2 problems

[Nora]

Hello,

I hope you can help me, I called the store where I bought the new
motherboard, processor,memory and video graphics card but they were not able
to give me an answer to my question.
I emailed the Dutch helpdesk (e-mail address removed) but got a reply from:
(e-mail address removed): delivery failed.
I tried the German site of ASUS but couldn't get to the support sites....
I emailed ASUS but until now no reply.... conclusion: ASUS is not easily
contacted for me from the Netherlands

Friday the 27th 2004 I've bought:
Motherboard: ASUS A7V8X-X
Processor: AMD Athlon XP 3000+ Socket A XP3000+ 333Mhz FSB
2x Corsair 512MB DDR333 64Mx64 Value Serie, PC333, Cas 2.5
Asus video graphics card V9520 TD/ 128 Mb chipset:nVidia Geforce FX 5200

2 problems:
1:
CPU temp is as high as 77Celsius/170Fahrenheit while playing games.
Is this because of the videocard getting overheated? Or is it the CPU
overheating?

2:
BIOS (Revision 1007 11/13/2003) Advanced:
CPU Speed: 2167 Mhz Item Specific Help in red :
According to CPU external frequency setting, system memory can only operate
at frequency higher than or equal to 333 Mhz, please make sure the DRAM
maximum frequency is not less than 333 Mhz.

CPU Frequency Multiplier: 13.0x
CPU External Frequency: 166/33
Memory Frequency: auto Item Specific Help in red:
Only support 1 certified DDR 400 Module on this product.
when I manually put this on 333 Mhz I get the same warning.

CPU Vcore setting: auto Item Specific Help in red:
Auto setting is recommended. The higher you set the CPU Vcore voltage to,
the more likely you will cause damage to your CPU

CPU Vcore 1.650V

What does this mean and what can I do to fix it????

kind regards,
Nora Verbeek
The Netherlands

 

[Creeping Stone]

I hope you can help me, I called the store where I bought the new
motherboard, processor,memory and video graphics card but they were not able
to give me an answer to my question.
I emailed the Dutch helpdesk (e-mail address removed) but got a reply from:
(e-mail address removed): delivery failed.
I tried the German site of ASUS but couldn't get to the support sites....
I emailed ASUS but until now no reply.... conclusion: ASUS is not easily
contacted for me from the Netherlands

Hi Nora,
Sorry to hear your efforts havent gotten anywhere -I dont think thats
unusual with Asus, maybe they rely on this group ... (fools

Friday the 27th 2004 I've bought:
Motherboard: ASUS A7V8X-X
Processor: AMD Athlon XP 3000+ Socket A XP3000+ 333Mhz FSB
2x Corsair 512MB DDR333 64Mx64 Value Serie, PC333, Cas 2.5
Asus video graphics card V9520 TD/ 128 Mb chipset:nVidia Geforce FX 5200

A respectable list'

2 problems:
1: CPU temp is as high as 77Celsius/170Fahrenheit while playing games.
Is this because of the videocard getting overheated? Or is it the CPU
overheating?

77C is sky high CPU temp so thats not a small problem y'know !:0
Its the sheer speed that XP3000 runs at, makes it one of the hottest. So
you need a good heatsink (preferably with copper in it), it needs correctly
fitted with just a touch of thermal paste on it and a powerful/noisy fan on
the heatsink, *and very good case ventillation - even when the CPU Heatsink
gets the heat out of the CPU well enough, it needs to get pushed out of the
case quickly or the graphics card, disk drives and motherboard will cook,
that should require at least one other fan blowing air into the case, as
well as the PSU blowing out -for an XP3000+.

Its a modest task to get all that sorted out quickly, so in the meantime,
you might run with case open - or underclock the system so its not running
at the limits of practical air cooling.

In the long run, make sure the reported motherboard temp is well under ~40C
or your disk drive at least will suffer.
50C is comfortable for CPU. 55C at the edge of stability, if it reaches 85C
the a7v8x-x will quite reliably (and wisely) shut down immediately.

