Soltek Nforce3 memory troubles

[Tom]

I added a second 512mb DDR pc4000 dimm to my Soltek Nforce3 Athlon64
system and it does not show during post or within WinXP. I have tried
all combinations of the 2 memory modules and the 2 memory slots and
only one of the 2 dimms will ever show up. Either dimm will work fine
alone in either slot but together I can only get one to show in POST.

The 2 dimms are as follows: OCZ 512mb pc4000 Rev3 and Corsair XMS4000
512mb. According to the manual the board should work with upto 2 1GB
DIMMS. Any help would be appreciated. I have e-mail Soltek tech support
but heard nothing yet.

 

[George Macdonald]

I added a second 512mb DDR pc4000 dimm to my Soltek Nforce3 Athlon64
system and it does not show during post or within WinXP. I have tried
all combinations of the 2 memory modules and the 2 memory slots and
only one of the 2 dimms will ever show up. Either dimm will work fine
alone in either slot but together I can only get one to show in POST.

The 2 dimms are as follows: OCZ 512mb pc4000 Rev3 and Corsair XMS4000
512mb. According to the manual the board should work with upto 2 1GB
DIMMS. Any help would be appreciated. I have e-mail Soltek tech support
but heard nothing yet.

With the timing tolerances on modern memory, it's always better to stay
with one particular brand and type... especially if those are double sided
DIMMs, you've got the memory bus loaded up to its max. Have you tried
going into BIOS Setup and turning off SPD and slowing down the timings
manually?... maybe even try a slower than spec clock speed just to see if
that makes it work. Are you actually using the 250MHz (DDR500) clock that
the memory claims to support? I'm not sure how that impacts the
Hypertransport clocking with that chipset.

 

[Tom]

I am actually running the memory at 220mhz. I also have the
hypertransport set to 4x the mem bus. I have tried running them at
200mhz and have tried various manual mem timings to no avail. Both
modules are double sided. I guess I'll have to order a matching dimm
and hope for the best.

 

[George Macdonald]

I am actually running the memory at 220mhz. I also have the
hypertransport set to 4x the mem bus. I have tried running them at
200mhz and have tried various manual mem timings to no avail. Both
modules are double sided. I guess I'll have to order a matching dimm
and hope for the best.

If Soltek doesn't have a list of recommended modules, take a look at docs
for similar mbrds from other mfrs, e.g. at http://www.msi.com.tw/index.htm.
There are some interesting discussions here
http://forum.msi.com.tw/board.php?boardid=28&sid=5bdfebce8533899bbd9df9e1d9ccd306
Apparently some people have found A64 mbrds picky on memory - personally I
tend to go for Crucial and have never had trouble.

I assume you checked for BIOS updates?