Hey all, this is my first post. I'll try to make it good. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

So, I have this computer. The specs read out like this:

Soyo K7ADA MoBo
Athlon T-Bird 1400 CPU (running at default speed...I let the Mobo autodetect voltage, FSB speed, multipliers)
256 MB DDR
GeForce 2 Ti (AGP)
SoundBlaster Live!
16x DVD-ROM
300w power supply

The aforementioned computer runs well most of the time...unless I start playing games with it. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif Then it becomes very crashy...I get invalid page faults, I get errors in various .dll files, sometimes I get errors in the game executable itself. It does not seem to happen at any one time or another...sometimes I can only play for a few minutes, sometimes for 45 min - 1 hr. plus. This is with a variety of games (I've even installed old games I don't play anymore to see if they'll work)!

I recently did a HDD format and clean install (oops, forgot to mention I'm using Windows Me for an OS). I have very little running in the background...the computer crashes even when only Explorer and Systray are running. I also added another case fan which dropped CPU temps 10-15 degrees Farenheit(FWIW, the CPU usually hovers between 110-120, occasional peaks of 125). Voltage is usually 1.73...the posted voltage requirement is 1.75...I don't think that's enough of a difference to be problematic...is it?

I have all the latest drivers, BIOS updates, etc. Is this a heat related issue? That's the only semi-reasonable answer I've come up with so far. Should I try setting my Mobo manually? I hope I've provided enough info to establish a pattern...but please ask if there's something else that could help narrow it down. TIA!

this isn't what you want to hear, but maybe a system as nice as that deserves a real operating system..

winXP?

Welcome to PcGuide!

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

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sea1_69@hotmail.com

homepage (http://www.seanweb1.homestead.com/index.html)

[This message has been edited by sea69 (edited 04-27-2002).]

(blushes) Thanks! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

Y'know, I'd been thinking about XP....I know Me is a raging POS...oddly enuff, it runs OK on my old PC. You just have to restart every few hours. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/tongue.gif

heh...

tell you what- I absolutely dread having to do much of anything with win9x... winME is even worse (in my personal experience), and I was reminded of that just (2) days ago when I needed to get something done in a certain amount of time on a win98se machine.

was quickly reminded of all that I do NOT miss in those operating systems!


have kinda taken for granted how good it feels to be able to do anything I want, all the time.


no crashes/freezes/reboots every 15 minutes..


http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

How's hardware/software compatibility with XP? I've heard some mixed reports, that's the only thing that's made me hesitate...

I had little to no problems at all :

this (http://shop.store.yahoo.com/compusavers/compres7ap.html) is similiar configuration as my pc, which I had to only update a couple drivers.

Your machine is much more up to date.

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

Kewl, thanks. Guess I have to cough up for XP now. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

JT

ME has crash-itis unless it gets fed about a gazzillion
MB's of RAM. Resource piggie.

Then continues to do so for spite.

sea...
Be kind Budro. I still like 98SE for the O/C end.

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

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....How long is a minute... depends on which side of the Bathroom door you're on. ......
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[This message has been edited by ranchdog (edited 04-28-2002).]

jt,

Also, check into a larger wattage power supply module. Your 300W unit may be a little on the weak side for your system, especially if the '3.3V + 5.0V' rating is less than 180 watts.

A gazillion...hm, OK, who has the best prices on gazillion MB RAM sticks? http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/tongue.gif

Maybe that's why my old PC works OK with ME...448 MB of SDRAM, baby! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/eek.gif

Originally posted by ski:
jt,

Also, check into a larger wattage power supply module. Your 300W unit may be a little on the weak side for your system, especially if the '3.3V + 5.0V' rating is less than 180 watts.

Really? I wouldn't have thought so, considering I don't have much in the system...but thanks, I'll take a look.

ranchdog, my friend- I didn't mean to upset ya..hehe

win98se has it's uses, just as DOS does!

just was thinking he may want to get completely out of the win9x/me category.. and that means onward and upwards...