With a new a7v8x-x, if you have the board out for messing with the CPU's
heatsink, its an idea to take the little brown HS off, which is underneath
the CPU (on the Northbridge) and check it for fluff(!)
I read someone here report finding fluff under this and checked my own to
find the same - Asus might be putting it there for some reason..~I dont
know, much better off with a little thermal paste though - or just, no
fluff :/
The thing is attached by little plastic legs which pop out if you squeeze
their 'roots' on the underside of the board, and then pop back in again
easily -something to look at if you have the board out and handy, otherwise
shouldnt worry about it...

The immediate task in hand: getting that temp down...>

2:
BIOS (Revision 1007 11/13/2003) Advanced:
CPU Speed: 2167 Mhz Item Specific Help in red :
According to CPU external frequency setting, system memory can only operate
at frequency higher than or equal to 333 Mhz, please make sure the DRAM
maximum frequency is not less than 333 Mhz.

CPU Frequency Multiplier: 13.0x
CPU External Frequency: 166/33
Memory Frequency: auto Item Specific Help in red:
Only support 1 certified DDR 400 Module on this product.
when I manually put this on 333 Mhz I get the same warning.

CPU Vcore setting: auto Item Specific Help in red:
Auto setting is recommended. The higher you set the CPU Vcore voltage to,
the more likely you will cause damage to your CPU

CPU Vcore 1.650V

What does this mean and what can I do to fix it????

Thats not a problem, actualy it means you are starting at the correct
speed. The red writing is just help information which the bios is
'SHOUTING' to stop people wondering why they cant change the memory speed
after 166/=333. (166 Mhz, 333 DDR)

In the same page you can underclock things (and reduce your temps) by
reducing the "CPU External Frequency: 166/33" -setting.
If you take it off auto, (toggle to 'manual') you could take it down to
"151/30" with no problems or complications and temps would reduce a lot,
though system performance would reduce 10%, heat and stability should
benefit. Overclockers increase it, but thats not advisable just now.

-Go lower than 151/30 and the mode might change and complicate things, so
watch out for that.

HTH,

 

[Paul]

Hello,

I hope you can help me, I called the store where I bought the new
motherboard, processor,memory and video graphics card but they were not able
to give me an answer to my question.
I emailed the Dutch helpdesk (e-mail address removed) but got a reply from:
(e-mail address removed): delivery failed.
I tried the German site of ASUS but couldn't get to the support sites....
I emailed ASUS but until now no reply.... conclusion: ASUS is not easily
contacted for me from the Netherlands

Friday the 27th 2004 I've bought:
Motherboard: ASUS A7V8X-X
Processor: AMD Athlon XP 3000+ Socket A XP3000+ 333Mhz FSB
2x Corsair 512MB DDR333 64Mx64 Value Serie, PC333, Cas 2.5
Asus video graphics card V9520 TD/ 128 Mb chipset:nVidia Geforce FX 5200

2 problems:
1:
CPU temp is as high as 77Celsius/170Fahrenheit while playing games.
Is this because of the videocard getting overheated? Or is it the CPU
overheating?

2:
BIOS (Revision 1007 11/13/2003) Advanced:
CPU Speed: 2167 Mhz Item Specific Help in red :
According to CPU external frequency setting, system memory can only operate
at frequency higher than or equal to 333 Mhz, please make sure the DRAM
maximum frequency is not less than 333 Mhz.

CPU Frequency Multiplier: 13.0x
CPU External Frequency: 166/33
Memory Frequency: auto Item Specific Help in red:
Only support 1 certified DDR 400 Module on this product.
when I manually put this on 333 Mhz I get the same warning.

CPU Vcore setting: auto Item Specific Help in red:
Auto setting is recommended. The higher you set the CPU Vcore voltage to,
the more likely you will cause damage to your CPU

CPU Vcore 1.650V

What does this mean and what can I do to fix it????

kind regards,
Nora Verbeek
The Netherlands

There was a report recently, that Asus tech support had stopped
using email, due to the volume of spam they were receiving. The
best way to reach Asus is by phone. The call is generally not toll
free, and the tech on the other end of the phone should take your
phone number and call you back. I think they like you to fill out
a case report on the web, but I've never gone through the process
myself.

