Soltek SL-75DRV5 issues

Trying to set up new comp:

SL-75DRV5
XP 2100+
SCSI 10krpm Fujitsu HD
Corsair 256mb ddr PC-3000


Keep getting the blue screen of death every few minutes, followed be restarting.

New problem: I enabled the cpu fan autoshutdown and set it for 400rpm. Now it wont allow the system to start. It runs for 3 sec, then beeps and shutsdown. Is my cpu fan too slow? Its the same fan and heatsink that came with the chip.

Help

most fans run at speeds of 4000 rpm to 7000 rpm, if you set it for 400 then the comp will shut off everytime the fan hits 400 rpm. i only see 2 ways outta that.

one) set the reset CMOS jumper to clear out your CMOS, then move it back and start up the comp.

two) connect the cpu fan to a different header or a 3 pin to four pin molex then boot the system and disable that feature.

a couple of questions about the blue screens, was that an empty hard drive when you put it in that system (i mean did you do a fresh install of windows after you hooked up that system). is that system overclocked..what is the fsb? what are your temps/voltages (mainly the cpu temp and the vcore and +5V voltages, that should be in the BIOS)

I tried to hook the fan to different lead, but it didnt work, but i did clear the cmos and its working again. Still getting the bluescreen. Yes it was a new/empty hard drive. SCSI Fujitsu and a Tekram DC-390U2W controller card. The temps in bios were low and I havent tried to overclock it yet. Ill look in the BIOS when i get off work.

well its good that you can at least boot it again, post back with your temps and voltages when you get the chance. as i said before it is mainly the +5v and the cpu vcore that are of importance, you said the temps are low... as long as you are under 45c idle then its probably not the temps that are causing the BSOD.

Temp1 cpu 46c
temp2 55c
cpu fan no read
system fan 3571 rpm
cpu Vcore 1.72V
DDR DIMM 2.42V
3.3V 3.24V
+5V 4.9V
+12V 12.48V
-12V -11.86V
-5v - 5.15V
5VSB 4.94V
Voltage Batt 3.11v

ok your voltages seem just fine, they shouldn't be an issue. but the temps could very well be the cause 46c is a little hot for the cpu, once you start doing stuff on the comp it could easily hit 50c or more, which can cause instability. try to run the computer with the case open to lower the temps and see if that makes it more stable. If it does then consider getting a new heatsink/fan for the cpu and/or some case fans, the first case fan should suck hot air out.

If that doesnt help then normally i would suggest to raise the Vcore to 1.775V but given your temp that would be a pretty big risk (raising the Vcore will raise your temps quit a bit). you could try lowering th Vcore to 1.725V and if that doesnt help try 1.7V, there have been a few cases where lowering the Vcore actually helped give stability.

did you use the thermal sesnor thing that came with your board (the wire that you plug into the motherboard and tape the other end to whatever you want to check temps)? Im just wondering why it says 55c.

do you have any case fans to suck out the hot air? what kind of heatsink and fan do you have on your processor? did you use arctic silver 3 thermal compound on the cpu/heatsink when you put it on?

Those temps are with the case open, i have one intake case fan downlow and two exhaust up top. I havent connected the extra thermal sensor to anything yet, I thought it was the 3rd. The fan and heatsink are the ones that came with the chip (xp 2100+) and i did use a thermal compound. I am going to try using a new BIOS that is available. Soltek answered my email and suggested doing that, so ill give that a try after work. I may buy a new fan and heatsink today if i have the time. Thanks for the help

The DRV5 comes with only 2 onboard sensor. A separate sensor is not included, AFAIK, due to ABSII being present.

One thing I would try is to back off the memory to 133 instead of 166. Lots of issues coming up with 166 mem speeds.

I personally run at 46 idle and 54 full load in the summer. Can't be helped, Ambient temps are about 37-38.

Sang

i bought a new fan and heatsink, and it is running 44 idle and the fan turns at just under 5,000rpm. Soltek emailed me back and said that their is a typo in the manual, and the correct fan switch for the cpu fan is Fan2 not Fan1.
Thanks for the memory speed info , ill try that as soon as I flash the new BIOS.
Im haveing troubles flashing a new BIOS on my new system, Soltek 75DRV5 with XP home. I tried flashing by putting the new BIOS and the flash utility on a formatted disk, then putting it into the floppy and starting the comp, but it isnt picking it up (i have set my floppy drive to be read 1st) i am just getting the "non system disk" message. I then read Doc's article on how to flash with getting a headache (too late), and made a start disk, however i couldnt find the "create a start disk" in the XP home OS, so i made it whith the ME OS on this computer, then added the the BIOS and flash utility to the disk and put that in and restarted. That seemed to be working, up untill i got a error message "not enough room on disk" or something like that. I read in Doc's article that there are 3 files that can be deleted from the floppy prior to using it, but i only saw one i could delete, and did, but i guess it wasnt enough.

Please Help

If you were running at 166 FSB then that CPU would have been heavily overclocked and the likely cause for the blue screens, adding more Vcore would have made the CPU more stable but would raise the temps a lot. that would probably also account for the high CPU temps (mine is an xp1800 (1540mhz) OC'd to 1730 @1.85 Vcore and only 40c idle/46ish load).

