Anyone using these???

  • Thread starter Thread starter Nikolaos Tampakis
  • Start date Start date
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Nikolaos Tampakis

Paul said:
Hey all, anyone use a P4P800 with an Apacer
embedded USB2 card reader and a HP Photosmart
145 USB2 printer?? If you are, I'm just wondering
if your system reboots by itself, if you're using XP.

I have a feeling that these 2 don't like each other.

BOTH the card reader and this printer, have 4 memory
card slots, for memory cards. IF I leave the printer
connected, and install the software for it, the system
reboots often, with a bugcheck error in XP. I've
been told this error code, has something to with a driver
problem. And I have a feeling it's either the driver
that I install from CD for the printer is either corrupted.

(I've even downloaded the updated software from
the HP site and it still reboots).

Or the drivers for BOTH the internal card reader
and the printer, are interferring with each other?

On bootup, it shows 4 removable devices (with the printer on), and when the
digital camera is on.

BUT if I disconnect the printer from the USB 2 port. It shows 5 removable
devices on bootup (4 for the internal
card reader, +1 for the digital camera.

If the internal card reader has 4 slots and the printer
also has 4, + the digital camera, shouldn't bootup
show 9 removable devices?? NOT 4 or 5?

Any info appreciated

Cheers

A shot in the dark could be the system has trouble fully enumerating
more than one composite USB device. This wouldn't explain the XP trouble
though as XP ought to enumerate properly. There've been some USB updates
for XP of course but I assume you have them.
I don't know how much help this would be in your case but you could try
connecting the printer through a self-powered USB hub, if you have one
available (not worth buying one just for troubleshooting).

Regards
Nikos
 
Hey all, anyone use a P4P800 with an Apacer
embedded USB2 card reader and a HP Photosmart
145 USB2 printer?? If you are, I'm just wondering
if your system reboots by itself, if you're using XP.

I have a feeling that these 2 don't like each other.

BOTH the card reader and this printer, have 4 memory
card slots, for memory cards. IF I leave the printer
connected, and install the software for it, the system
reboots often, with a bugcheck error in XP. I've
been told this error code, has something to with a driver
problem. And I have a feeling it's either the driver
that I install from CD for the printer is either corrupted.

(I've even downloaded the updated software from
the HP site and it still reboots).

Or the drivers for BOTH the internal card reader
and the printer, are interferring with each other?

On bootup, it shows 4 removable devices (with the printer on), and when the
digital camera is on.

BUT if I disconnect the printer from the USB 2 port. It shows 5 removable
devices on bootup (4 for the internal
card reader, +1 for the digital camera.

If the internal card reader has 4 slots and the printer
also has 4, + the digital camera, shouldn't bootup
show 9 removable devices?? NOT 4 or 5?

Any info appreciated

Cheers
 
Thanx for the info Nik. I do have
a USB HUB, BUT it's only 1.1 NOT 2.0.

Which would reduce the speed of the printer
since, the printer is USB2 not 1.1.

I could try it (once I get enough money)! to get a USB
2 Hub.

Cheers
 
The funny thing is, BOTH work when the
printer is connected.

The internal card reader works no worries
at all. So does the printer's card slots.

BUT it's the crashes/reboots that are the problem.
 
Check the related device drivers. HP used to have some quite bad drivers -
don't know these days.

Run sigverif.exe (start, run, sigverif) and it will give a list of non
signed drivers and files. Check off each entry in the results by identifying
if it is EG a device driver, if so go to the manufacturers web site and look
for udpates. Check with others using the same device(s) and find what they
recommend.

Next time, note what the BSOD says and post the details - it often has
strong clues as to the cause of the crash in terms of which device driver is
causing the problems - if it is a device driver.

- Tim
 
It wasnt a BSOD. It was a reboot
Even tho I unticked automatically restart.

Here's one of the errors.