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

jt,

Your Athlon 1400 CPU consumes a lot of watts.
AMD may recommend a minimum 300 watt PSM for your CPU, but a 350-400 watt unit is better suited to handle your system's power needs.
A 180 watt rating for the PSM's '3.3V + 5.0V' is minimum, shoot for a 220 watt rating.

I guess so!

OK, correct me if I'm wrong here...the sticker on the PSM says I get 30A @ 5v, and 14A @ 3.3v. So, the 3.3 + 5.0 rating is these two figures added together (making 196.2w). Please don't flame me too much if I'm completely wrong, I'm still very much a n00b when it comes to PSMs. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

I did notice that VIN 5v comes up a little low at 4.86v, according to ALi Hardware monitor....

Yep, you Math looks pretty good.....so you got that covered and the 4.86V is with in spec, (within 5% of stated output, so you can go from 4.75 to 5.25V and still be ok)

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mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

Good, good. Hooray for logic!

Well, it's probably my crappy OS then. I'm still going to look into a bigger PSM...you never know. Headroom is always good, too. Thanks, everyone! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

Actually, a power supply's '3.3V + 5.0V' watt rating will be less than the simple sum of the separate 3.3V and 5.0V watt ratings.
There should be a separate watt rating for '3.3V + 5.0V'(or '3.3V & 5.0V') somewhere on your PS's label.
I have a 430 watt Enermax PS that's rated for 38A at 3.3V(125.4W) and 44A at 5.0V(220W), or 345.4W total. But the '3.3V + 5.0V' rating is only 220W.
That means if the 5.0V components are maxed out at 44A(220W), then there's nothing left for the 3.3V components, and the system will become unstable or crash.
Similarly, if the 3.3V items max out at 38A(125.4W), then there is only 94.6W available for the 5.0V items.

It looks to me like Enermax (and probably most others) are taking the 3.3V from the 5V leg (so the max of both is going to be the max of the 5V leg)...so yes in that case what ski said is true. If there was a truly separate leg for the 3.3V then yes the way we did it would work...I guess there is really no substitute for looking at the spec sheets! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

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mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

hrm...I didn't see a 3.3 + 5.0 spec on my PSM (all I have is a sticker on the side). I'll look again...

I just picked up XP this afternoon, and will be installing this evening...

The 250W PS that I replaced with the 430W Enermax in my system has the following ratings:
3.3V-15A(49.5W)
5V-25A(125W)
'3.3v & 5.0V'-150W

So you're right, mjc. One has to check the specs.

Well, I got XP installed.


...and it's crashing at least as much as it was before. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/mad.gif

Time to check into a PSM, I guess...

Boy O Boy, here we go again. ME is a POS. ME is a resource hog. ME can’t handle this or that. ME has to be restarted every 15 minutes.
You gentlemen making these claims are very knowledgeable and I have a great deal of respect for you, BUT, your claims here are JUNK.
Case in point:
The machine I am using right now is a Compaq laptop PIII650, 192 Mgb (sharing 4Mgb with vid) ME, AOL6.0, most of the latest updates. I have only had 2 real problems with this machine, both revolved around IE and nothing to do with ME.
My main work machine, Celeron 700, now 384 Mgb, ME, running all kinds of intensive programs, on for days at a time, never a problem.
My project machine (this one will floor you), Pentium 133, 4-8Mgb simms, ME, Office 97, AOL 6.0, voice and fax prog, and a few other goodies. This machine was a trade for setting up a newer machine. It came to me with the current setup (except voice and fax) and all I have done is a general cleanup, scandisk and defrag. Removed a few progs that I didn’t need and she runs like a raped ape. On for days at a time, buzzes to life in a second with the flick of the mouse, logs on to AOL like nobodies business. I have downloaded some updates, but not many.

My point is, ME really is not the pig that many have claimed. It has had it’s issues just like any other OS, so what’s the real problem here?

JT- I hope you are not too disappointed when you find that your latest purchase does not fix your problem.

Good luck http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/cool.gif


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Waiting patiently for the future to arrive.

Frank's Place (http://dreamwater.net/tech/frankscomp/)

Well..it didn't. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/frown.gif

I wonder if my HDD is crap....

Another thing - my hardware monitor reports that my system fan speed is 0. BUT! I can open the case and see that the system fan is running....?

