SDRAM TO DDR

[JS]

I'm not disagreeing, but if the Crucial memory
advisor says the specified ram will work for
a given PC, then it should work. If not you
can always get your money back.

--
JS
http://www.pagestart.com

The PC2700 memory is faster but this should not be an issue
as 2700 is the max speed and should work just fine a slower
speeds.

Two of my computers both have memory that is rated
faster than the computers require and I have no memory
problems.

--
JShttp://www.pagestart.com

news:%[email protected]...

There are two options at the Crucial site:
One will scan your PC, which is I believe what you let Crucial do.
The second option is the "Crucial Memory Advisor tool"
which has three step process were you select the
1) Manufacture = Elite Group (ECS)
2) Product Line = Elite Group (ECS) Motherboards
3) Select model = K7S5A
(Note: there are 3 K7S5A listed, you need to select the one that
matches
your system)
Click on the "Find it" button.
Scroll down the web page results displayed for system.
You should see DDR memory listed.
Look carefully at the specifications that are listed for the Crucial
DDR
memory
and see how it compares to the memory you purchased.
For example:
Part #: CT6464Z335 . DDR PC2700 . CL=2.5
Unbuffered . NON-ECC . DDR333 . 2.5V .
64Meg x 64 . . more details
Most likely from the specs listed above the
2.5V requirement is the most critical as some motherboards
require memory that will operate at a lower voltage.
--
JS
http://www.pagestart.com
--
[SNIP]
I have scanned at The Crucial site and posted here results I have
the
old SDRAM at the moment
a.. Maximum Memory Capacity: 1024MB
b.. Currently Installed Memory: 512MB
c.. Available Memory Slots: 0
d.. Number of Banks: 2
e.. Dual Channel Support: No
f.. CPU Manufacturer: AuthenticAMD
g.. CPU Family: AMD Duron(tm) Processor Model 3, Stepping 1
h.. CPU Speed: 896 MHz
i..
Well JS I followed as advised above on crucial and it returned parts
as
your example DDR. I checked the spec I have, and details are listed >>
Advert as 266Mhz 184 pin 512 MB PC 2100 DDR Ram 2.5v 2.1GB/sec.
On spec list it showed PC 2100/DDR 266= 133mhz/266mhz = Bandwidth of
2.128 GB/sec.
I tried them singular and they did not work. I contacted Novatech Tech
dept they looked at motherboard Manual for mine and could not
understand
why they did not work, as it should have been Auto pick up. I have to
return them for refund.
I quoted info from Crucial search on my unit and he said that info did
not
match what the Manual quoted, as they quote PC2700 which is higher !
Where do I go from here to get a "simple" update to DDR for my board
but
not having to pay through the nose for memory.
Regards Roger
===========================================
=======================================

I have since Googled about this board and DDR fitted and it seems on
various
sites there have been many with this DDR problem not booting. It was
mention
that this board is sensitive to make of memory, and they believe that
ECs
recommends Kingston, but one post said they had used crucial with
success
but they are far between with success results. Has anyone sorted this
problem before I buy memory again.

Roger

Kingston is generally accepted as a top quality memory maker. They
usually have huge R&D in the development of RAM.

Crucial also makes their own RAM.

Not every motherboard that was originally designed for a "lower speed"
DDR RAM module can also accept the higher speed modules. Depending
on the version of the BIOS installed on the motherboard, this may
work. In my experiense, ECS motherboard have always been "difficult"
using RAM out of the "expected" specification. Since the motherboard
is requiring DDR then DDR should be used.

 

[Adrian C]

Help please,

My OS is XP Pro SP2 my board is ECS 62-0206-001131-00101111-040201
SIS735 K7S5A. I have been running on Sdram 512 133 MHz but are changing to
DDR 184 pin 266MHz. I removed SDRAM from board and inserted the new DDR 2
sticks of 512mb this would give me the board max fitted of 1GB. When I
booted back up it appeared not to recognize them it was searching as my both
CD & DVD lights kept coming on.

Is this a 100MHz (200FSB) bus Duron, or a 133MHz (266FSB) one?

Run Cpu-Z and tell us what CPU spec is installed in this board
http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php

Kind of wondering if you could be overclocking the FSB, and while
getting away with it for SDRAM - DDR is behaving differently?

 

[Paul]

The PC2700 memory is faster but this should not be an issue
as 2700 is the max speed and should work just fine a slower
speeds.

