This is stupid... lol

Hi there.

Firstly, thanks to everyone who has contributed to this thread. Having
built my first Uber gaming system recently at considerable cost, only to
be thwarted and dismayed by the problems experienced due to my (now seemingly foolish) choice of the infamous Asus/Ati combo, this thread has provided some much needed solace and help, even if I have only lurked.

After a stressful few weeks I think I finally have a top-end PC system running as it should, and as this thread has helped me so much, I thought I'd post all the details here in case it helps anyone else.

Firstly, before I list all my settings, the quick answer to the cure, in
my case at least, has been installing both the Catalyst 3.4 drivers from
ATI and the Asus P4G8X beta bios driver version 1005_003. It's too early
to say that this is a 100% cure-all, only time will tell, but it's looking very
good so far, as I have just completed an afternoon of looping benchmark
tests (3DMark01, PCMark02 and 3DMark03 - 4 times each) without a single lock-up or reboot, whereas before I would be lucky to get through a single test without a lock-up.

I now have both FastWrites and AGPx8 enabled and what's more, I have both my CPU and GPU overclocked.

Oh and BTW, FastWrites on or off appears to make absolutely no difference whatsoever to 3DMark03 scores. However, the latest 3.4 Cat drivers adds nearly 400 points to my 3DMark03 score (sneaky ATI eh, but then NVidia are doing the same with the FX). Don't forget, this is 3DMark03, not 3DMark01-SE.

Anyways, for anyone it may help, here's my full spec and BIOS settings. BTW - overclocking has only been enabled since the system became stable.

Intel 3.06GHz + Asus P4G8X (CPU overclocked to 3311)
Saphire Radeon 9700Pro (GPU overclocked to 370/330)
1024Mb Corsair 3500 XMS DDR Ram

Bios Advanced:
CPU Multiple: 23x
CPU Freq: 144
AGP/PCI freq: 70.26/35.13
CPU Vcore: Auto (sets itself to 1.6 in XP)
AGP Voltage: 1.6
DDR Voltage: 2.6

Cip Config:
SDRAM CAS latency: 2T
SDRAM RAS to CAS: 2T
SDRAM RAS Pre: 2T
SDRAM ACTIVE pre: 5T
SDRAM Idle: 16T
Memory Turbo: Auto
Graphics Aperture: 256Mb
AGP: 8x
Video Memory Cache: USWC
Primary VGA Bios: AGP VGA Card

Good luck to all - I hope you all have similar success with the
latest drivers and bios.

Cheers
Sprout

I agree that in a perfect world we should be allowed to use every feature on a card, but if you can't, and you need to get rid of that feature in order to run smoothly, so what? As long as it's not too painful to get rid of it. I understand both points, and they are both correct. Just that everyone has different priorities. Tim/Mike's was just to get every thing they paid for, even if it doesn't do anything and the other point was that as long as it ran ok, who cares if it didn't use everything. Can't you all just agree to disagree. Now to my problem (I know nothing about BIOS or any of this hardware stuff so I need soemone to lay it out for me in babysteps.)

"Go into bios and change the memory setting from UC to USCW."

How do I go into bios?

"Change aperture memory to 128 (64 if you only have 256 mb of ram)"

I have 1GB ram, do I need to chage anything?

"Load up windows
Download Radeonator 2.0 and where you can adjust the GPU and memory speed change the memory from 310.5 to 303.75 (1 notch to the left) you can then increase the GPU to 330 if you want or leave it."

I've been looking for Radeonator but I think one link I followed led me to a website that is in a diff language and I had no idea what to do.

"Set it so it changes the memory speed when windows loads.
Then click ok."

This is still in Radeonator?

"Now goto Smartgart and turn on fast write and restart..."

Should this allow me to have 8x AGP as well? Or is it just to get FW on?

Shane.

>How do I go into bios?

Reboot your PC - as it starts to boot up you'll hear a beep and see the Asus logo on the screen - hit the escape (ESC) key at this point (in fact hit it 2 or 3 times to be sure). This will take you into the Bios. This is "Geek" territory, so only change what you understand or have been advised!

You use your keyboard cursor keys to Navigate the sections in the Bios. Right and Left to move sections, and Up and Down to move between settings in each section. It's easy - you'll see when you are there. The AGP aperture setting is located within a sub-directory of the Chip configuration menu, which is off of the main Advanced menu. So, it's, Advanced, Chip Configuration, scroll down for AGP aperture setting.