The computer has rebooted from a bugcheck. The bugcheck was: 0x1000007f
(0x00000008, 0x80042000, 0x00000000, 0x00000000). A dump was saved in:
C:\WINDOWS\Minidump\Mini060104-01.dmp.
 
hey now,

i just received a new p4c800-e dlx that seems DOA and wanted to check here
that i have exhausted the straightforward ways of testing this board to
ensure that it's quite dead ...

on initial system assembly, i installed a minimal set of stuff:

antec case and 480W PS
P-IV 3.4 GHz CPU
2x512MB OCZ PC4000
ati aiw 9800 pro
floppy drive
western digital 74GB Raptor
plextor 12x DVD+-RW
mouse/keyboard

on power-up, the green power status LED on the mobo lights up and i get
power to the cpu and case fans, but there is no video out and no status
beeps ...

i then stripped the board down to just the CPU and RAM, with no external
connections of any sort other than an external speaker and the power
switch (i.e., no drives, video, usb, firewire, mouse, keyboard, etc. were
connected to the board)

same result as before -- the power LED lights up, and there is power to
the cpu fan but no status beeps at all, although with this config the mobo
should complain

back in the dim, deep and distant day, i built a few systems using asus
cuv4x-d and p2b-ds, and i can't think of any other way to test a mobo that
fails its initial power-up ...

any suggestions? or can i fairly declare it DOA and RMA it for
replacement?

thanks much,
kevin
==========================================================================
The worst flaw in electronic voting machines is that they generally offer
such a poor selection -- I hope they get that fixed in time for the next
election.
 
Kevin Flood said:
hey now,

i just received a new p4c800-e dlx that seems DOA and wanted to check here
that i have exhausted the straightforward ways of testing this board to
ensure that it's quite dead ...

on initial system assembly, i installed a minimal set of stuff:

antec case and 480W PS
P-IV 3.4 GHz CPU
2x512MB OCZ PC4000
ati aiw 9800 pro
floppy drive
western digital 74GB Raptor
plextor 12x DVD+-RW
mouse/keyboard

on power-up, the green power status LED on the mobo lights up and i get
power to the cpu and case fans, but there is no video out and no status
beeps ...

i then stripped the board down to just the CPU and RAM, with no external
connections of any sort other than an external speaker and the power
switch (i.e., no drives, video, usb, firewire, mouse, keyboard, etc. were
connected to the board)

same result as before -- the power LED lights up, and there is power to
the cpu fan but no status beeps at all, although with this config the mobo
should complain

back in the dim, deep and distant day, i built a few systems using asus
cuv4x-d and p2b-ds, and i can't think of any other way to test a mobo that
fails its initial power-up ...

any suggestions? or can i fairly declare it DOA and RMA it for
replacement?

thanks much,
kevin
==========================================================================
The worst flaw in electronic voting machines is that they generally offer
such a poor selection -- I hope they get that fixed in time for the next
election.

Have you plugged in the ATX 2x2 12V power connector? A new P4 machine
has two power connectors, and even your video card has a drive connector
that must be plugged in.

I have the same motherboard, and it has the fine "Voice POST" feature.
The Winbond chip that does the Voice POST is an autonomous system that
creates voice messages, even if CPU and memory are not plugged into the
machine. To use it, you'll need to plug your stereo into the lime
colored lineout jack on the back of the computer. Turn on power to
the system and press the power switch on the front of the case. When
something is wrong, you'll hear a heavily compressed female voice
talking to you. See the table of messages in the manual, to try and
align what you hear, to an error message. And, you must be patient, as
for some of the messages, it can take 30 seconds or a minute before
you hear them.

In any case, my suspicion is the 2x2 square power connector is
all you need.

I tested mine, starting with no components in the board, then
added CPU, memory, video card etc, listening in each case as a
different Voice POST message was generated. Just because I'm
easily amused :-)

Paul
 
Kevin Flood said:
hey now,
on power-up, the green power status LED on the mobo lights up and i get
power to the cpu and case fans, but there is no video out and no status
beeps ...
any suggestions? or can i fairly declare it DOA and RMA it for
replacement?

thanks much,
kevin


I had exactly the same thing with my P4C800-I and I was just about to RMA it
too.
Luckily I found a solution on http://www.abxzone.com/ to my Seemingly Dead
M/B.
Basically take out the cmos battery or short the CLRTC jumper, probably one
or the other would suffice
but I done both to be safe!
After this M/B came back to life and is now working like a dream....