Two of my computers both have memory that is rated
faster than the computers require and I have no memory
problems.

--
JShttp://www.pagestart.com

There are two options at the Crucial site:
One will scan your PC, which is I believe what you let Crucial do.
The second option is the "Crucial Memory Advisor tool"
which has three step process were you select the
1) Manufacture = Elite Group (ECS)
2) Product Line = Elite Group (ECS) Motherboards
3) Select model = K7S5A
(Note: there are 3 K7S5A listed, you need to select the one that
matches
your system)
Click on the "Find it" button.
Scroll down the web page results displayed for system.
You should see DDR memory listed.
Look carefully at the specifications that are listed for the Crucial
DDR
memory
and see how it compares to the memory you purchased.
For example:
Part #: CT6464Z335 . DDR PC2700 . CL=2.5
Unbuffered . NON-ECC . DDR333 . 2.5V .
64Meg x 64 . . more details
Most likely from the specs listed above the
2.5V requirement is the most critical as some motherboards
require memory that will operate at a lower voltage.
--
JS
http://www.pagestart.com
--
[SNIP]
I have scanned at The Crucial site and posted here results I have the
old SDRAM at the moment
a.. Maximum Memory Capacity: 1024MB
b.. Currently Installed Memory: 512MB
c.. Available Memory Slots: 0
d.. Number of Banks: 2
e.. Dual Channel Support: No
f.. CPU Manufacturer: AuthenticAMD
g.. CPU Family: AMD Duron(tm) Processor Model 3, Stepping 1
h.. CPU Speed: 896 MHz
i..
Well JS I followed as advised above on crucial and it returned parts as
your example DDR. I checked the spec I have, and details are listed >>
Advert as 266Mhz 184 pin 512 MB PC 2100 DDR Ram 2.5v 2.1GB/sec.
On spec list it showed PC 2100/DDR 266= 133mhz/266mhz = Bandwidth of
2.128 GB/sec.
I tried them singular and they did not work. I contacted Novatech Tech
dept they looked at motherboard Manual for mine and could not understand
why they did not work, as it should have been Auto pick up. I have to
return them for refund.
I quoted info from Crucial search on my unit and he said that info did
not
match what the Manual quoted, as they quote PC2700 which is higher !
Where do I go from here to get a "simple" update to DDR for my board but
not having to pay through the nose for memory.
Regards Roger
===========================================
=======================================
I have since Googled about this board and DDR fitted and it seems on
various
sites there have been many with this DDR problem not booting. It was
mention
that this board is sensitive to make of memory, and they believe that ECs
recommends Kingston, but one post said they had used crucial with success
but they are far between with success results. Has anyone sorted this
problem before I buy memory again.
Roger

Kingston is generally accepted as a top quality memory maker. They
usually have huge R&D in the development of RAM.

Crucial also makes their own RAM.

Not every motherboard that was originally designed for a "lower speed"
DDR RAM module can also accept the higher speed modules. Depending
on the version of the BIOS installed on the motherboard, this may
work. In my experiense, ECS motherboard have always been "difficult"
using RAM out of the "expected" specification. Since the motherboard
is requiring DDR then DDR should be used.

The board uses SIS735, a "single chip" chipset. As usual, there
are a number of versions of the board, and I picked one at random.

http://download.ecs.com.tw/dlfileecs/manual/mb/eng/k7/k7s5a31eng.zip

The SIS735 operates the RAM interface, at up to PC2100 (DDR266).
Faster memory, such as PC2700 or PC3200, should be able to function as a
PC2100 stick. (The chips themselves are rated for variable clock rate,
to slightly below PC1600 rates.)

http://www.sis.com/products/sis735_features.htm

If the sticks were registered, instead of unbuffered, that
could throw the BIOS off. Normally, there would be a beep
pattern, for an obvious mismatch of that type. In Google
I see some people using ECC memory on K7S5A without a problem,
which means the BIOS wasn't picky enough to reject ECC memory.
There is no reason to reject it anyway - using ECC memory
in a non-ECC board, means the extra ECC chip on the DIMM is
electrically "left dangling" and it doesn't receive any
data from the data bus.

When a motherboard won't beep, that means that something
bad happened to the BIOS. Like maybe the BIOS started to
parse the table of data from the SPD chip on the DIMM,
but crashed while parsing. Either that, or another reason
for silence when new RAM is plugged in, is the DIMM
shorting out a critical onboard power supply. That
is why I suggested testing the new DDR one stick at
a time, in case just one stick was defective.

