Serious problems with K7S5A

[majewski9]

Okay I know the ECS K7S5A isnt the best known for reliability, but the the price cannot be beat! So far there are two problems with this board that are just simply pissing me off. First of all I cant get it to work properly with my Radeon 32 meg! Even at the bios startup screen all I get is scrambled images. Second in WinXP it locks up after ten or so minutes! I have downloaded a newer BIOS and the AMI flasher, but how do I get to real DOS in WinXP? Any other drivers should I get? I already am downloading the AGP driver, what about any other drivers? anyone have had these problems with this board before?

I dont think I have IRQ setting problems! Other hardware: SB Live & 56k modem & my current vid card is a Rage xl 8meg!

 

[Toonces311]

Check out this FAQ it should answer most of those questions.

 

[majewski9]

Yeah I got it to become stable but at a huge scarfice!!!! I have to set my FSB to 100 instead of 133! So I am only at 1000mhz!!! I dont think I can stand that for very long!!!!

 

[Rickr]

Check out the message board at the FAQ link for more information.

The most likely cause of your problem is an underpowered power supply. Another source may be an overheating chipset. I would bet money on the power supply myself.

 

[nortexoid]

FLASH YOUR BIOS!!!

use the latest OFFICAL BIOS found on ECS' website dated 12/15/01...it resolves numerous memory timing issues as well as other problems...and if u want to o/c through the bios using unofficial bios FSB settings, READ THIS THREAD

I've noticed that it removes the 128M agp aperature setting (which might have caused issues)...also, try disabling 4X AGP mode (don't worry, u'll lose little to no performance)

to get it to flash, read the ocworkbench FAQ in the ECS forum at the top...but i'll summarize for the hell of it anway..to flash the ECS bios, do this.

1. download the ECS AMI flasher here
2. download the K7S5A bios here (note one is for LAN, one isn't)
3. make a bootable CD or disk (people don't realize that you can make a bootable win ME OS disk in winXP using explorer...right click on A: and select format, then check the make MS-boot disk option)....it won't read NTFS partitions, but if you have a FAT partition on your HDD, copy the AMI flasher and BIOS there, if not, burn them onto a CD, and make sure your boot disk enables your CD devices so you can flash from them

you cannot flash from the floppy - at least, it doesn't usually work...i woudln't either since it might corrupt the bios due to CRC errors.

this is what i do to flash:

copy the AMI flasher and BIOS onto a RW CD, then use the win98 OS CD to boot from and select boot from CD, start with CDs enabled...then flash from the RW CD

 

[foofoo]

dont be reticent to rma it if you cant get it stable at 133 fsb. i tried 2 ecs boards before i gave up. neither would run 133 in a stable way, 100 was ok. i tried all of the updates and the faqs (and you should too...) but in the end it was the mbds. i had good 350w power suplies (tried many) and all of the same components are running my shuttle ak31a just great right now.
point is, in my admittedly small experience of myself and friends, these boards can have this type of problem and it's the mb, not you.
try everything suggested, then rma if it doesnt work.
good luck

 

[nortexoid]

it's partially the motherboard's fault, but it's also partly the ram

if u're using generic RAM sticks (and mixing them at that), the K7S5A tends to have memory timing issues that they've somewhat resolved in the latest bios
some advice, if u have the board, stick to quality modules and try not mixing them...

 

[ku]

I agree with nortexoid. I had a Samsung stick and I had problems (not as bad as yours, just BSODed once or twice a week). I put in some crucial ram and it's fine. Update to the latest BIOS by using a win98 boot disk or any other DOS book disks. if problems persists, take out the SB LIVE and 56k and see how that works.