A7N8X-X died on me!

[William]

I returned it and am getting a new one.

AND...

I read on this Anandtech forum that n-force 2 boards die if you try to overclock them. If this is true, then, well, mine died. I tried overclocking my XP2600 barton, and I ran Prime for ten minutes, went to the bathroom, and came back to find the computer completely powered off. I tried to power it on, but nothing worked or powered up. I switched out the parts and the cpu (and this barton worked in another mb I have, so it's not the cpu) and got nothing.

Oh well.

 

[BlueWeasel]

Originally posted by: William
I switched out the parts and the cpu (and this barton worked in another mb I have, so it's not the cpu) and got nothing....

Let me guess....you didn't even try to clear the CMOS, did you? If you didn't even attempt to do that, then that board may or may not be dead.

Yeah, sure, there is always a chance (albeit a very small one if you KNOW what you're doing) that you could damage your CPU or board when overclocking. This exists with all MB's - there is no reason that Nforce2 boards are more prone to "die" when OC'ing.

 

[William]

I didn't mention it, but I did clear the CMOS, so you can take your rant about n-force2 boards elsewhere. I only broached what I had heard of them.

 

[Duvie]

Originally posted by: BlueWeasel

Originally posted by: William
I switched out the parts and the cpu (and this barton worked in another mb I have, so it's not the cpu) and got nothing....

Let me guess....you didn't even try to clear the CMOS, did you? If you didn't even attempt to do that, then that board may or may not be dead.

Yeah, sure, there is always a chance (albeit a very small one if you KNOW what you're doing) that you could damage your CPU or board when overclocking. This exists with all MB's - there is no reason that Nforce2 boards are more prone to "die" when OC'ing.

I have to agree with the blu weasel here...most of those threads I read sure sounded like newbies who didn't know how to short the board or power supply and clear the cmos....There are more options then just a jumper....I don't think most of these boards are totally dead and I have a feeling it will be a nice refurb for someone.....

I always wondered why someof these refurbs are so awesome...Now I am starting to understand it a bit...


Edit: recheck some of these threads and you may see someof these guys got them started again and not all from a simple cmos jumper or pulling the battery....

 

[Shinei]

I'm having a similar problem, though my problem stems more from the fact that I'm suffering from underclocking... My GA-7N400 Pro2 refuses to boot if I push the bus of my 2800+ Barton over 110MHz; the hardware will spin up, but the video signal stays black unless I clear the CMOS by popping the battery. Now, for a processor that's SUPPOSED to pull 2.08GHz, getting to 1.313GHz without having audio or boot problems is pretty sad...

Edit: Yeah, it's not exactly on topic, but since the guy RMA'd his board already, I figure I may as well use an existing topic to get a reply, since no one seems to read my topics...

 

[Duvie]

I would likely rma that one....

have you tried setting the agp slightly out of spec??? Like 68-70mhz on the agp line???


I have heard of one that when the guy tested it his agp lock was malfunctioning and it was out of spec....He wasn't ocing either but just at default it wasn't giving it 66mhz like it was supposed to...

 

[William]

It's all in the assumptive stance he took.

Sure, he could have asked me if I had reset the CMOS, but he took it upon himself to snidely assume I hadn't, as opposed to simply asking me if I had. That's pretty much an ad hominem attack, anyone can read through condescending tripe like that.

 

[Duvie]

Originally posted by: William
It's all in the assumptive stance he took.

Sure, he could have asked me if I had reset the CMOS, but he took it upon himself to snidely assume I hadn't, as opposed to simply asking me if I had. That's pretty much an ad hominem attack, anyone can read through condescending tripe like that.

point taken...It was a bit to assumming but one can understand when there has been quite a few threads here and elsewhere on this and in a lot of those situations many did not clear cmos or try anything....I can imagine not all are technological geekified to try a lot of the options out of the norm of the manual but in many I have read we got the boards running again....

 

[Doh!]

This sounds like the problem that was raised during the introduction period of nForce2 boards when certain nForce2 boards would have problems booting once an overclocking attempt failed/crashed. I'd assumed that this problem was corrected w/ later revisions for many boards but I'm not sure. For MSI boards, an extra jumper for 100mhz in included which can be used in case a failed overclocking attempt results in a "seemingly" dead MB.

 

[BlueWeasel]

Originally posted by: William
It's all in the assumptive stance he took.

Sure, he could have asked me if I had reset the CMOS, but he took it upon himself to snidely assume I hadn't, as opposed to simply asking me if I had. That's pretty much an ad hominem attack, anyone can read through condescending tripe like that.

*puts on kid gloves*

Like Duvie said, I can't tell you how many times people jump on the board and rant about how their system is dead without exploring all options. I admit, I did make an assumption that turned out to be wrong (lord knows that's not the first time that's happened) and apologize if you were offended.

