Go Back   PCMech Forums > Help & Discussion > Computer Hardware

Need Some Help? Type Your Keywords Here:

Reply
 
LinkBack Thread Tools Search this Thread Rate Thread Display Modes
Old 11-25-2006, 12:41 AM   #1
Member (3 bit)
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
Posts: 6
Need help with strange Bios

First, here are my specs :

Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 2.4 Ghz

Abit AB9 Motherboard with latest Bios

Corsair TWINX XMS2 PC-6400-C4 Version (2 x 1 GB Matched Pair)

Gecube ATI Radeon X1950 Pro 256MB

Antec P180 Case + Antec TRIO! 550W PS


I was changing the bios values as the Abit settings seemed to be wrong. The Corsair DDR2 800 RAM C4 version was supposed to have a timing of 4-4-4-12, but with the default SPD settings, only runs at 5-5-5-16. I changed the values, and then changed the RAM settings underneath the CPU clock speed to DDR2-800 instead of SPD AUTO.

The PC then would not boot, and following the instructions in the AB9 manual, I placed the 3 pin jumper on the reset mode, waited 40 seconds, then took it out and replaced it in the default position.

The PC then booted, but something was not right. The bios screen had some sort of weird coloured rectangular spots and felt as if it was going to crash. I exited the bios after setting it on normal values.

I thought the bios was corrupted, so I tried to re-flash the bios with the same bios file to overwrite the current one, but it just would not work and stopped. I reset the computer, and the bios read : CMOS CHECKSUM ERROR - Defaults loaded.

My computer has not been quite stable since.

Can anyone help me out ?

Could there be damage to the motherboard ?
ELDDJOC is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-25-2006, 01:19 AM   #2
Member (11 bit)
 
chuck4456's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: eastern nc
Posts: 1,349
Could be mislabeled. What is your DDR SDRAM Voltage reading ? That board automatically defaults to 1.8v after a reset. Most Corsair XMS operates at 1.9v. Check that.
BIOS 1.5 is supposed to address that. Is that what you have?
__________________
DFI LP LT X48-E8600-Thermalright HR01 Plus-GeIL Esoteria PC2 6400-Sapphire HD3870 Xfire-Seagate Barracuda Drives-Antec P182-XP Pro
ASUS P5Q Deluxe-Q6700-TRUE BE-Noctua Fan-Corsair Dominator C5DF-Sapphire HD4870T-WD Black Drives-CM690-Windows 7
- powered by PC POWER & COOLING -

Last edited by chuck4456; 11-25-2006 at 01:42 AM.
chuck4456 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-25-2006, 02:35 PM   #3
Member (11 bit)
 
chuck4456's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: eastern nc
Posts: 1,349
Had to go to work this AM, so I cut it short last nite. Checking in to see if you had any luck. Either you did, or your set your PC in the drive and drove over it with your car. Let us know what you found.
chuck4456 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-25-2006, 03:57 PM   #4
Member (3 bit)
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
Posts: 6
Quote:
Originally Posted by chuck4456
Could be mislabeled. What is your DDR SDRAM Voltage reading ? That board automatically defaults to 1.8v after a reset. Most Corsair XMS operates at 1.9v. Check that.
BIOS 1.5 is supposed to address that. Is that what you have?

I have the latest bios for the AB9 board, dated 10.19.2006.

The DD2 voltage is on AUTO, and reads 2.0 V.

I dare not change it again because I do not want to manually reset the CMOS jumper again.

Will a newer bios update get rid of the CMOS Checksum error : defaults loaded error ?

Or is the AB9 board not supposed to be compatible with Corsair DD2-800 C4 ram and Core 2 Duo processors ?
ELDDJOC is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-25-2006, 09:34 PM   #5
Member (11 bit)
 
chuck4456's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: eastern nc
Posts: 1,349
This may sound like a crazy question (but): Is your time and date accurate?
chuck4456 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-25-2006, 10:11 PM   #6
V12
 
Mr.Ferrari's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Houston, T.E.X.A.S
Posts: 3,488
Send a message via AIM to Mr.Ferrari
1. SET your N/B strap to "BY CPU"
2. Set your DRAM Spec to "BY SPD"
3. Lock your pci-e clock to 100mhz
4. Set your DDR2 voltage to 2.1V
5. Put your DRAM timings to BY SPD or if your gonna change them, make sure they correspond. Not all bios' have the timings in order.
I.E 1-2-3-4 Might be 1-3-2-4 in bios.