In principle, a PCI Port 80 debugger card, could be
installed in slot #1, to collect more information during
POST. But the thing is, the POST codes are poorly documented,
and in all the cases that an original poster had access
to such a card, the test results shed no further light
on what the problem is. On the cards that have
little power status LEDs on them, sometimes the power
status LEDs tell you more than the POST codes do.

Paul

 

[Roger]

Hi,
I have got this off system> Bios V1, Processor AMD Duron (tm), MMX, 3DNow,
890 MHz

And also copied this below,

OS Name Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Version 5.1.2600 Service Pack 2 Build 2600
OS Manufacturer Microsoft Corporation
System Name
System Manufacturer ECS
System Model K7S5A
System Type X86-based PC
Processor x86 Family 6 Model 3 Stepping 1 AuthenticAMD ~896 Mhz
BIOS Version/Date American Megatrends Inc. 07.00T, 02/04/2001
SMBIOS Version 2.3
Windows Directory C:\WINDOWS
System Directory C:\WINDOWS\system32
Boot Device \Device\HarddiskVolume1
Locale United Kingdom
Hardware Abstraction Layer Version = "5.1.2600.2180
(xpsp_sp2_rtm.040803-2158)"

Roger
========================================================

The PC2700 memory is faster but this should not be an issue
as 2700 is the max speed and should work just fine a slower
speeds.

Two of my computers both have memory that is rated
faster than the computers require and I have no memory
problems.

--
JShttp://www.pagestart.com





There are two options at the Crucial site:
One will scan your PC, which is I believe what you let Crucial do.
The second option is the "Crucial Memory Advisor tool"
which has three step process were you select the
1) Manufacture = Elite Group (ECS)
2) Product Line = Elite Group (ECS) Motherboards
3) Select model = K7S5A
(Note: there are 3 K7S5A listed, you need to select the one that
matches
your system)
Click on the "Find it" button.
Scroll down the web page results displayed for system.
You should see DDR memory listed.
Look carefully at the specifications that are listed for the Crucial
DDR
memory
and see how it compares to the memory you purchased.
For example:
Part #: CT6464Z335 . DDR PC2700 . CL=2.5
Unbuffered . NON-ECC . DDR333 . 2.5V .
64Meg x 64 . . more details
Most likely from the specs listed above the
2.5V requirement is the most critical as some motherboards
require memory that will operate at a lower voltage.
--
JS
http://www.pagestart.com
--
[SNIP]
I have scanned at The Crucial site and posted here results I have
the
old SDRAM at the moment
a.. Maximum Memory Capacity: 1024MB
b.. Currently Installed Memory: 512MB
c.. Available Memory Slots: 0
d.. Number of Banks: 2
e.. Dual Channel Support: No
f.. CPU Manufacturer: AuthenticAMD
g.. CPU Family: AMD Duron(tm) Processor Model 3, Stepping 1
h.. CPU Speed: 896 MHz
i..
Well JS I followed as advised above on crucial and it returned parts
as
your example DDR. I checked the spec I have, and details are listed >>
Advert as 266Mhz 184 pin 512 MB PC 2100 DDR Ram 2.5v 2.1GB/sec.
On spec list it showed PC 2100/DDR 266= 133mhz/266mhz = Bandwidth of
2.128 GB/sec.
I tried them singular and they did not work. I contacted Novatech Tech
dept they looked at motherboard Manual for mine and could not
understand
why they did not work, as it should have been Auto pick up. I have to
return them for refund.
I quoted info from Crucial search on my unit and he said that info did
not
match what the Manual quoted, as they quote PC2700 which is higher !
Where do I go from here to get a "simple" update to DDR for my board
but
not having to pay through the nose for memory.
Regards Roger
===========================================
=======================================
I have since Googled about this board and DDR fitted and it seems on
various
sites there have been many with this DDR problem not booting. It was
mention
that this board is sensitive to make of memory, and they believe that
ECs
recommends Kingston, but one post said they had used crucial with
success
but they are far between with success results. Has anyone sorted this
problem before I buy memory again.
Roger
Kingston is generally accepted as a top quality memory maker. They
usually have huge R&D in the development of RAM.

Crucial also makes their own RAM.