For CPU temperature, things to check are:
a) Make sure the heatsink is oriented properly. When you look at the
contact patch of the heatsink, it should line up with the die.
There are some HSF that can be rotated 180 degrees and they
won't work properly that way.
b) Use some thermal paste. See the arcticsilver.com website for
instructions for how to apply the paste. What is critical is the
air gap between the processor silicon die and the heatsink. Air
is a good insulator, and 50W of heat is trying to flow through it.
Some heatsinks come with a membrane attached to the bottom, and
if there is a protective plastic cover, it should be removed
before installing the HSF. Since your temp is only 77C, I don't
think that is your problem.
c) Check fan speed in the monitor. Make sure the fan cable is connected.
Disable Q-fan in the BIOS until you have solved the CPU temp
problem.
d) Heat is proportional to F*C*V*V. If you overclock, F, the core
frequency, will be higher than normal. C is capacitance and is fixed
for a given gate feature size (0.13u is better than 0.18u). The
V squared term is the core voltage, and your processor should be
requesting 1.65V. Check the BIOS to see if this is the case.
Ref: http://www.qdi.nl/support/CPUQDISocketA.htm

You didn't state what the motherboard temperature is reported as,
or what your room temperature happens to be. It is possible your
case needs more ventilation. An FX5200 shouldn't be an issue
thermally. At a minimum, you should have the PSU fan cooling the
case, plus at least one more case fan.

As for your other problem, 2167MHz seems to be the right speed for
the processor. Compare the OPN printed on the top of the processor
to the information on this page:

http://www.qdi.nl/support/CPUAMDsocketA.htm

If using two DIMMs, place them in DIMM slots 1 and 3 for best
electrical performance. After you've fixed the CPU temperature
problem, get memtest86 or memtest86+ from memtest86.com or memtest.org,
to test the memory and make sure it is OK.

HTH,
Paul

 

[Nora]

Hi Andy,

Thank you for the reply!
We used the thermal paste and I use the fan that came with the cpu.
Coolermaster CP5-8JD1F...
I will try the underclocking and see if temps go down.
Do you think updating the BIOS might help?

Nora

I hope you can help me, I called the store where I bought the new
motherboard, processor,memory and video graphics card but they were not able
to give me an answer to my question.
I emailed the Dutch helpdesk (e-mail address removed) but got a reply from:
(e-mail address removed): delivery failed.
I tried the German site of ASUS but couldn't get to the support sites....
I emailed ASUS but until now no reply.... conclusion: ASUS is not easily
contacted for me from the Netherlands

Hi Nora,
Sorry to hear your efforts havent gotten anywhere -I dont think thats
unusual with Asus, maybe they rely on this group ... (fools

Friday the 27th 2004 I've bought:
Motherboard: ASUS A7V8X-X
Processor: AMD Athlon XP 3000+ Socket A XP3000+ 333Mhz FSB
2x Corsair 512MB DDR333 64Mx64 Value Serie, PC333, Cas 2.5
Asus video graphics card V9520 TD/ 128 Mb chipset:nVidia Geforce FX 5200

A respectable list'

2 problems:
1: CPU temp is as high as 77Celsius/170Fahrenheit while playing games.
Is this because of the videocard getting overheated? Or is it the CPU
overheating?

77C is sky high CPU temp so thats not a small problem y'know !:0
Its the sheer speed that XP3000 runs at, makes it one of the hottest. So
you need a good heatsink (preferably with copper in it), it needs correctly
fitted with just a touch of thermal paste on it and a powerful/noisy fan on
the heatsink, *and very good case ventillation - even when the CPU Heatsink
gets the heat out of the CPU well enough, it needs to get pushed out of the
case quickly or the graphics card, disk drives and motherboard will cook,
that should require at least one other fan blowing air into the case, as
well as the PSU blowing out -for an XP3000+.