Try it now. If that doesnt work then it may turn out to be a bad flash. In which case....
www.badflash.com
__________________
“We must not let ourselves get driven off course, no matter what happens we must stick to our natural game”
-Zenedine Zidane

Last edited by Mr.Ferrari; 11-25-2006 at 11:09 PM.
Mr.Ferrari is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-25-2006, 10:58 PM   #7
Member (9 bit)
 
DarkPacMan77's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jul 2006
Posts: 398
aren't those the default settings for that bios?

if not, change them, but like Mr. Ferrari suggested last... it seems to me like a bad flash

edit: awesome website btw Mr. Ferrari, I had never heard of a site like that before.
DarkPacMan77 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-26-2006, 01:04 AM   #8
Member (11 bit)
 
chuck4456's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: eastern nc
Posts: 1,349
That concurrs with what I was getting at. My suggestion was going to be to load in the defaults, be sure it was all running OK, and then leave the PC on all nite. In the morning, he could get up, shut the system OFF for about a half hour and then fire it back up in order to see if he still got that error. That could eliminate the possibilty of a faulty battery. There are also several instances of AB9 (Pro) with ANTEC PSU problems. The first switch on powers the PSU but never reaches the motherboard. Then at the second switch on, the power does go thru, but the system has already reset itself. If it turns out to be BIOS, U-ABIT will send him a new chip if he needs it. If it's a new board, he can (most likely) get a case number from U-ABIT and get a brand new one. Covering all bases for accurate diagnosis.
chuck4456 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-26-2006, 01:14 AM   #9
V12
 
Mr.Ferrari's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Houston, T.E.X.A.S
Posts: 3,488
Send a message via AIM to Mr.Ferrari
We'll he said he was messing around with the Dividers, and the fact that his ram needs 2.1v. Not 2.0v. Also could be an issue of setting the timings wrong.

Bad flash would be next logical step.
Mr.Ferrari is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-26-2006, 01:18 AM   #10
Member (3 bit)
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
Posts: 6
Quote:
Originally Posted by chuck4456
That concurrs with what I was getting at. My suggestion was going to be to load in the defaults, be sure it was all running OK, and then leave the PC on all nite. In the morning, he could get up, shut the system OFF for about a half hour and then fire it back up in order to see if he still got that error. That could eliminate the possibilty of a faulty battery. There are also several instances of AB9 (Pro) with ANTEC PSU problems. The first switch on powers the PSU but never reaches the motherboard. Then at the second switch on, the power does go thru, but the system has already reset itself. If it turns out to be BIOS, U-ABIT will send him a new chip if he needs it. If it's a new board, he can (most likely) get a case number from U-ABIT and get a brand new one. Covering all bases for accurate diagnosis.

All are on defaults as you guys suggested, but bios flash still gives the CMOS checksum error.

Could it be a bad chip ? Or did I reset CMOS the wrong way ? I read somewhere you need to reset the cover on the 3 pin connector to clear, boot the PC, then reset the little cover to the normal position, then boot, to completely make the PC normal ?

Is it possible to kill the motherboard just because of my error in changing the value from SPD to DDR2 800 RAM ?
ELDDJOC is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-26-2006, 01:23 AM   #11
V12
 
Mr.Ferrari's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Houston, T.E.X.A.S
Posts: 3,488
Send a message via AIM to Mr.Ferrari
It really shouldnt. Which method did you use for the bios flash? Alt-F2? Floppy boot? Or windows flash?

And your memory is at 2.1v?

Perhaps reverting back to an older BIOS?