Regards

Frank
 
Have you plugged in the ATX 2x2 12V power connector? A new P4 machine
has two power connectors, and even your video card has a drive connector
that must be plugged in.

I have the same motherboard, and it has the fine "Voice POST" feature.
The Winbond chip that does the Voice POST is an autonomous system that
creates voice messages, even if CPU and memory are not plugged into the
machine. To use it, you'll need to plug your stereo into the lime
colored lineout jack on the back of the computer. Turn on power to
the system and press the power switch on the front of the case. When
something is wrong, you'll hear a heavily compressed female voice
talking to you. See the table of messages in the manual, to try and
align what you hear, to an error message. And, you must be patient, as
for some of the messages, it can take 30 seconds or a minute before
you hear them.

In any case, my suspicion is the 2x2 square power connector is
all you need.

I tested mine, starting with no components in the board, then
added CPU, memory, video card etc, listening in each case as a
different Voice POST message was generated. Just because I'm
easily amused :-)

Paul


Hi,

I have two issues mentioned in this post:

1.My old P4T-E displayed exactly the same symptoms.
I used the P4T-E for about year and a half, and one day my system
froze in WinXP.After I restarted, the problem occured - couldn't boot
the system (no POST at all and no video).The funny thing is that after
I tinkered with the board for some time, one day it just booted, but
then again one day, everything just repeated itself.The light on the
mobo lights when I flick the PS switch, all components start running
when I power up the system from the case power button, but no beeps,
and no video.Tried diferent video card, processor but-nothing.They are
all working, as I tried them on diferent MB. Also tried to strip down
the system and test by adding components one at a time, but at no
avail. As this MB has no voice post, I am not sure what the problem
is. All PS connectors are plugged, even the AUX connector is
connected. I powered the mobo out of the case even, to see if there
might be a short with the case, but still nothing. Eventually I gave
up and upgraded to new P4C800E MB.I justified this purchase as I made
a general upgrade, and moved to a new 3.0Ghz Prescott, Dual channel
HyperX memory, and RAID 0 with two SATA drives.
Should I throw this mobo away? The processor and the mem are still
good!

2.Paul touched briefly the issue with the voice post on the P4C800E
DLX.
My new system is state of the art, and everything works extremely
well.
My issue is that I don't hear the Voice post at boot. I have enabled
this feature in the BIOS, and installed a PC speaker even, but can't
hear the voice post.I use an Audigy card for sound, and have disabled
the onboard audio.
Paul, you mentioned that the speaker jack has to be plugged into the
lime connector, but does that mean I have to enable the onboard audio,
then plug extra set of speakers (otherwise I have to re-connect the
system speakers from the Onboard sound to the Audigy everytime after I
boot) in order to be able to hear the voice post?

Thank you for your feedback.
 
(e-mail address removed) (Paul) wrote in message


Hi,

I have two issues mentioned in this post:

1.My old P4T-E displayed exactly the same symptoms.
I used the P4T-E for about year and a half, and one day my system
froze in WinXP.After I restarted, the problem occured - couldn't boot
the system (no POST at all and no video).The funny thing is that after
I tinkered with the board for some time, one day it just booted, but
then again one day, everything just repeated itself.The light on the
mobo lights when I flick the PS switch, all components start running
when I power up the system from the case power button, but no beeps,
and no video.Tried diferent video card, processor but-nothing.They are
all working, as I tried them on diferent MB. Also tried to strip down
the system and test by adding components one at a time, but at no
avail. As this MB has no voice post, I am not sure what the problem
is. All PS connectors are plugged, even the AUX connector is
connected. I powered the mobo out of the case even, to see if there
might be a short with the case, but still nothing. Eventually I gave
up and upgraded to new P4C800E MB.I justified this purchase as I made
a general upgrade, and moved to a new 3.0Ghz Prescott, Dual channel
HyperX memory, and RAID 0 with two SATA drives.
Should I throw this mobo away? The processor and the mem are still
good!