Its a modest task to get all that sorted out quickly, so in the meantime,
you might run with case open - or underclock the system so its not running
at the limits of practical air cooling.

In the long run, make sure the reported motherboard temp is well under ~40C
or your disk drive at least will suffer.
50C is comfortable for CPU. 55C at the edge of stability, if it reaches 85C
the a7v8x-x will quite reliably (and wisely) shut down immediately.

With a new a7v8x-x, if you have the board out for messing with the CPU's
heatsink, its an idea to take the little brown HS off, which is underneath
the CPU (on the Northbridge) and check it for fluff(!)
I read someone here report finding fluff under this and checked my own to
find the same - Asus might be putting it there for some reason..~I dont
know, much better off with a little thermal paste though - or just, no
fluff :/
The thing is attached by little plastic legs which pop out if you squeeze
their 'roots' on the underside of the board, and then pop back in again
easily -something to look at if you have the board out and handy, otherwise
shouldnt worry about it...

The immediate task in hand: getting that temp down...>

2:
BIOS (Revision 1007 11/13/2003) Advanced:
CPU Speed: 2167 Mhz Item Specific Help in red :
According to CPU external frequency setting, system memory can only operate
at frequency higher than or equal to 333 Mhz, please make sure the DRAM
maximum frequency is not less than 333 Mhz.

CPU Frequency Multiplier: 13.0x
CPU External Frequency: 166/33
Memory Frequency: auto Item Specific Help in red:
Only support 1 certified DDR 400 Module on this product.
when I manually put this on 333 Mhz I get the same warning.

CPU Vcore setting: auto Item Specific Help in red:
Auto setting is recommended. The higher you set the CPU Vcore voltage to,
the more likely you will cause damage to your CPU

CPU Vcore 1.650V

What does this mean and what can I do to fix it????

Thats not a problem, actualy it means you are starting at the correct
speed. The red writing is just help information which the bios is
'SHOUTING' to stop people wondering why they cant change the memory speed
after 166/=333. (166 Mhz, 333 DDR)

In the same page you can underclock things (and reduce your temps) by
reducing the "CPU External Frequency: 166/33" -setting.
If you take it off auto, (toggle to 'manual') you could take it down to
"151/30" with no problems or complications and temps would reduce a lot,
though system performance would reduce 10%, heat and stability should
benefit. Overclockers increase it, but thats not advisable just now.

-Go lower than 151/30 and the mode might change and complicate things, so
watch out for that.

HTH,

 

[Nora]

Thanks for your reply Paul.
I will ask a friend of mine to help me with replacing the dimm's.
I only have opened an older computer and am afraid I'm going to damage
something on this new one.

I know thermal paste is being used. The motherboard temp is 41C

Thanks for the advice.

Nora

 

[Harry]

Thanks for your reply Paul.
I will ask a friend of mine to help me with replacing the dimm's.
I only have opened an older computer and am afraid I'm going to damage
something on this new one.

I know thermal paste is being used. The motherboard temp is 41C

I think 41C is a little high. Generally you should be aiming for a
motherboard temp of 4 - 8C higer than the room temperature.

Having said that the temp reported by the motherboard will be based on
a sensor somewhere on the board. That sensor may be in a 'hot spot' in
your case, and so the 41C might be a little misleading.

Look at your case fans. Have fans blowing out the back and sucking in
from the front.

Keep the amount of air blowing out, the same volume as the air being
sucked in.

If you have a case with 'stamped' vents on the back for the fans then
these may restrict the air flow and result in higher case temps.

Harry.

 

[Creeping Stone]

Hi Andy,

Thank you for the reply!

You're Welcome

We used the thermal paste and I use the fan that came with the cpu.
Coolermaster CP5-8JD1F...

I read that fan is okay, so it shouldnt reach that temperature unless the
air inside the case is getting very hot, or if the Heastsink is attached
the wrong way round - i think that normaly the end of the attachment brace
which is slighlty larger and which is used to grasp onto when attaching
(the other side is smaller with no place for screwdriver or crowbar -its
usualy on the right hand side -beside the memory dimms. If its not, remove
it extremely carefully (might crack cpu).
~or it could just be that the case isn't well enough ventillated.

oops, I see Paul already explained that :/

I will try the underclocking and see if temps go down.