Last edited by Mr.Ferrari; 11-26-2006 at 01:26 AM.
Mr.Ferrari is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-26-2006, 02:17 AM   #12
Member (11 bit)
 
chuck4456's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: eastern nc
Posts: 1,349
Excellent suggestion. If your latest BIOS rev is 1.5, try going back to 1.4. Did this problem begin before or after you udated ?
chuck4456 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-26-2006, 05:37 AM   #13
Member (3 bit)
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
Posts: 6
Quote:
Originally Posted by chuck4456
Excellent suggestion. If your latest BIOS rev is 1.5, try going back to 1.4. Did this problem begin before or after you udated ?
Well ....

The bios weirdness happened after the computer would not boot with the new adjusted v1.5 bios settings, in which I changed both the RAM timings and RAM type to DDR2-800/DDR800 ?

After I cleared the CMOS and reset the jumper, the PC began acting strange, and I attempted to re-flash the bios with the v1.5 bios again, and the instability symptoms then started.

Bios 1.4 was updated to 1.5 even before I installed windows, as unless that happened, the SATA settings could not be done properly and windows would not install at all, and the only way around that was the flash v1.4 to 1.5.
ELDDJOC is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-26-2006, 04:01 PM   #14
Member (11 bit)
 
chuck4456's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: eastern nc
Posts: 1,349
The flash may have crashed your chip. I would use the BLACK BOX and submit all details to U-ABIT. I would also contact support by phone to be sure that they have received accurate details. Being Sunday, that may be tough to do. One last question: What Antivirus do you use in your system?
Please let us know what you find out.
chuck4456 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-26-2006, 04:16 PM   #15
Member (10 bit)
 
tempus's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Montreal, Canada
Posts: 705
Quote:
Originally Posted by ELDDJOC
Well ....

The bios weirdness happened after the computer would not boot with the new adjusted v1.5 bios settings, in which I changed both the RAM timings and RAM type to DDR2-800/DDR800 ?

After I cleared the CMOS and reset the jumper, the PC began acting strange, and I attempted to re-flash the bios with the v1.5 bios again, and the instability symptoms then started.

Bios 1.4 was updated to 1.5 even before I installed windows, as unless that happened, the SATA settings could not be done properly and windows would not install at all, and the only way around that was the flash v1.4 to 1.5.
Try removing the battery for several minutes, replace it, then try again. You attempted to reflash to the BIOS v1.5? Was this the correct BIOS for the board?
__________________
C1) Intel C2D 3.0GHz E8400 | Asus P5K-E - BIOS rev.1012 | Corsair 2GB | Ati HD 3850 | Seagate 7200.11 500gb SATA AD14 | Seagate 7200.10 320G SATA 3.AAC | LG GH20NS10 | Antec Sonata Plus 550 with Neopower | Samsung SyncMaster 931DF | Altec-Lansing VS2220 | D-Link DI-604 | Gnet BB2060 | Windows 7 Pro 64 bit
C2) Intel P4 2.8 GHz | Asus P4C800E-DX - BIOS rev.1023 | Corsair TwinX 1GB | Ati Radeon 9600XT | Maxtor SATA 200gb | Antec TP II 480W | LG GSA-H55N x 2 | Evercase E4252 | Samsung SyncMaster 731DF | Windows 7 Pro
tempus is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-26-2006, 05:50 PM   #16
Not so new
 
newbuilder14's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Maryland, United States
Posts: 2,576
Send a message via AIM to newbuilder14
Quote:
Originally Posted by chuck4456
The flash may have crashed your chip. I would use the BLACK BOX and submit all details to U-ABIT. I would also contact support by phone to be sure that they have received accurate details. Being Sunday, that may be tough to do. One last question: What Antivirus do you use in your system?
Please let us know what you find out.
Really sounds like what happened to one of my boards. I reset the CMOS and it was all downhill from there. Sometimes you just have a bad BIOS chip. Try to get Abit to send you a new one.
__________________
“To me there are three things everyone should do every day. Number one is laugh. Number two is think -- spend some time in thought. Number three, you should have your emotions move you to tears. If you laugh, think and cry, that's a heck of a day.” - Jim Valvano
newbuilder14 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-27-2006, 06:20 AM   #17
Member (3 bit)
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
Posts: 6
Quote:
Originally Posted by chuck4456
The flash may have crashed your chip. I would use the BLACK BOX and submit all details to U-ABIT. I would also contact support by phone to be sure that they have received accurate details. Being Sunday, that may be tough to do. One last question: What Antivirus do you use in your system?
Please let us know what you find out.
I cannot use the black box because it keeps wanting me to use outlook express and the setup wizard, which I don't use, not to mention that the blackbox incorrectly detected my RAM amount as 1GB not 2GB, which is weird.