[This message has been edited by jt (edited 05-01-2002).]

bassman, how in the world do you have ME on a 133mhz machine--it doesnt alow you to install it, unless you have at least a 200 or 300 mhz processor??--
just wondering-
dilbert04 http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/rolleyes.gif

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Network+, A+, VB6, C++,HTML, Java, Flash....
All before 16-

Ok, well after reading over this thread, it seems people are hung up on power and OS, but I don't think it's either.

Invalid page faults usually result from faulty RAM or improper memory settings in BIOS.

Do you have a different stick of RAM that you could try?

Go into BIOS setup and load Fail Safe Defaults or similar. Make sure that CAS Latency is set to "3", even if your actual RAM is faster than that.

Your temps are borderline. Usually over 60C, a system will start showing signs of stress evidenced by weird behavior. What are you using to measure your temps? Have you cross referenced it against the BIOS reported temps?

It could be that your temps are being reported incorrectly and in fact you're cruising past 60C when you stress the system.

What brand of heatsink are you using? What kind of TIM did you use?

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This space reserved for highly intelligent observations and witty remarks.

This message has not been edited by BigBlue66.

I'm using ALi's hardware monitor. They manufactured the chipset for the MB, so I would think (hope) that their tools are accurate.

I have loaded fail-safe defaults before...didn't seem to make a diff. I'll check the latency thing.

I have two RAM sticks. One is a generic from tigerdirect.com (came with the system), the other is from Crucial. I do have a spare 64 MB SDRAM stick. I guess I can try that.

The CPU fan is a Speeze. The unfortunate thing about this case is that the CPU fan is right behind the PSM. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/redface.gif As far as heatsink paste...just some generic stuff (is that what you meant by TIM?).

What about a liquid-cooled case? Anybody tried one of 'em?

JT,
I would definitely lean with Blue on this one. Try pulling one of the installed RAM sticks and see how you do. If you still have the same problem, pull the other and install the first.
You will want to make sure you have nothing but Explorer and Systray running before you start the game. No scheduled tasks, no voice/fax software, nada.

In thinking on your last posts, you may want to open that case and put a small house fan pointing in to see if you can get your temps down.
Just a couple of thoughts.

Dilbert, I am not sure how ME was installed on this machine, it came to me this way. Here is the craziest thing, I believe it was done as an upgrade from 95 http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/eek.gif
Like I said, I traded it for a setup fee. The gal told me she was having problems with this machine and her neighbor came over and installed ME on it for her. It was working fine, just very slow. Get this, she was complaining about the lack of performance while using her photo editing software (some cheapo junk that came with a cheap camera).
I don’t know how to explain that, just havin fun with it http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif


------------------
Waiting patiently for the future to arrive.

Frank's Place (http://dreamwater.net/tech/frankscomp/)

That's the thing: I haven't been running anything except for Explorer and Systray. I will try the RAM and the fan to see if they yield anything.

I think XP is going back...it didn't solve the problem, and it is a little too "overbearing" for me. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

Originally posted by jt:

I think XP is going back...it didn't solve the problem, and it is a little too "overbearing" for me. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif


personally I think that's a mistake, maybe it didn't solve your problem as it may be a hardware prob, but XP is the way to go. You are going to get it eventually, or maybe they will create another but RIGHT NOW having used win9x for years I can tell you that on my machine it makes a WORLD of difference.


you will find those that still don't like those new fangled things called doorknobs- "well, I been a openin' this hear door with my foot by kickin' it for years and no problems here!".....yessiree

I have it, love it, and am NOT under any circumstances going backwards.

winME was merely an experiment in my opinion. They were trying to fill the gap between win98se and win2000, and it didn't work. There are no improvements in the way your system resources are used and that's the BIG problem. WinXP addresses this problem.


As you will see, there are those that have little to no problems with winME, they are generally people that know how to tweak it out to work right. They in general are also people that have not used winXP and seen first hand the MASSIVE improvements, you just about can not crash it.

My only real problem with winME is that it didn't "take" with a majority of people- too bad, I could have made much more $$ fixing it if more people had installed it.

lol

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif




[This message has been edited by sea69 (edited 05-02-2002).]