Theyll definitely go down - cant say how much, in the long term its better
to sort out the ventillation, but it should improve things a lot to go on
with.

It will be intresting if you can say how much they do down, I guess about
20c for 151 FSB

Do you think updating the BIOS might help?

It wont help this problem, if you update bios past revison 1006, it will
seem to get worse because the temperature reading is adjusted to report
even higher temps, so watch out for that. Ive just gone back to 1006 from
1008, which might have solved a sporadic problem I was having. I dont think
the Bios needs changing really, unless you have a known bug to fix.

gl,

 

[Nora]

Hi Andy,

I left the case open and now temps are cpu 50C mb 33C
so I guess the case isn't enough ventilated.

Any suggestions?

TIA,
Nora

Hi Andy,

Thank you for the reply!

You're Welcome

We used the thermal paste and I use the fan that came with the cpu.
Coolermaster CP5-8JD1F...

I read that fan is okay, so it shouldnt reach that temperature unless the
air inside the case is getting very hot, or if the Heastsink is attached
the wrong way round - i think that normaly the end of the attachment brace
which is slighlty larger and which is used to grasp onto when attaching
(the other side is smaller with no place for screwdriver or crowbar -its
usualy on the right hand side -beside the memory dimms. If its not, remove
it extremely carefully (might crack cpu).
~or it could just be that the case isn't well enough ventillated.

oops, I see Paul already explained that :/

I will try the underclocking and see if temps go down.

Theyll definitely go down - cant say how much, in the long term its better
to sort out the ventillation, but it should improve things a lot to go on
with.

It will be intresting if you can say how much they do down, I guess about
20c for 151 FSB

Do you think updating the BIOS might help?

It wont help this problem, if you update bios past revison 1006, it will
seem to get worse because the temperature reading is adjusted to report
even higher temps, so watch out for that. Ive just gone back to 1006 from
1008, which might have solved a sporadic problem I was having. I dont think
the Bios needs changing really, unless you have a known bug to fix.

gl,

 

[Paul]

I think 41C is a little high. Generally you should be aiming for a
motherboard temp of 4 - 8C higer than the room temperature.

Having said that the temp reported by the motherboard will be based on
a sensor somewhere on the board. That sensor may be in a 'hot spot' in
your case, and so the 41C might be a little misleading.

Look at your case fans. Have fans blowing out the back and sucking in
from the front.

Keep the amount of air blowing out, the same volume as the air being
sucked in.

If you have a case with 'stamped' vents on the back for the fans then
these may restrict the air flow and result in higher case temps.

Harry.

Agreed. This means the CPU/HSF is not at fault. The delta-T between
the air temp inside the case and CPU is normal, and the air in there
is too hot. I'd bet, if you took the side off the case, the CPU
would cool down immediately.

You need to move more air through the case. Go to the computer store
and buy some 80mm case fans, as this is a common size. Your case
may have a plastic holder meant to hold a fan, and the holder can
be removed, so you can take it with you to the computer store, to
find a fan that fits. The motherboard usually has a three pin header
for a fan, and the header will give the +12V needed by the fan. The
header is keyed, so the connector should only (easily) fit one way.

Since you are in the northern hemisphere, I was assuming the room
temperature wasn't responsible for the high temperature

Paul

 

[Nora]

Agreed. This means the CPU/HSF is not at fault. The delta-T between
the air temp inside the case and CPU is normal, and the air in there
is too hot. I'd bet, if you took the side off the case, the CPU
would cool down immediately.

I had already done that, and the temp is now at a constant temp of cpu 50C
and mb 33C.

Will take the case to the shop and let them find a suitable fan.......

Nora

 

[Harry]

Agreed. This means the CPU/HSF is not at fault. The delta-T between
the air temp inside the case and CPU is normal, and the air in there
is too hot. I'd bet, if you took the side off the case, the CPU
would cool down immediately.