I have written 2 emails to Abit support, but no response.

Somehow, I am beginning to feel that Abit is not as good as I thought they were.

Anyway, my virus checker is AVG 7.5 Free Edition.

Also, where is the bios chip and how do you replace it ?

Thanks guys
ELDDJOC is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-27-2006, 08:09 PM   #18
Member (11 bit)
 
chuck4456's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: eastern nc
Posts: 1,349
OKAYYYYYYY.......................
You built a new system as illustrated in the opening. Everything went well.
You installed Windows and the Jmicron drivers at the F6 prompt and it was all hunky-dory.
You had a good time with it. Then you decided it was time for a RAM upgrade.
You installed 2 gigs of Corsair XMS. That's when it all fell apart.
You updated your BIOS. No effect or improvement.
This is how I interpret it. We're going in a circle here. Do you have the RAM that you used originally?
The AB9Pro is an advanced board, designed for users that are very aware that they will be changing settings and making adjustments nearly everyday. It's that way because it's that way. The safety features kick in any time the sytem senses an improper setting or dangerous situation. If a user starts rearranging these settings and they are (simply) dead wrong, the board throws up its fail safe.
Give us exact, specific system specs and start over from the beginning with precise details. We don't want to see anyone not able to be happy with their system.
chuck4456 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-28-2006, 05:24 PM   #19
Member (3 bit)
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
Posts: 6
Angry Fire

Quote:
Originally Posted by chuck4456
OKAYYYYYYY.......................
You built a new system as illustrated in the opening. Everything went well.
You installed Windows and the Jmicron drivers at the F6 prompt and it was all hunky-dory.
You had a good time with it. Then you decided it was time for a RAM upgrade.
You installed 2 gigs of Corsair XMS. That's when it all fell apart.
You updated your BIOS. No effect or improvement.
This is how I interpret it. We're going in a circle here. Do you have the RAM that you used originally?
The AB9Pro is an advanced board, designed for users that are very aware that they will be changing settings and making adjustments nearly everyday. It's that way because it's that way. The safety features kick in any time the sytem senses an improper setting or dangerous situation. If a user starts rearranging these settings and they are (simply) dead wrong, the board throws up its fail safe.
Give us exact, specific system specs and start over from the beginning with precise details. We don't want to see anyone not able to be happy with their system.

I have already given the exact happenings in my first post, and with the RAM, it was in fact already installed. The memory timings were on 5-5-5-16, and I wanted to change it to 4-4-4-12, the verified low latency for the C4 Corsair RAM.

It is actually the normal AB9 board, not AB9 Pro. I chose Abit because I had used their boards before, and it was quite good. I had ASUS and Gigabyte boards fail on me before (default settings) and I did not like those two companies.

I am still awaiting a reply from Abit.
ELDDJOC is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-30-2006, 12:48 AM   #20
Member (11 bit)
 
chuck4456's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: eastern nc
Posts: 1,349
us_cts_abit_support
us_support@abit.com
chuck4456 is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Bookmarks

Still Need Help? Type Your Keywords Here:


Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search
Display Modes Rate This Thread
Rate This Thread:

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is On
Trackbacks are On
Pingbacks are On
Refbacks are On


Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
Bios rom checksum error Norm Computer Hardware 2 03-25-2005 04:42 PM
After upgrading BIOS, will not boot makapacs Computer Hardware 2 07-09-2004 10:56 AM
nForce2 BIOS Hot Flashing Guide Tin Computer Hardware 3 06-13-2004 01:53 PM
Front usb ports Chicster Computer Hardware 19 02-20-2002 12:52 PM
First run! Bios setup. Need your skill and expretise. calmius Computer Hardware 3 12-05-2001 07:47 AM


All times are GMT -5. The time now is 05:54 AM.
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.6
Copyright ©2000 - 2012, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
SEO by vBSEO 3.6.0