"system failed cpu test" on P4P800

[Lasher]

I really hope somebody can help with this one.
My specs.

Antec Sonata 380W TruePower ATX12V
P4 3.0
Asus P4P800 Deluxe
1GB Kingston RAM DDC PC-3200
ATI Radeon 9800
Maxtor SATA 160GB Harddrive
DVD Drive

I have add this system for about 2 weeks.
After 1 week of running with 0 problem, the issues started up.

"system failed cpu test". I am starting to really hate that girl's
voice. lol.
This message will come up just when getting into Windows XP.
Sometimes, Windows will start and things will work for about 5
minutes, 10 minutes, even 2-3 hours before the message. Sometimes the
message will come up but Windows will keep working.

I have noticed that the voltages are off sometimes.
3.3V can drop below 3.0V at times.
5.0V can drop to about 4.2V at times.
These will bring up the message about the CPU immediately.

Also sometimes on boot, the board doesn't pickup the harddrive. It
will complain that it has nothing to boot from. Sure enough in the
BIOS it only is picking up the DVD Drive. But after yet another boot
the Maxtor drive is there.

I took this system in to be serviced with the complaints above. Their
solution. We upgrade the BIOS and ran a game (in a loop) for 24 hours.
No errors. Came home with the system (very suspect of their work) and
right away my old friend greated me with a quick "system failed cpu
test".

They suggested that the power supply out of my outlet is the cause.
They said it must have a drop in power and therefore the machine is
loosing power and the message occurs. They had no problem cause they
have 'certified hydro power' whatever the #@$$ that is.

So I changed power outlets. Even tried a friend's house. The problem
continues.
I am taking this box back to the store. I suspect that either the
board or the power supply is the cause.

Any suggestions on what else I can check would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance

 

[Paul]

I really hope somebody can help with this one.
My specs.

Antec Sonata 380W TruePower ATX12V
P4 3.0
Asus P4P800 Deluxe
1GB Kingston RAM DDC PC-3200
ATI Radeon 9800
Maxtor SATA 160GB Harddrive
DVD Drive

I have add this system for about 2 weeks.
After 1 week of running with 0 problem, the issues started up.

"system failed cpu test". I am starting to really hate that girl's
voice. lol.
This message will come up just when getting into Windows XP.
Sometimes, Windows will start and things will work for about 5
minutes, 10 minutes, even 2-3 hours before the message. Sometimes the
message will come up but Windows will keep working.

I have noticed that the voltages are off sometimes.
3.3V can drop below 3.0V at times.
5.0V can drop to about 4.2V at times.
These will bring up the message about the CPU immediately.

Also sometimes on boot, the board doesn't pickup the harddrive. It
will complain that it has nothing to boot from. Sure enough in the
BIOS it only is picking up the DVD Drive. But after yet another boot
the Maxtor drive is there.

I took this system in to be serviced with the complaints above. Their
solution. We upgrade the BIOS and ran a game (in a loop) for 24 hours.
No errors. Came home with the system (very suspect of their work) and
right away my old friend greated me with a quick "system failed cpu
test".

They suggested that the power supply out of my outlet is the cause.
They said it must have a drop in power and therefore the machine is
loosing power and the message occurs. They had no problem cause they
have 'certified hydro power' whatever the #@$$ that is.

So I changed power outlets. Even tried a friend's house. The problem
continues.
I am taking this box back to the store. I suspect that either the
board or the power supply is the cause.

Any suggestions on what else I can check would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance

As for their suggestion the problem is with the AC power from the
wall, probably not. A switching supply automatically compensates for
line side variations, so as long as the voltage stays above 90VAC (
on a 115V cct) it should still work. If you notice your lights
blinking a lot, then it is possible, but remember that the PS has
a "hold-up time" of 20 milliseconds or more, and runs off the energy
stored in the main capacitor, so the blinking of the lights would
have to be very bad for a line problem to be the cause.

Try pulling out the ATX 20 pin connector, and examine it for damage.
If the connector pins aren't making good contact, they can heat up
and the nylon shell of the connector can get burned. Damage like that
is kind of chronic, in that if the contact area on the connector is
not working properly, it will never get better. If it is burned, it
should be replaced, because the contact problem will happen again.

For the 3.3V to get down to 3.0V, this is a 10% drop, and a PS
usually has better regulation than this (5% max). There will be
a 3.3V pin on the ATX 20 pin connector, that has two wires connected
to it - the thinner of the wires is used to sense and adjust the
3.3V on the PS. So, for the voltage to drop like that, the sense
wire would have to be busted, or the PS feels it is under an
overload, so it is just about to shut down or something.

You don't list the +12V, but I presume that is on the low side as
well.

Either there is some fault in a component in your system, the PS
is defective (it can happen, even to a Truepower), or a connector
is bad. A tech should be using a voltmeter and a DC clamp-on ammeter,
to get an independent picture of what is going on, from a loading
perspective. If your computer store just has "component changer"
type techs, they might not find the problem.

If you feel that really warm air is coming from the PS exhaust,
or the computer case is hot where the PS is bolted to the case,
then something is drawing too much power from the PS.

There were some problems with P4C800 boards, where a solder blob
underneath the CPU socket was shorting, but I don't know if the
same problem ever happened to the P4P800 or not. In the following
picture, the lower right chunk of solder gets squashed by the
bracket on the underside of the motherboard, and you can see how
the bulge is touching an adjacent track. That was causing an
overload on the P4C800 boards. You have to pull out the motherboard
to examine for this.

http://koti.mbnet.fi/~nightops/eki/DSC00249.JPG

HTH,
Paul

 

[Lasher]

Thanks for the help.
I have never had an light flicker from that outlet or circuit.
Furthermore, I had a computer working there with no problems before
(300W, AMD system).

My gut feeling was the PS or the board itself. I further suspect that
the tech inspection the first time around consist of nothing more than
a visual inspection and bios update.

I will be providing them with more suggestions this time around.
I had heard about the board/cpu issue in posts before and orginally
thought that was the cause but it looks clean after an inspection.
I never checked the voltages myself (outside of tools from ASUS). No
idea if they have the skills to do this. If not, i guess they will be
stucking swapping components.

Again, Thanks for your help.

 

[sbb78247]

Go check out alt.comp.periphs.videocard.ati and search for the sonata case
and the radeon 9800. I seem to remember there being an issue with them.

Shannon

 

[Paul]

Go check out alt.comp.periphs.videocard.ati and search for the sonata case
and the radeon 9800. I seem to remember there being an issue with them.

Shannon

Wow. I never would have thought of that. This thread (click Complete
Thread) discusses some issues with the 380W supply in the Sonata
versus the 9800. The suggestion in that thread, is the 380W supply
is not the same as buying a retail 380W Antec Power supply.

http://groups.google.com/[email protected]

Interesting theory.
Paul

 

[Lasher]

In case this helps someone.

I swapped out the PS from my Antec 380W TruePower.
Put in a generic 300W PS and the problem went away.

I can say that the PS was working properly. Tests showed nothing
wrong.

I suspect the conflict was with the video card. But I don't have
access to hardware to allow for swapping things so the video card is
only an assumption.

Hope that helps.....