>"Change aperture memory to 128 (64 if you only have 256 mb of ram)"
>I have 1GB ram, do I need to chage anything?

I don't think there's anything wrong with 128Mb tbh, but as you have 1Gig of ram, wont do any harm to try 256Mb.

>"Load up windows
>Download Radeonator 2.0 and where you can adjust the GPU and >memory speed change the memory from 310.5 to 303.75 (1 notch to >the left) you can then increase the GPU to 330 if you want or leave it."
>>I've been looking for Radeonator but I think one link I followed led me to >>a website that is in a diff language and I had no idea what to do.

Try Powerstrip instead - it does the same thing...

http://www.entechtaiwan.com/files/pstrip.exe

>"Set it so it changes the memory speed when windows loads.
>Then click ok."
>>This is still in Radeonator?

Yes, but use Powerstrip. You'll see how easy it is to tweak when you download it.

>"Now goto Smartgart and turn on fast write and restart..."
>>Should this allow me to have 8x AGP as well? Or is it just to get FW >>on?

You can set AGP8x within the Bios, and from the same menu where you'll find FastWrites - right click on desktop, then properties/settings/advanced/SmartGart

Good luck!
Sprout

Shane,

Don't hit the escape key mate, hit the delete key.

So to get into bios, follow the instructions above but hit the delete key, not the escape key.

Doh! Typo, sorry!

If you get really stuck, email your phone number to the address below and ill phone you and talk you through it.

Cheers
Sprout (aliensprout@msn.com)

"Can't we all just get along?"

Anyway, I was getting occassional resolution/color drops with the Catalyst 3.2, but not a single one since upgrading to the 3.4.

Two things I wanted to point out:

The first thing, For those people that are having trouble with the SmartGart dropping back to 4x and FW "off" each time they reboot. I read this in a previous post, but hadn't yet experienced this so I sor of ignored it. I've recently rebuilt my system and this time I witnessed the problem first-hand. the thing that I did differently is, I installed the 3.2 drivers fresh onto the new build and may have even missed the mainboard chipset drivers. That being said; I believe the problem is with A. installing the key system drivers out of sequence, or B. just installing the ATI drivers out of sequence and skipping the retail driver CD.

Needless to say, I went through a process of gracefully backing out the 3.2 drivers and associated ATI control panel, installing then the ATI drivers and control panel from the retail CD, then uninstalling the retail drivers and ATI control panel only to re-apply the 3.2. (This sounds crazy and may not be the most efficient approach, but I am tired of getting burned by lockups and continuous problems, so I decided to spoon-feed my system.

The second thing, the power supply situation is something that I have first-hand experience with and I did not receive benefit from adding additional wattage. I started with a 350W and now I have a 480W, this palyed no part in my successes or failures. ATI recommends 300W+, and I know people using anywhere from 300W to 350W with my exact Momo/Proc/Vid-card configuration and "no problems." I myself went to 480W and although my earlier problems with rebooting had been addressed by upgrading to a newer revision of the 9700 pro, I was still getting occasional resolution/color drops while doing basically nothing inside of Windows. Sometimes this problem would occur just by walking away from the system and allowing it to go into "standby" mode.

What has truly helped is the new Catalyst 3.4 drivers. I read the release notes for these new drivers and they completely talk about all of the issues mentioned in this forum.

For those of you that are still having touble even after installing the new 3.4 drivers, you might want to look at your process for installing the new drivers. (i.e. uninstall the old ones reboot, install the new ones reboot.) If did this correclty, then I don't know what to say.

Regards,
Chris

One more thing to add... If the concept of running into problems after purchasing the latest and greatest harware causes so much distress, then why not look at an OEM? I mean really!

Some people are into putting their own system together, as it makes them feel like oldschool hardware geeks. And as easy as it might seem, home system building is not for everyone. This is the first system that I've built in at least 2 years and being oldschool myself, I do not remember it being this painful before. All I really wanted in the beginning was a functional and powerful machine in order to develop on and play games on occassion. What I got instead was a few lessons on hardware and a reminder that trying to do it all can sometimes brings about unnecessary headaches and frustration. (I used to change my own oil as well)

Anyway my point is that Dell and other OEM's sell amazing systems and they certainly will listen to your comlaints and problems. If the frustration becomes too intense, why not go a different route next time?

Good day everyone!

Chris

Thanks for explaining how to od that but something has come to my mind that may prove that my problems are simpler than I'm making them out to be.