First off, just for future needs to make a start up disk in XP just pop a blank disk in, double click "my computer", right click on drive a: and select format. then a little window pops up, first format the disk then check the box that says "create a MS DOS start up disk" but win ME start up disks are better they have Fdisk and stuff winXP doesnt.

for flashing the BIOS you should have enough space if it is a 1.44 meg disk, I have both my new and old BIOS, the awdflash.exe utility and ALL of the MS DOS start up files. maybe the disk was write protected? I would start from scratch, create a new start up disk, copy the awdflash.exe file and the xxxxdrvxx.bin BIOS file to the disk.

boot from the disk and type awdflash.exe xxxxdrvxx.bin (where the xxxxdrvxx.bin is the name of the new BIOS). then, if memory serves, it will say something about backing up the old BIOS, say yes and give it a file name like old.bin. then it will say something like ok to flash, again type yes and wait untill its done. that should be all you have to do and it should work just fine. If you still have problems please post back and we will try to help.

I tried it just as you desrcibed, but i kept getting "Message: Sourcefile not found. It would appear after it asked what I wanted to name the old BIOS, I would hit return after enting a name for the old BIOS and after a few secounds, i get the "Message:sourcefile not found.
I tried it some 10 times, always the same response. I tried a previously released (older bios version 11) but again same result.

It doesnt look like anyfiles in the bios update need to be unzipped that i can see. And i tried start up disk with ME, then XP. Same response.
And I also tried two or three different floppys
Help

well i just looked at my BIOS disk (my 3.5") and the old BIOS has the full name (75drv4-k4) and i kinda remembered having some trouble flashing. i think its saying source file not found because it cannot find the BIOS old.bin (if thats what you called it), try to typr the whole name of the old BIOS. the old BIOS should follow the same naming convention (ie 75drv5-1) to find the number after the - just look for something like "bios revision 1" when you boot up your comp. since it goes to fast to read just push the Pause/Break key on your keyboard, that will pause the POST screen, when you want the post to continue push any key.

I think that is the problem as i wouldnt have specifically named my old bios to 75drv4-k1 unless i had to, try typing 75drv5-11.bin and if that doesnt work try it without the .bin, dont be affraid to try stuff while backing up the old BIOS (ie try 75drv5-1, 75drv5-11) because simply backing up the old bios wont cause any problems. when you go to actually flash the bios you want to make sure you do it all right, as a problem there will cause your system to not POST/boot (BTW if something did go wrong first try the clear CMOS jumper, if that didnt help just unplug the comp then pull out the battery and clear the CMOS, then replace the battery and you should be back to your original BIOS).

you can also flash the BIOS without backing up the old one but then you dont have anything to fall back on if there is something wrong with the new BIOS, so i wouldnt reccomend that (although what i said above about pulling the batt ect. should revert you to your original BIOS but you dont want to place the future of your comp in the hands of a "should"). I hope that giving your old BIOS the real name will help, if not then I guess you should email soltek and/or post the problem in a more popular area of these forums so you can get more people's advice (perhaps the AMD motherboards section, this "other motherboards" doesnt get very many views). of course I will try to help if you post back here... let me know how it goes.

The motherboard DOES come with a thermal probe (thin type). I think that is what he was referring to.

Trying what your prescribed, now have new message: The program file's BIOS-Lock String does not match with your system!

any clue?
thanks for your help

OK NM it finally flashed. I did the same thing I had done 5 times previously and it decided to flash this time.
oh well. at least thats done, Ill keep you posted

Damn still with the blue screen!!! going to reinstall drivers

Newbie_Doo said:

The motherboard DOES come with a thermal probe (thin type). I think that is what he was referring to.

Click to expand...

yeah thats what i was talking about.

what FSB are you running at? my board's default was 100, i had to change the dip switches to make it to 133, I dont know about your board it might have been factory set to 166. check in the bios, if you are at 166 then thats the reason for the blue screens.

if you are at 133 then play with the cpu core voltage (Vcore), try to lower it a little first and see if that helps. if it doesnt try to raise it BUT keep a close eye on your temps.

if you are at 166 raising the Vcore will probably get rid of the blue screens but you will probably have to raise it a lot to make it stable and that will take your cpu temp up a lot, probably too much. i would just try running the board at 133 to see if it gets rid of the blue screens

OK, I reinstalled drivers, still got blue screen. My FSB was and still is set at 133. I changed the multiplier dipswitch Dip one from 10.5x to 12.5x (im running a xp 2100+), but i still got a blue screen. I just changed the Vcor setting to 1.70v, it was on default at 1.72v. So far so good, no blue screen, but it has only been 3 minutes since i changed it. But this is as long as ive gone without seeing the cursed BS. This computer sure is fast though, cant wait untill its stable.

How can I be sure that the BIOS flash worked? It appeared to finally work, but i dont see where it says what version it is during the start up screens. The only thing i see that might be it is "T1.1" I hope thats not it, because that is what it said prior to flashing the new BIOS. Is there another way to be sure the BIOS is the new one?

Just got Blued again, i guess ill try raising the Vcore. Its when i try to download a file off the internet that im sure to get the blue screen, but it pops up other times too.

I raised the Vcore in the Bios/frequency/voltage controll to 1.775v but in the SmartDoc anti-burn shield screen it reads the [email protected] ? Anyway stlill getting blued. Need to walk away for a bit before i do something i regret.