games crashing on NF7-S

KjellB. · Oct 21, 2003

First of all; I don't know if my problems are related to the mobo, just want to figure out if anyone else is having similar problems. I currently have 4 games installed, Colin McRae 3 (cmr), Rise of Nations (ron), Flight Simulator 2004 (fs9) and Falcon 4 (f4). ron, fs9 and f4 keeps shutting down, either with a crash to desktop or a reboot, with not-so-helpful crash reports from xp. cmr runs, but not as smoothly as one would hope for, but at least doesn't crash. I can sometimes play ron, fs9 and f4 for up to an hour without crash, but they eventually will crash. I've run burn in tests (cpu burn-in and all the sandra test and memtest), and cpu never exceeds 50 degC, and no instability is showing up. These are my primary reasons for not thinking it's the mobo, but you'll never know. I'm just reading and posting in different ng to see if I can find a solution. system: nf7-s v2, bios 19
xp2500+ run as xp3200+
2 x 512mb ram twinmos run as dual channel
350w fortron/source psu
40gb ibm 60gxp hdd
radeon 9500 pro video
Newest drivers for everything, win xp pro sp1 & numerous patches, dx 9.0b.

all suggestions, links or whatever much appreciated.

KjellB

KjellB. · Oct 21, 2003

2 x 512mb ram twinmos run as dual channel

set to 'by spd' btw...

Wayne Youngman · Oct 21, 2003

"KjellB." wrote

I currently have 4 games installed, Colin McRae 3 (cmr), Rise of Nations (ron), Flight Simulator 2004 (fs9) and Falcon 4 (f4). ron, fs9 and f4 keeps shutting down, either with a crash to desktop or a reboot, with not-so-helpful crash reports from xp. cmr runs, but not as smoothly as one would hope for, but at least doesn't crash. I can sometimes play ron, fs9 and f4 for up to an hour without crash, but they eventually will crash. I've run burn in tests (cpu burn-in and all the sandra test and memtest), and cpu never exceeds 50 degC, and no instability is showing up. These are my primary reasons for not thinking it's the mobo, but you'll never know. I'm just reading and posting in different ng to see if I can find a solution. ...

Hi,
not sure what the problem is? I run a similar set-up and it works flawlessly. Out of interest who is *Fortron* (I'm U.K based) are they a reputable brand name in PSU's? that's the only possible weak-spot I see in your very nice machine. . .

dr_hardware · Oct 21, 2003

"KjellB." wrote:

First of all; I don't know if my problems are related to the mobo, just want to figure out if anyone else is having similar problems. I currently have 4 games installed, Colin McRae 3 (cmr), Rise of Nations (ron), Flight Simulator 2004 (fs9) and Falcon 4 (f4). ron, fs9 and f4 keeps shutting down, either with a crash to desktop or a reboot, with not-so-helpful crash reports from xp. cmr runs, but not as smoothly as one would hope for, but at least doesn't crash. I can sometimes play ron, fs9 and f4 for up to an hour without crash, but they eventually will crash. I've run burn in tests (cpu burn-in and all the sandra test and memtest), and cpu never exceeds 50 degC, and no instability is showing up. These are my primary reasons for not thinking it's the mobo, but ...

First, problems have been reported with the Catalyst 3.8 drivers. See this:
http://www.overclockers.com/tips00479/

I doubt, however, that's your problem. Have you increased the CPU core voltage? With overclocking, it's usually necessary to raise the Vcore for stability under stress. Also, the new BIOS (d19) has been reported to cause problems as well. I'm running with d17 and have no problems, although I only play UT2003 as far as games are concerned.

Helge Johnsen · Oct 21, 2003

<snip>

Hi,
not sure what the problem is? I run a similar set-up and it works flawlessly. Out of interest who is *Fortron* (I'm U.K based) are they a reputable brand name in PSU's? that's the only possible weak-spot I see in your very nice machine. . .
--

<snip>
Fortron is also sold as Conrad and Verax (and is pretty much the same as Sparkle) Very good PSU.