You see, the whole problem was that when I opened a game it would minimize the game and leave me at windows. If I restored it it would just repeat it again. Though if when I restored it and the screen went black, and I click on what would become the game screen it would allow me to stay in the game.

And in Test Direct3D at dxdiag it kept saying that I cancelled the test by pressing a button, but now I decided to give it a reason to complain and I pressed the button just as the screen went black to opent he test and this time it worked. So I think I have some cross or something here that in order to open a game I've been having to click on the screen and to test Direct3D I've had to click (precisely the opposite they told me to do)

Maybe this will allow you guys to understand my problem and be able to correct it...

shane

Hi folks,

I just updated Bios with 1005_003 beta revision and Catalyst 3.4. I now have AGP 8x and FW is ON. So far it's OK. I will test it and let you know.

My PC:
ASUS P4G8X
ATI Saphire Radeon 9500 PRO
2 * 512 MB Kingstone PC2700
PSU 300W

I forgot to mention CPU:

P4 2.4@3.06

After about 5 hours it crashed to VGA, so I turned off FW again

could anyone tell where i can turn fast writes of??

Hey everyone I just finished building my first computer. It has the new P4C800, a P4 2.6 Ghz (800 fsb) and a radoen 9700 Pro. All my drivers are updated except the motherboard bios because my comp has no floppy drive. Could someone explain how to upgrade the bios using a cd possibly? Also how do you get to Dos from XP which is what it says to do on Asus's website.
My system seems to be running great at 8x AGP but no FW... If I turn it on it goes back to off probably because my Bios isnt updated. I scored 13600 in 3DMark. Anyway to improve this without overclocking? Thanks guys
Stro

You can update your BIOS without entering DOS or booting from a floppy disk. There is a BIOS update tool from ASUS on your CD, and also at Asus' website.

Enter DOS-prompt by going to the start menu and run, then type cmd.

Btw, your system should give way over 15000 points in 3DMark2001SE.

I'm having a few problems finding smartgart in the advanced properties. I downloaded both the 4 and 12 MB Control Panel from ATi, but I can't seen to find it. Can anyone help me with this?

I also encounter te same problems. Regular crashed in Windows/games, sometimes after a hour or 4, sometimes after 3 minutes.

Things I tried: Different OS'ses (Win2k just freezed, WinXP returns to 640x480@8bit). Different drivers (3.1, 3.2, 3,4), different chipset drivers, (4xx and 5.xx) and i changed several voltages (from cpu to ddr and vga). Nothing seems te help. I just changed the AGP bus to 70mhz \, see how that's works.

I can't disable FW cause I can't find the Smartgart thing :S

Simon, according to Asus' website I should only update to version 1006 through DOS. http://www.asus.com/support/download/item.aspx?ModelName=P4C800%20Deluxe
It says specifically "Do not use Aflash.exe / EZflash /Afudos.exe to update BIOSV1006
Extract all the files into the floppy disk,and simply run P4C81006.exe under DOS mode,the BIOS update will execute automatically.Please refer to the readme file which is included in the zipfile to get the details of BIOS update procedure."
My problem is that I do not have a floppy drive so is it possible to put the file on a CD and do it that way through DOS? Anyone have some ideas here? Also how do I get my 3DMarks up to around 15000? Thanks
Andrew

Andrew, can't you borrow a FDD from someone? I tried to make a bootable CD with DOS and the new bios, unsuccesfully .

IMHO the best thing is to borrow a FDD from someone

Actually I tried installing a very old floppy drive (7 years) utill my new one arrives but it didnt work. On the floppy drive cable that cable with my motherboard there is one spot with out a hole for a pin on the connector kind of like this
000000000000x00
000000000000000
but on the back of the old floppy drive it looks like this
0000000000000x0
000000000000000
seems like the connectors arnt the same. I was able to push it together but it didnt look like it was together correctly. (some pins were outside the connector) Is this because it is a old floppy drive or am I not seeing something? I'll try to come up with a newer floppy drive to test.

The "new" ones are like this: 00000000000x00 (<- 2 left to it instead of 1). You could ask a friend or neighbour really friendly or so . Good luck

[/offtopic]

Yesterday I got mail from Sapphire support. Maybe it is of some interest for you...

>---

Hi everyone,



We had been in touch with ASUS regarding compatibility issues of 8X AGP Radeon and E7205 (P4G8X) motherboard. We were sent a beta BIOS which is available to download from asus website. Having ran some tests, we think the BIOS is a solution to this problem. It is early days yet but it seems a lot more stable than before. Please try it and let me know.

Ray

Sapphire Europe