(originally posted in Intel Abit thread...)
I've been running an Abit BD7II-RAID and P4 1.6a @ 2.4 ghz since June with no problems. I have it wirewrapped and the core voltage is reported as about 1.69 V. Just a few days ago, I started getting lots of instability, and now most of the time XP won't even boot. If I run at 2.1 ghz, Prime95 crashes after a few iterations. Sometimes it's a bluescreen and sometimes it's a reboot. The only way I can get XP to boot and run Prime95 stable is running it at 1.6 ghz (well, maybe slightly higher but its not worth talking about). I tried increasing the VCore but that just made my CMOS lose my CPU settings. Lowering it didn't really help either.
I am using a generic 250W power supply. I've measured the voltage of the power supply straight from the MOLEX connectors with a DMM. When idle, my 5V rail is at 5.1V and my 12V is at around 11.9V. When running Prime95 at 2.1ghz (before it fails) my 5V is at 5.1V and very stable while my 12V rail is at about 11.75-11.8V. I can't measure my 3.3V rail directly but Hardware Monitor tells me it's about 3.18-3.20V. These all seem to be reasonable voltages..
My memory is 512 megs (2x256) of Corsair XMS3000. I recently upgraded from one 256 meg module. Thinking this might be the problem, I tried slowing down the memory, removing a module, moving slots etc, but that didn't help.
Other hardware I have a single 5400 rpm HD, a GeForce 2 which is non-overclocked, a Santa Cruz, and a NIC.
So, I would jump the gun and say it's the power supply, but my voltage readouts seem pretty good.
I tried upgrading to the latest BD7II BIOS but that didn't do much. Also I'm running a fresh install of XP.
I don't think it's temperature related because I reapplied the silver thermal grease on my retail HSF. Also, after I started having stability problems, I pulled my case off and have a panaflo blowing right on the heatsink, and it's cool to the touch yet not any more stable than with my case on.
I haven't added anything to my machine recently that would cause it to suck any more power, except 256 megs of memory, but like I said, I tried removing / moving around some of the memory and that didn't help.
Any tips or suggestions would be much appreciated! Otherwise I might head over to Best Buy and get an Antec 330W TruePower to see if that fixes my problem. And hope they have a good return policy in case it doesn't!
I've been running an Abit BD7II-RAID and P4 1.6a @ 2.4 ghz since June with no problems. I have it wirewrapped and the core voltage is reported as about 1.69 V. Just a few days ago, I started getting lots of instability, and now most of the time XP won't even boot. If I run at 2.1 ghz, Prime95 crashes after a few iterations. Sometimes it's a bluescreen and sometimes it's a reboot. The only way I can get XP to boot and run Prime95 stable is running it at 1.6 ghz (well, maybe slightly higher but its not worth talking about). I tried increasing the VCore but that just made my CMOS lose my CPU settings. Lowering it didn't really help either.
I am using a generic 250W power supply. I've measured the voltage of the power supply straight from the MOLEX connectors with a DMM. When idle, my 5V rail is at 5.1V and my 12V is at around 11.9V. When running Prime95 at 2.1ghz (before it fails) my 5V is at 5.1V and very stable while my 12V rail is at about 11.75-11.8V. I can't measure my 3.3V rail directly but Hardware Monitor tells me it's about 3.18-3.20V. These all seem to be reasonable voltages..
My memory is 512 megs (2x256) of Corsair XMS3000. I recently upgraded from one 256 meg module. Thinking this might be the problem, I tried slowing down the memory, removing a module, moving slots etc, but that didn't help.
Other hardware I have a single 5400 rpm HD, a GeForce 2 which is non-overclocked, a Santa Cruz, and a NIC.
So, I would jump the gun and say it's the power supply, but my voltage readouts seem pretty good.
I tried upgrading to the latest BD7II BIOS but that didn't do much. Also I'm running a fresh install of XP.
I don't think it's temperature related because I reapplied the silver thermal grease on my retail HSF. Also, after I started having stability problems, I pulled my case off and have a panaflo blowing right on the heatsink, and it's cool to the touch yet not any more stable than with my case on.
I haven't added anything to my machine recently that would cause it to suck any more power, except 256 megs of memory, but like I said, I tried removing / moving around some of the memory and that didn't help.
Any tips or suggestions would be much appreciated! Otherwise I might head over to Best Buy and get an Antec 330W TruePower to see if that fixes my problem. And hope they have a good return policy in case it doesn't!