2.Paul touched briefly the issue with the voice post on the P4C800E
DLX.
My new system is state of the art, and everything works extremely
well.
My issue is that I don't hear the Voice post at boot. I have enabled
this feature in the BIOS, and installed a PC speaker even, but can't
hear the voice post.I use an Audigy card for sound, and have disabled
the onboard audio.
Paul, you mentioned that the speaker jack has to be plugged into the
lime connector, but does that mean I have to enable the onboard audio,
then plug extra set of speakers (otherwise I have to re-connect the
system speakers from the Onboard sound to the Audigy everytime after I
boot) in order to be able to hear the voice post?

Thank you for your feedback.

1. It sounds like your PSU was bad, and not the motherboard.
Try the old motherboard, using a new power supply unit. It
is amazing how many problems in this newsgroup turn out to
be power supply related. Motherboards are more reliable
than PSUs. The weakest link on the motherboard is the BIOS
chip contents.

2. The Voice POST is a monophonic sound source. It is permanently
wired to the lime colored, lineout jack on the back of the
computer. I prefer to use amplified speakers or use my stereo
to listen to the Voice POST. (The computer case speaker is
wired to a different circuit.)

When you plug in an Audigy, the Voice POST signal is still
on the lime colored lineout jack on the back of the computer.
It cannot be moved in software - it is capacitively coupled,
a hardware thing. It also does not use or rely on the AC97
sound system. The Voice Post is a separate Winbond chip,
with its own tiny processor inside. The eight pin DIP next
to the Winbond chip, contains the "script" the Winbond processor
uses, and it also contains the sound samples.

Also, you must put the two jumpers on the FP_AUDIO header,
to ensure the continuity of the lineout signal on the back
of the computer. I would disconnect any headphone jack, if
you have wired one from the case to the FP_AUDIO header, then
put the two jumpers back in their factory default position.
(See item #16 in the manual, which shows where the two
jumpers belong.)

With regard to "FrankB"'s comments about the CLRTC, I set up
my motherboard outside the case and tested it first, before
installing it. I set up particular BIOS settings, including the
clock. I had a terrible time putting the motherboard in the case
(because I like to install the HSF before putting the mobo in
the case, and the HSF I've got is big and clumsy). I must have
dragged some connections on the bottom of the motherboard, over
the brass standoffs, because when I first booted the system, the
motherboard had a wiped out clock setting. The thing is, the
CMOS battery and some of the circuitry is running, even when the
PSU is disconnected from the board. The CMOS circuit is very similar
to the workings of a digital watch - it consists of a 32KHz
cylindrical quartz crystal, mounted sideways on the motherboard,
and the watch circuit is inside the Southbridge. The Southbridge
counts the pulses and keeps the time when everything else has
been shut off. The CMOS battery contains enough energy to make
the circuit work for a couple of years, if the computer is left
unplugged for example. If the computer is left plugged in and
the switch on the back is switched on, the battery could last
for its shelf life (8-10 years?).

HTH,
Paul
 
1. It sounds like your PSU was bad, and not the motherboard.
Try the old motherboard, using a new power supply unit. It
is amazing how many problems in this newsgroup turn out to
be power supply related. Motherboards are more reliable
than PSUs. The weakest link on the motherboard is the BIOS
chip contents.

2. The Voice POST is a monophonic sound source. It is permanently
wired to the lime colored, lineout jack on the back of the
computer. I prefer to use amplified speakers or use my stereo
to listen to the Voice POST. (The computer case speaker is
wired to a different circuit.)

When you plug in an Audigy, the Voice POST signal is still
on the lime colored lineout jack on the back of the computer.
It cannot be moved in software - it is capacitively coupled,
a hardware thing. It also does not use or rely on the AC97
sound system. The Voice Post is a separate Winbond chip,
with its own tiny processor inside. The eight pin DIP next
to the Winbond chip, contains the "script" the Winbond processor
uses, and it also contains the sound samples.

Also, you must put the two jumpers on the FP_AUDIO header,
to ensure the continuity of the lineout signal on the back
of the computer. I would disconnect any headphone jack, if
you have wired one from the case to the FP_AUDIO header, then
put the two jumpers back in their factory default position.
(See item #16 in the manual, which shows where the two
jumpers belong.)