You need to move more air through the case. Go to the computer store
and buy some 80mm case fans, as this is a common size. Your case
may have a plastic holder meant to hold a fan, and the holder can
be removed, so you can take it with you to the computer store, to
find a fan that fits.

If it doesnt have the holder then it may only have 4 screw holes.
Check that any fan you buy has the 4 screws necessary to fit it to the
case.

I think you will find that 99% of cases have one or 2 places at the
back of the case to put 80mm fans (other sizes are rarely catered for
at the back of a case)

At the front your case (near the bottom) you should have a place for
an 80mm fan (or 92mm or 120mm) Get your ruler out and measure the
disstance between 2 screw holes to find the fan size.

The motherboard usually has a three pin header
for a fan, and the header will give the +12V needed by the fan. The
header is keyed, so the connector should only (easily) fit one way.

Fans can be bought with the 3 pin connector or a 4 pin molex. The 4
pin fan plus into the lead coming out of your power supply. The same
leads are plugged into your Hard Disk/ CD ROM Drive.

Also, the 4 pin fans have a pass-though connector so you can plugs the
fan and the Hard Disk into one lead.

Since you are in the northern hemisphere, I was assuming the room
temperature wasn't responsible for the high temperature

No chance of that, esp. in the UK

 

[Creeping Stone]

(Paul) wrote:

Since you are in the northern hemisphere, I was assuming the room
temperature wasn't responsible for the high temperature

No chance of that, esp. in the UK

Last summer it was like the south of France!
~albeit without the wine, food and 35hr weeks

 

[Harry]

I had already done that, and the temp is now at a constant temp of cpu 50C
and mb 33C.

Will take the case to the shop and let them find a suitable fan.......

Nora

I would consider 2 fans - One blowing out the back and one sucking in
from the front.

CPU of 50C is not that bad really. With the fans you may well see it
drop another 3C. See how it performs under load. If the temp only goes
up by 4-7C then I would say you are alright.

However:-
If it shoots up very quickly to 70C then you've got a heatsink
problem.
If it keep rising steadily then I would say you have a cooling (eg
Fans and Airflow) problem.

HTH

Harry

 

[Creeping Stone]

Hi Andy,

I left the case open and now temps are cpu 50C mb 33C
so I guess the case isn't enough ventilated.

Any suggestions?

Its pretty straight forward now then -case open and/or underclock, or beef
up the ventillation. Plenty of manual to read and drivers to switch if you
want to kill time servicing it, but there are no great advantages to be
gained. -apart from the odd defrag. As long as its not cooking, it should
be good to go.

I think 90% of driver and bios updating is a complete waste of time -for
this board at least, mine run as well after installing the asus supplied
drivers that came with it ever has -well, I have a few tweaks implemented,
but probably only I could notice the difference.

(google.groups.com for a7v8x-x turns up lots of info -from this group, some
of its my own volatile reporting

cya :]

 

[Steph]

Hi folks !

I had the same problem with my Barton 2500+
High temp (from 70C to >85C under load) then my system used to freeze !!
I underclocked it at 1467 (133*11) and opened the front of my case but the
temp is still between 64 to 70C under load
Is the cpu still in "danger" and should I underclock it to, say, 1100 MHz ?
What do you think of water cooling ?
Would it "cool" my cpu enough so I would not need any case fan ?

Stef

 

[Harry]

Hi folks !

I had the same problem with my Barton 2500+
High temp (from 70C to >85C under load) then my system used to freeze !!
I underclocked it at 1467 (133*11) and opened the front of my case but the
temp is still between 64 to 70C under load
Is the cpu still in "danger" and should I underclock it to, say, 1100 MHz ?
What do you think of water cooling ?
Would it "cool" my cpu enough so I would not need any case fan ?

Stef

Sound like the heatsink is either 'not up to the job' or its not
seated correctly.

You should be able to air cool a Barton 2500 with a reasonable
heatsink.

Harry