Well, yes, I might be a little reactionary here. I just don't like the way XP seems to want to stick its fingers into everything. can I help you with that? C'mon, pleeeeease? Pleeeeeeze, puhleeeeeeze?? http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/tongue.gif*shrugs* Maybe if I get the computer to run worth half a damn I'll warm up to it a little more. The jury's still out, anyway.

the good news is, most of that can be turned off, controlled by you.

it is "dummed up" for the home user who could get overwhelmed by all the settings it has to choose from in comparison to win98/me

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif



[This message has been edited by sea69 (edited 05-02-2002).]

Bassman, thats pretty cool w/ the ME machine.--ya, i have ME on a Micron, PIII--personally, i dont like it--it crashes alot http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/frown.gif -
dilbert

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Network+, A+, VB6, C++,HTML, Java, Flash....
All before 16-

Originally posted by sea69:
the good news is, most of that can be turned off, controlled by you.

it is "dummed up" for the home user who could get overwhelmed by all the settings it has to choose from in comparison to win98/me

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

[This message has been edited by sea69 (edited 05-02-2002).]

Yeah, I've already changed a lot of the options so that it looks/operates more like Win9x. That, and I'm beginning to like some of the features...especially the compatibility wizard! It's a neat idea, even though I haven't done much with it.

No more memory leak, too... http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

well- for me, it was the challenge of learning a new OS.

I won't say I know everything about win9x but I know about as much as I want to know.

I wanted to not be so "limited" anymore, this gives me an entire new toy to take apart, break and put back together.

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

Hello jt and all others

I've been very reluctant to contribute on this topic but here goes.

I think this is a problem with the usage of Conventional Memory [down in the first 640 kB].

"jt" said "runs well most of the time...unless I start playing games with it" and I think that is no coincidence.
"crashy...I get invalid page faults" again suggests a problem with the retreival of info from memory [see my contribution to "kjones" at "System Troubleshooting"]

Your Conventional Memory is overcrowded I think and some prog is overwriting other's memory spaces.

I dont know how your Operating System is using the space.

HERE'S A QOUTE:
"The first 640 KB of system memory is called conventional memory. The name refers to the fact that this is where DOS, and DOS programs, conventionally run. Originally, this was the only place that programs could run; today, despite much more memory being added to the PC, this 640 KB area remains the most important in many cases."
"As programs grew in size and complexity in the 1980s, programs strained to fit into their increasingly tight 640 KB "clothing". The problem was exacerbated by the fact that the 640 KB wasn't all available: parts of it are used by DOS routines themselves, along with interrupt vector tables, buffers for file access, and drivers for CD-ROM drives, disk compression, and network access. Because of this, many PC users found that after DOS had booted up, they typically had as little as 550 or even 500 KB free for running programs. Meanwhile, program developers were straining and squeezing to try to get their programs small enough for people to be able to use them. The end result was usually a lot of problems. I have seen PCs that, without optimization, boot up with less than 400 KB free of usable memory. Many programs will refuse to load with less than 500 KB free."

"TIP: You can use the DOS command "MEM /C /P" to see how much conventional memory is used and free."

"Windows 95 can also use extended memory for its hardware drivers. Certain parts of the code must still run in conventional memory."
"In order to use your CD-ROM drive, sound card and many other devices, you have to use real mode drivers, which must go either in conventional memory or in the upper memory area. Many times this can cause memory shortages."
"Many users run into trouble when they boot into MS-DOS mode."
END OF QUOTE

I don't know how the later operating systems do it but I used to use "memmaker.exe" for "Optimizing Conventional Memory".
It was on the Windows 95 CD-ROM in the "Other\OldDOS" directory and I copied the files onto a Boot disk and ran it from there.

Sylvander- please don't hesitate in the future, we all work together here to try and help!

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif


HAL(hardware abstraction layer) -

The HAL is why 2k/XP are so stable, hardware communicates through software using this HAL instead of directly, when something goes wrong you will usually receive an error instead of a crash.

