running chdsk and several other utilities, I came to the conclusion that it was possiblu the ram (which is three pc2700 333mhz 512 ddr (1.5g total)).

ASUS A7V333 MoBo BIOS 1017 400W power supply.

After running a memory test program. I removed the RAM in one of the slots (leaving 1G in) and the problem seemed to go away, and memtest didn't report any more errors. I mixed and matched the ram to make sure it just wasn't one bad stick, but it always worked fine with only 2, and always had errors with 3, no matter what the configuration was.

so the only conclusion that I can draw right now is that there is some compatability error with over 1g or RAM. I have been all over the web all day long and have not come up with a definate answer. I've read things from voltage boosting to different slot usage, to memtest errors. Any help? Thank you very much!

I think I found my problem. (posted on anandtech.com)


"Unfortunately here is also where we ran into the first problem with the A7V333; the board will not work with Kingston's DDR333 ValueRam at DDR333 speeds, though the same memory worked fine in all other motherboards. We've brought up the issue with ASUS but have not received an answer yet. We're not sure whether the problem is related to Kingston or ASUS at this point; seeing as how the memory worked fine in every other motherboard we're betting the blame is with ASUS for this one. The board worked just fine with all of the other DDR333 memory we tested."

i haven't gotten different memory yet, but that is almost certainly the problem.

but if anyone knows anything else that might be the problem, PLEASE let me know

whats you 2700+ FSB?? are you giving your RAM max Vdimm???Divider?

the CPU has a 333 FSB. i'm not really memory savy enough to reply to your vdimm/divider question. feel free to explain if you like, i'm all ears.

dont worry...givig your RAM max doesnt hurt at all..as a matter a fact everyone puts their mem at max vdimm just incase of OC or they OC'd it so there isnt any probs..2.85-2.9 shouldnt hurt anything...and what i meant by divider is is it running like at 1:1 which is in sync with the CPU or 5:4 or 3:2 which run async....mayb its listed in your BIOS as DRAM Freq. [Auto] and in that it says 400 333 266...u wanna use 400

in the BIOS the divider is at 1:1, but there is no other option (that I can tell). CPU frequency is 166/33 and CPU multiple is 13.0x. I'm not sure how to adjust the vdimm. Is that done in BIOS as well? sorry for the basic questions, this is unfamiliar territory for me.

yes and that should be listed in the bios as well in the same location as the divider but i forgot the name of it but find an option with 2.8 or 2.85 as your max voltage and that should be your vdimm

I checked the BIOS, but found no place to change voltage for anything except the cpu. and that was 1.65-1.85v. I believe my MoBo needs to be changed through the jumpers.

well im not familiar with that particular board but i assume the bios layout is quite similar to the newer boards