NF7, Fortron 350W, TwinMOS (CH-5), XP2100+ @ 2400MHz
On my rig I have to set the memvoltage from 2,7V to 2,8V to get it stable at FSB>200MHz

Helge

Skid · Oct 22, 2003

"dr_hardware" wrote:

First, problems have been reported with the Catalyst 3.8 drivers. See

this:

http://www.overclockers.com/tips00479/

I know this is heading OT and doesn't answer the OP's question. But ...

For the record, ATI flatly denies that their drivers cause card overheating or blown monitors. They say they haven't had a single report to their own support people or from any of their more than 100 OEMs. These conspiracy theories are concentrated in a few hardware forums, where suspicion is now focusing on plants by Nvidia fanboys.

I know you give good advice, Doc, and I'm sure you don't want to aid the spread of unsupported trash-talk.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/33492.html

http://www.rage3d.com/#1066668794

dr_hardware · Oct 22, 2003

"Skid" wrote:

"dr_hardware" wrote:

First, problems have been reported with the Catalyst 3.8 drivers. See this:
http://www.overclockers.com/tips00479/

I know this is heading OT and doesn't answer the OP's question. But ...

For the record, ATI flatly denies that their drivers cause card overheating or blown monitors. They say they haven't had a single report to their own support people or from any of their more than 100 OEMs. These conspiracy theories are concentrated in a few hardware forums, where suspicion is now focusing on plants by Nvidia fanboys.

I know you give good advice, Doc, and I'm sure you don't want to aid the spread of unsupported trash-talk.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/33492.html

http://www.rage3d.com/#1066668794

Thanks for the heads up regarding the drivers, Skid. I certainly don't believe they can harm a monitor, and am not entirely convinced they could cause extra heat, but overclockers.com usually doesn't post anything of that nature unless they feel there *may* be a problem and I thought it couldn't hurt to point it out. If that's all there is to it, then that's great. I had no problem with 3.8 myself, although there was no improvement over the 3.7's with my 9500Pro.

minus200 · Oct 22, 2003

my guess would be heat related most likely the video card. it could also be faulty RAM or heat failure on your ram. just a guess

could be power supply but not likely

"KjellB." wrote:

First of all; I don't know if my problems are related to the mobo, just want to figure out if anyone else is having similar problems. I currently have 4 games installed, Colin McRae 3 (cmr), Rise of Nations (ron), Flight Simulator 2004 (fs9) and Falcon 4 (f4). ron, fs9 and f4 keeps shutting down, either with a crash to desktop or a reboot, with not-so-helpful crash reports from xp. cmr runs, but not as smoothly as one would hope for, but at least doesn't crash. I can sometimes play ron, fs9 and f4 for up to an hour without crash, but they eventually will crash. I've run burn in tests (cpu burn-in and all the sandra test and memtest), and cpu never exceeds 50 degC, and no instability is showing up. These are my primary reasons for not thinking it's the mobo, but ...

KjellB. · Oct 23, 2003

First, problems have been reported with the Catalyst 3.8 drivers. See this:
http://www.overclockers.com/tips00479/

I doubt, however, that's your problem. Have you increased the CPU core voltage? With overclocking, it's usually necessary to raise the Vcore for stability under stress. Also, the new BIOS (d19) has been reported to cause problems as well. I'm running with d17 and have no problems, although I only play UT2003 as far as games are concerned.

I hadn't increased the core voltage, I have now though, still crashing, and, actually it was crashing when the cpu was running at default speed as well.. Went back to cat 3.6, no difference. Sometimes after one of these crashes, if I don't reboot, IE also crashes (been playing rise of nations, game crash, surfed web to search for solutions - IE 6 crash, this has happened several times). Mostly winXP reports the cause being a unspecified device driver, once it reported ram trouble. Ran memtest last night (full set of tests) without problems reported. Waiting on a new hdd, and as I want to install windows on that I haven't activated it, and suspiciously enough - often after a crash that little balloon reminding me to activate comes up simultaneously with the crash. Coincidence?

Kjell