Not every motherboard that was originally designed for a "lower speed"
DDR RAM module can also accept the higher speed modules. Depending
on the version of the BIOS installed on the motherboard, this may
work. In my experiense, ECS motherboard have always been "difficult"
using RAM out of the "expected" specification. Since the motherboard
is requiring DDR then DDR should be used.

The board uses SIS735, a "single chip" chipset. As usual, there
are a number of versions of the board, and I picked one at random.

http://download.ecs.com.tw/dlfileecs/manual/mb/eng/k7/k7s5a31eng.zip

The SIS735 operates the RAM interface, at up to PC2100 (DDR266).
Faster memory, such as PC2700 or PC3200, should be able to function as a
PC2100 stick. (The chips themselves are rated for variable clock rate,
to slightly below PC1600 rates.)

http://www.sis.com/products/sis735_features.htm

If the sticks were registered, instead of unbuffered, that
could throw the BIOS off. Normally, there would be a beep
pattern, for an obvious mismatch of that type. In Google
I see some people using ECC memory on K7S5A without a problem,
which means the BIOS wasn't picky enough to reject ECC memory.
There is no reason to reject it anyway - using ECC memory
in a non-ECC board, means the extra ECC chip on the DIMM is
electrically "left dangling" and it doesn't receive any
data from the data bus.

When a motherboard won't beep, that means that something
bad happened to the BIOS. Like maybe the BIOS started to
parse the table of data from the SPD chip on the DIMM,
but crashed while parsing. Either that, or another reason
for silence when new RAM is plugged in, is the DIMM
shorting out a critical onboard power supply. That
is why I suggested testing the new DDR one stick at
a time, in case just one stick was defective.

In principle, a PCI Port 80 debugger card, could be
installed in slot #1, to collect more information during
POST. But the thing is, the POST codes are poorly documented,
and in all the cases that an original poster had access
to such a card, the test results shed no further light
on what the problem is. On the cards that have
little power status LEDs on them, sometimes the power
status LEDs tell you more than the POST codes do.

Paul

 

[Paul]

Hi,
I have got this off system> Bios V1, Processor AMD Duron (tm), MMX, 3DNow,
890 MHz

And also copied this below,

OS Name Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Version 5.1.2600 Service Pack 2 Build 2600
OS Manufacturer Microsoft Corporation
System Name
System Manufacturer ECS
System Model K7S5A
System Type X86-based PC
Processor x86 Family 6 Model 3 Stepping 1 AuthenticAMD ~896 Mhz
BIOS Version/Date American Megatrends Inc. 07.00T, 02/04/2001
SMBIOS Version 2.3
Windows Directory C:\WINDOWS
System Directory C:\WINDOWS\system32
Boot Device \Device\HarddiskVolume1
Locale United Kingdom
Hardware Abstraction Layer Version = "5.1.2600.2180
(xpsp_sp2_rtm.040803-2158)"

Roger

You provided a BIOS string in the original post, but the thing is,
that number apparently isn't unique. The K7S5A was shipped by
both ECS and PC Chips, and I also found a version shipped by
Asrock. The BIOS string doesn't seem to tell you what
PCB revision is being used. You might have to physically
look at the PCB, for a revision number. And I'm not sure
that additional identity info is going to help here
anyway.

I'd try a different brand of RAM, and see if
it gets any further. If you are tight for funds, pick
up a used 128MB DDR stick somewhere, something small
that will be dirt cheap. Just to see if any DDR, can make
it run. The 128MB would be enough so that you could
enter the BIOS, and that would be proof enough that
some DDR works.

Do you have a URL available, to a web page that shows the
RAM you bought ? Just so I can check to see if it is an
unbuffered product or not.

This page shows two sticks near the bottom of the page.
Notice how a registered stick, has "extra chips in the
center". The unbuffered one in the example, only
has eight uniform chips showing. (No - I don't intend this
to be a primer about everything you could possibly
know about RAM. It may, however, coax the OP to describe
what his looks like.)

http://www.2cpu.com/articles/44_1.html

Paul

 

[Roger]

You provided a BIOS string in the original post, but the thing is,
that number apparently isn't unique. The K7S5A was shipped by
both ECS and PC Chips, and I also found a version shipped by
Asrock. The BIOS string doesn't seem to tell you what
PCB revision is being used. You might have to physically
look at the PCB, for a revision number. And I'm not sure
that additional identity info is going to help here
anyway.

