IWill KA-266R problems / help...

[reberry]

A friend just got the IWill KA-266R and I am helping him set it up. The only problem: It won't boot.

We have the KA-266R with 128 Meg PC 2100 from Mushkin pluged in. The cpu and heatsink/fan are attached just fine as is the Video Card. I have all the connectors (power, reset ...) connected with a hard drive and floppy hooked up right.

Power on... A green light comes on in the motherboard, the heatsink fan starts spinning, the floppy light goes on (does not go off) and the HDD makes a few cycles just because it was powered on. (If I remove the IDE cable, it does the exact same thing.)

The problem: Nothing comes up on the monitor. Just the usual "Monitor working, check the computer and video cable." I have the hard drive set to master on IDE0, and can't think of anything.

Any ideas?

I have also played with the jumper settings for raid, CPU FSB, and so on with no luck.

The two things I am currently thinking...

1.) I have noticed that the reset button does not do anything. I have checked the connection a hundred times and it is on the right pins. Might this stop the machine from going further?

2.) In the user manual it says: "KA-266 / KA-266R only support synchronous CPU & memory speed." This could be our problem. First, the Thunderbird is only 200 FSB. As for the Memory, well it is PC2100 which is 266 FSB. So I throw an unlocked processor in the motherboard, and get the same thing. Sure I could set the ratio jumper to 8.5, but it is not like this will give us a FSB of 133 for the processor. This I have to change in BIOS.... I think this could be the problem, but who knows!

Rebies

 

[DamnFast]

It seems like you have a connection problem on many places. One example is your floppy drive. If your floppy drives light is on all the time, that means you have connected the floppy drive cable backwards. Try flipping it over and see if it works. (Most of the times, the red line side should be located towards the inside of the case unlike the IDE drives cables.)
And your front panel switch cables might be connected inpropoerly. Teh reset button should work if it is connected properly.
Another possible causes are : 1) Is the power supply sufficient enough for AMD system? (i.e. 300Watts) 2) Did you try booting the computer in the factory default setting? (All the multipliers on auto for Multipliers and FSB. 3) Did you install the AGP videoo card properly? Check if the card did not go all the way down(in the AGP slot)
Try all these and if it still won't boot then contact Iwill technical support.
I have the exact same board and have no problem what so ever on this magnificent mobo.

Good luck

 

[Metaxas]

I feel your pain. I just bought an Iwill KA-266R also. Having trouble with it too. But i've found the prob with mine..dead ram. If it won't post at all, BE SURE to check to make sure your ram is seated ALL THE WAY IN. This board is REAL picky about that. As far as the synchronis (sp?) thing goes...no way, other wise my crap would have never booted period. Just lower the multipler and crank up the FSB in the Iwill smart settings menu to 133. Hope mushkin ram is better then corsair...cause I got screwed...corsair memory sucks my arse. It will NOT do CAS 2 what so ever, and NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER EVER put the Dram performance on anything higher then Normal, because you WILL most likely FRY it. I can't be sure but I think that may have at least contributed to the premature death of my new rig. Ram is dead, so I got it RMA'ed and going to send it off tommorrow overnight express. As far as the reset button goes, from what I can gather, it will not function, unless the board actually posts. Make sure that the bios clear jumper block (JP1) is on pins 1 and 2 - NOT 2 and 3. If your using raid, the jumper block to the right of JP1 should be on pins 1 and 2, - no raid, 2 and 3. HDD's should be plugged into EXT_IDE0 and 1. I don't know why this is, but it is. Hope that helps man...like I said...I feel your pain.

Oh yeah, and make DAMN sure that the pins for the front panel are COMPLETLY connected, that can really mess things up too.

 

[DamnFast]

well....seems like some problems with memory eh?
How much did you guys paid for tose PC2100 DDR RAM modules?
I did mention that my PC1600 Crucial memory is running very stable at CAS2 and FSB at 133MHz. You guys should have just purchased the Crucial memory. Although they are PC1600, they rock. It's very cheap too. You can get 128MB module for less than 75 bux with free 2nd day UPS shipping free.
Well, I don't think it will help since you guys have already bought one. I've heard that those Corsair and Mushkins are very good performers. So I read in some reviews.
Anyways, good luck with your new system.

 

[Nagorak]

PC2100 DDR (and possibly 1600 too?) is rated only to Cas 2.5. I believe it has higher latency than SDRAM but more throughput. Anyway, that might explain why you can't get it to do 2. 2.5 should be fine under normal circumstances and it is still way better than CAS 2 PC133 or PC150 SDRAM. I don't really know much more about the subject than that