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

Someone correct me if I'm wrong here, but once we passed 98SE didn't we leave the days of "Conventional memory" and using things like "Memmaker.exe" behind??
It is my understanding that that is the single biggest step made by ME. When using DOS in ME, you are using a VDM. This is why you have limited usage of DOS thru ME. ME does not run on top of DOS as was the case with 3.1, 95, 98,...

I will agree that JT has a memory issue, but I don't think conventional memory issues are involved here.

------------------
Waiting patiently for the future to arrive.

Frank's Place (http://dreamwater.net/tech/frankscomp/)

Well, I'm using XP, so I don't think I'm limited to the 640k memory thing. I hope, anyway... http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

I ran the PC quite a bit yesterday...no crashes! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif Of course, I don't expect a problem like this to just disappear on its own, so I'll see if I can stress test it a little more and see what I can get away with...

ok, this may sound off the hook but bare with me.

When I first installed winXP Pro it had a couple "quirks"- small annoying things (this of course couldn't have anything to do with me changing just about every default setting there was- http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/eek.gif http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

Now the 'funny' part- winXP seems to have a way of '"fixing itself"..

so be patient- go to ViperXP411 (http://www.blkviper.com/WinXP/servicecfg.htm) and see what you have going on.

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif



[This message has been edited by sea69 (edited 05-03-2002).]

Neat site... :thumbup:

Well, we'll see...I'm LOL @ "changing every default" tho. That's exactly what I did..

Lessee...get rid of that....make that look like what I'm used to....OO! I can turn that off so it'll stop $&*&^%% bugging me...

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

Still crashing...I've tried cooling the PC with a window fan. The temps dropped significantly, but it still crashes.

I'm now trying manual MB configuration. *shrugs* You never know...

Have you tried messing around with different sticks of memory? Have you checked the CAS Latency timings in BIOS?

Have you ran DXDIAG to see if you're having DirectX problems? Do you have any IRQ conflicts or device conflicts?

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This space reserved for highly intelligent observations and witty remarks.

This message has not been edited by BigBlue66.

No, not yet...

But I tried something kinda unusual last night that seemed to work.


Underclocking. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/eek.gif

That's right, I'm now running at 1066 MHz. I was able to play Black & White ( a notorious crasher ) for hours. Not an ideal solution, but neither is crashing all the time.

Funny thing is, the nominal temperatures stay the same. Peak temps are way down. I don't know what this indicates, but I'm going to raise the speed a bit and see what I can get away with.

It is my understanding that overclockers will raise the CPU voltage a touch when speeding up. What if I raised the voltage a bit, say, 1.80v as opposed to 1.75v? Am I way off track here? http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/rolleyes.gif

here's mine:

http://seanweb1.homestead.com/files/processor.jpeg

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!! So that's the only way you could get your T-bird to run reliably, eh? Guess I can be grateful that I'm running as fast as I am.

The jacked thing is that I didn't notice a lick of difference in performance. Except that the computer doesn't crash anymore. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

also there's:

http://seanweb1.homestead.com/files/processor2.jpeg

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

Done it...except I think I adjusted memory usage for better program performance, not the cache...why is that preferable?

cause it works.

heh

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/tongue.gif

Oh.... http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/tongue.gif

I read through your posts because my pc suffered from the same symptoms.

Two things helped me clear them up.
www.pcpitstop.com, (http://www.pcpitstop.com,) try a free diagnostic check on your system. This test is thorough and can even be done anonymously. The only system error it reported was a bios RAM report of 96 MB compared to Windows 128 MB (which was what the computer contained). This lead me to download their SMBIOS program which confirmed this finding.

The next step was downloading and running MCS' suggestion, C'TSD (see link from previous - THANK YOU MCS!) you tried it and it didn't work. Same here. But it seems it does it's checking as soon as it is run. The files not found error went away after I removed the faulty RAM chip, AND THE PROGRAM AND MY COMPUTER HAVE WORKED FINE EVER SINCE.

Thank you for saving me from purchasing Windows XP. This step would have frustrated me even further.

Look closer at the RAM chips and maybe your computer will be running smoothly as well.

Happy Gaming!

Jay

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PATIENCE is the only virtue