I'd try a different brand of RAM, and see if
it gets any further. If you are tight for funds, pick
up a used 128MB DDR stick somewhere, something small
that will be dirt cheap. Just to see if any DDR, can make
it run. The 128MB would be enough so that you could
enter the BIOS, and that would be proof enough that
some DDR works.

Do you have a URL available, to a web page that shows the
RAM you bought ? Just so I can check to see if it is an
unbuffered product or not.

This page shows two sticks near the bottom of the page.
Notice how a registered stick, has "extra chips in the
center". The unbuffered one in the example, only
has eight uniform chips showing. (No - I don't intend this
to be a primer about everything you could possibly
know about RAM. It may, however, coax the OP to describe
what his looks like.)

http://www.2cpu.com/articles/44_1.html

Paul

Here is the page with the DDR they sent, which I have now returned for
refund.

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/dirresults.html?s=RAM-21/51s

Roger

 

[Paul]

Here is the page with the DDR they sent, which I have now returned for
refund.

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/dirresults.html?s=RAM-21/51s

Roger

That is a generic unbranded stick.

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?RAM-21/51S

There are various ways to make modules, and a couple of
kinds of unbranded memory. For example, if the chips had
"Novatech" screen printed on each one, you know that
Novatech did not make the chips in their basement. The
chips would be purchased as blanks, and labels added
afterwards. A contract manufacturer could make the sticks.
If the only evidence of Novatech is an adhesive label, then
those are easy to affix by the staff at Novatech.

http://www.simmtester.com/page/news/showpubnews.asp?num=144

I cannot tell anything from the visual appearance of the
module. For example, even if the memory chips were
crappy ones, you'd still expect the motherboard to
beep a "bad RAM" BIOS beep pattern, with the RAM installed.
For the board to be completely silent, again, doesn't
give any conclusive evidence as to what the problem is -
if the BIOS is crashing while parsing some info from
the module, that would make it a fault of the BIOS.

They look vaguely similar to Kingmax TinyBGA products.
But that is likely cosmetic, and the product probably
isn't traceable to Kingmax.

http://www.techwarelabs.com/reviews/memory/kingmaxddr400/index_2.shtml

Paul

 

[Roger]

That is a generic unbranded stick.

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?RAM-21/51S

There are various ways to make modules, and a couple of
kinds of unbranded memory. For example, if the chips had
"Novatech" screen printed on each one, you know that
Novatech did not make the chips in their basement. The
chips would be purchased as blanks, and labels added
afterwards. A contract manufacturer could make the sticks.
If the only evidence of Novatech is an adhesive label, then
those are easy to affix by the staff at Novatech.

http://www.simmtester.com/page/news/showpubnews.asp?num=144

I cannot tell anything from the visual appearance of the
module. For example, even if the memory chips were
crappy ones, you'd still expect the motherboard to
beep a "bad RAM" BIOS beep pattern, with the RAM installed.
For the board to be completely silent, again, doesn't
give any conclusive evidence as to what the problem is -
if the BIOS is crashing while parsing some info from
the module, that would make it a fault of the BIOS.

They look vaguely similar to Kingmax TinyBGA products.
But that is likely cosmetic, and the product probably
isn't traceable to Kingmax.

http://www.techwarelabs.com/reviews/memory/kingmaxddr400/index_2.shtml

Paul

The sticks were made by Samsung as they had their name on them.
Roger

 

[Roger]

The sticks were made by Samsung as they had their name on them.
Roger

I suppose it's too late now, but can you test them in
another computer ?

[Snip]

Yes they have gone Paul, I have seen on Ebay a working used Crucial 256mb of
correct spec, for £4-50 I think I should go for it at least you said my unit
should at least boot up to give me some sort of screen to view. I thought
this was going to be such an easy situation just to go from SDRAM To DDR on
my board, what a bugger it's been. I have appreciated all your comments.

Roger

 

[Roger]

Is this a 100MHz (200FSB) bus Duron, or a 133MHz (266FSB) one?

Run Cpu-Z and tell us what CPU spec is installed in this board
http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php

Kind of wondering if you could be overclocking the FSB, and while getting
away with it for SDRAM - DDR is behaving differently?

As Stated in post on 17th I have Processor AMD Doron (tm) MMX, 3DNow, 890MHz
And in the bios it shows CPU speed 100/100MHz. Dram Frequency 100MHz.
And Auto Detect Dimm/ PCI is On. The SDR/DDR CAS Latency is SPD, RAS
Active time 6T, RAS Precharge time 4T
Hope this is helpful.
Roger