P3B-F, P3 600 - trouble with system locking up....

[Yellow Peril]

This is my first bit of tinkering under the cover of a PC. After
carefully selecting the components for my new machine, I got hooked
and now have started on upgrading the old box.

I have upgraded my secondary machine to a P3 600 katmai that I bought
on ebay. The Board is a P3B-F bought used at a local shop. Both
pieces were guaranteed no DOA. OS is XP pro, agp card is an older 8 M
ATI all in Wonder. I have not overclocked it at all, and I have tried
both jumperless mode and setting the dipswitches for true 600 mhz.

Initially it would not boot up to windows at all. I would get a Bios
warning telling me to look at my hardware settings. In Bios, the CPU
temperature was showing in red but the cpu did not feel hot to the
touch. I then set CPU temp to 'ignore' and rebooted. Still no boot, I
changed the core voltage to ignore, now it boots to windows. However
it is very unstable.

The machine will hang very regularly, once I start working it out a
little.

It will freeze completely... no keyboard or mouse and require a hard
boot. Ocassionally it will re boot itself and come back up with the
XP 'serious error' message.

I swaped the cpu for an older P2 333 I have lying around and it runs
fine. Slow, but no lock up.

I have done a ton of research on this forum and elsewhere on the web
for a solution.

Ideally I want to keep the 600 in this machine and tweak the speed up
nicely so that it is as fast as can be but still stable.

Any advice? Gracias

Steve

 

[Ayoub]

are you using the latest bios to correctly identify that cpu?
iirc for stability you had to use 2.05V instead of the stated 2.0V
as for temperature, are you sure the heatsink fan is actually working?

hth

 

[Stephan Grossklass]

This is my first bit of tinkering under the cover of a PC. After
carefully selecting the components for my new machine, I got hooked
and now have started on upgrading the old box.

I have upgraded my secondary machine to a P3 600 katmai that I bought
on ebay. The Board is a P3B-F bought used at a local shop.

Why use a 600 MHz Katmai then? They're very expensive and run hot, and
the P3B-F should virtually always take Coppermines. A P3-600E would have
been a much better bet! Not only is it faster than a Katmai at the same
speed, it also dissipates much less heat and has quite some o/c
headroom.
http://users.erols.com/chare/elec.htm

Initially it would not boot up to windows at all. I would get a Bios
warning telling me to look at my hardware settings. In Bios, the CPU
temperature was showing in red but the cpu did not feel hot to the
touch.

CPU cooler does not make proper contact, or CPU not seated properly.

Stephan

 

[Yellow Peril]

are you using the latest bios to correctly identify that cpu?
iirc for stability you had to use 2.05V instead of the stated 2.0V
as for temperature, are you sure the heatsink fan is actually working?

hth

Yes, Asus site states ALL Bios will support p3 600 on the p3b-f.
After the first problem, I downloaded and flashed the latest Bios,
just in case that was the issue.
Not sure what 'iirc' refers to?? The cpu markings state 2.05 volts yet
the bios settings don't give that option... just 2.07, and 2.03 or 4
(can't recall, not in front of machine)This is why I selected 'ignore'
and let the voltage regulator supply current based on cpu demand. It
was after this adjustment that it would actually boot to windows)
Heatsink is very large aluminum aftermarket AND I have a fan on it
directly. (even though manufacture says a fan is not needed)

I will remove the heatseak and check that the adhesive backing was
removed and conductive gel used... the cpu arrived with the heatsink
already installed.

 

[Yellow Peril]

Why use a 600 MHz Katmai then? They're very expensive and run hot, and
the P3B-F should virtually always take Coppermines. A P3-600E would have
been a much better bet! Not only is it faster than a Katmai at the same
speed, it also dissipates much less heat and has quite some o/c
headroom.
http://users.erols.com/chare/elec.htm


CPU cooler does not make proper contact, or CPU not seated properly.

Stephan

I will be verifying the hsf contact this weekend and reseat the cpu...

Why 600 Katmai? I bought it on eBay for $75 to go into my P2B as this
was the fastest Slot 1 listed for the P2B. I could not boot as I
neglected to update the Bios (newbie) could not reset Cmos or flash
with new Bios.
I found the P3B-F at a local shop for $30, which seemed a better
option than trying to find a flashed bios chip. Perhaps I should
resell the katmai and get a faster cpu for this board?

Steve

 

[P2B]

I will be verifying the hsf contact this weekend and reseat the cpu...

Why 600 Katmai? I bought it on eBay for $75 to go into my P2B as this
was the fastest Slot 1 listed for the P2B. I could not boot as I
neglected to update the Bios (newbie) could not reset Cmos or flash
with new Bios.

Email me if you'd like a P2B 1014beta3 (latest) BIOS chip for $US18 shipped.

P2B