*takes gloves off*

Regardless, you didn't mention reseting the CMOS in your initial post. 99% of the experienced OC'ers around here would have told you the exact same thing, because based on the wording of your post, you seem to be someone who is new to overclocking.

Sheesh, I didn't think my post wasn't THAT bad. Try going and hanging out in the OT forum...

Now, since we are talking about overclocking, what settings were you using when the system crashed? Also, what are your system specs?

 

[Shimmishim]

lol duvie!

yeah, i literally "frankensteined" my mobo back to life! gave it a few shocks from the atx connector and it came back to life!!!



whew!

now if i could only figure out how to get this darn prommy set up

 

[dnoyeb]

Sometimes if you have another processor laying around, try that one. Several times I have encountered this situation where the MB seemed to be dead, and clearing the cmos would not fix it. only to find that it would boot with a duron.

I think this is why ASUS still uses jumpers for certain things. that way the cmos is less likely to keep you from booting which you need to do to fix the cmos sometimes.

 

[William]

A7N8X-X, barton 2600XP, OCZ 3200 stick of 256mb (default 2-3-3-5).

I was running 11.5x180 (2070mhz).


Then it crapped out on me after 5 minutes of Prime and wouldn't turn on.

I replaced the board with another A7N8X-X today, and am running stock speed, but I'd to overclock it. Any ideas?

 

[myocardia]

Originally posted by: William
A7N8X-X, barton 2600XP, OCZ 3200 stick of 256mb (default 2-3-3-5).

I was running 11.5x180 (2070mhz).


Then it crapped out on me after 5 minutes of Prime and wouldn't turn on.

I replaced the board with another A7N8X-X today, and am running stock speed, but I'd to overclock it. Any ideas?

William, I've recommended this many times, because it works so well for me. It lets me boot at near stock speeds (100mhz over, actually), then overclock from Windows. If you try to go too high, Windows will freeze, and you push the reset button. When it reboots, it's always right back where you started from. It's called Clockgen, just click here to download it. You'll want to download CG-NVNF2, which is halfway down the page. It works great, I promise.

 

[BlueWeasel]

Nice link to Clockgen, myocardia. I haven't heard of it until now and I could certainly put it to use.

 

[myocardia]

Blue, I forgot to say in that last post, that it only lets you adjust the fsb, not the multi. Anyway, it's actually the best thing I've seen in OCing in a long time, besides the pci/agp lock.

 

[William]

Thanks. Clockgen seems interesting. It's working so far

 

[MMarks2]

Mine died as well. Need help.

1st time booting up booted into bios which i did to change fsb i though from 100 to 166.

Never booted again.

Tried -cpu switch, ram switch, cmos clear with battery and jumper, reinstalling all components.

Any suggestions.

 

[William]

I'm using a nice, big Speez fan/heatsink. What should thermal paste I buy, and where?

Using a 2600XP barton.

 

[BlueWeasel]

Well, most everyone around here swears on Artic Silver 5, which is available at SVC or Newegg. You might also try a local computer shop, as some of them have generic silver compound that probably performs similar to AS5.

Your overclocking temps should be OK, as long as you are using some type of thermal compound and not the AMD thermal PAD that comes on the bottom of the retail HSF. Just be sure to apply a very thin layer, and you should be good to go with the Speeze cooler.

I'd go ahead and get some AS5 if you are serious about OC'ing, but any compound you can get at a computer shop should be adequate for OC'ing until your AS5 arrives. Just be sure and monitor the CPU temps, and try to keep them around 55C or lower.

 

[William]

Thanks, I'm going to order it.

 

[BlueWeasel]

William:

I've been thinking about getting that particular Speeze cooler for one of my systems. How quiet is it and how does the noise compare to the retail AMD fan?

 

[xSkyDrAx]

I doubt there is any generic compounds that perform similar to AS3 let alone AS5.

 

[BlueWeasel]

Originally posted by: xSkyDrAx
I doubt there is any generic compounds that perform similar to AS3 let alone AS5.

Well, I picked up a tube of silver compound from my local computer store and it was made by Manhattan Computers. It's keeping my 2500+ running at 11x182 = 2.01ghz at 45C load with a TT Silent Boost. Not bad I say for a generic silver compound I paid $1.50 for a medium size tube.

Now...how it performs to AS3/AS5, I'll let you know in a few days. My shipment from SVC should be here any day now.

 

[SilentAssassin]

Originally posted by: MMarks2
Mine died as well. Need help.

1st time booting up booted into bios which i did to change fsb i though from 100 to 166.

Never booted again.

Tried -cpu switch, ram switch, cmos clear with battery and jumper, reinstalling all components.

Any suggestions.

My Asus A7N8X Deluxe ran fine for 6 months. Then one day when I went to up the fsb a little it never booted again. didn't even get to a boot logo and no beeps or anything. Only the fans and that's it. Turns out my bios got currupted. Had to send in the bios chip to Asus and they flash it with the latest version and sent it back to me. It's been working fine since then and even overclocked and is still running.