With regard to "FrankB"'s comments about the CLRTC, I set up
my motherboard outside the case and tested it first, before
installing it. I set up particular BIOS settings, including the
clock. I had a terrible time putting the motherboard in the case
(because I like to install the HSF before putting the mobo in
the case, and the HSF I've got is big and clumsy). I must have
dragged some connections on the bottom of the motherboard, over
the brass standoffs, because when I first booted the system, the
motherboard had a wiped out clock setting. The thing is, the
CMOS battery and some of the circuitry is running, even when the
PSU is disconnected from the board. The CMOS circuit is very similar
to the workings of a digital watch - it consists of a 32KHz
cylindrical quartz crystal, mounted sideways on the motherboard,
and the watch circuit is inside the Southbridge. The Southbridge
counts the pulses and keeps the time when everything else has
been shut off. The CMOS battery contains enough energy to make
the circuit work for a couple of years, if the computer is left
unplugged for example. If the computer is left plugged in and
the switch on the back is switched on, the battery could last
for its shelf life (8-10 years?).

HTH,
Paul

To Paul's reply:

Thank you for your feedback on my two issues.

The info on the Voice post is quite clear.But as I had suspected, I
have to plug a extra set of small speakers, just to hear the voice
post. Anyway, thank you for clearing this issue.

Regarding the P4T-E problem:
I don't think it's the PSU, as my new system with the P4C800E DLX is
running on the same PSU/case. With my new upgrade, I even added more
power requiring components - ie. Two SATA drives (besides the original
IDE drive), Asus nVidia FX5900 Ultra with it's extra power connector
(GeForce 2 Ultra previuosly), Prescott CPU.I have a Enermax Whisper
450W.
I took the Mobo to a friend's PC shop, and on a diferent PSU there,
the board was declared "DEAD" by them, as it didn't seem to operate
either.
When I mentioned, that I tinkered with the board, mainly I was
re-seating the CPU in the MB socket, start the system, re-seat then
start again until the system eventualy booted.In my opinion, it has to
do something with the CPU socket on the MB.CPU is fine and working, as
I checked it on diferent MB.Is there a way to further check, where the
broken link is on the MB?

Thank you for any further feedback.
 
To Paul's reply:

Thank you for your feedback on my two issues.

The info on the Voice post is quite clear.But as I had suspected, I
have to plug a extra set of small speakers, just to hear the voice
post. Anyway, thank you for clearing this issue.

Regarding the P4T-E problem:
I don't think it's the PSU, as my new system with the P4C800E DLX is
running on the same PSU/case. With my new upgrade, I even added more
power requiring components - ie. Two SATA drives (besides the original
IDE drive), Asus nVidia FX5900 Ultra with it's extra power connector
(GeForce 2 Ultra previuosly), Prescott CPU.I have a Enermax Whisper
450W.
I took the Mobo to a friend's PC shop, and on a diferent PSU there,
the board was declared "DEAD" by them, as it didn't seem to operate
either.
When I mentioned, that I tinkered with the board, mainly I was
re-seating the CPU in the MB socket, start the system, re-seat then
start again until the system eventualy booted.In my opinion, it has to
do something with the CPU socket on the MB.CPU is fine and working, as
I checked it on diferent MB.Is there a way to further check, where the
broken link is on the MB?

Thank you for any further feedback.

Well, to be honest with you, it is really miraculous that so many
boards work so well. The big chips on a motherboard are surface mount
devices, and the chip type is called BGA (ball grid array). BGA
is a nice technology, in that, when they make them in the factory,
a BGA will "snap" into alignment, as the balls of solder melt to
the board. This "auto-alignment" of the chip to the board, is what
makes the yield in the factory so high.

Now, when the board is installed in a product, there is a second
issue. That is thermal stresses and mechanical stresses. Thermal
stress is where the CPU heats up and cools down, as you vary the
loading on the CPU. The constant change in temperature of the
material around the balls of solder, causes the solder to fatigue
and crack. A cracked ball can give you an "intermittent" connection,
where a slight flexing of the board may cause the connection to be
made again. But, from a mechanical stress perspective, flexing
the board is also bad for the solder joints, if a lot of stress
is applied. Inserting DIMMs, for example, is a source of stress
to the board, and a good reason to keep all the screws on the
motherboard tight (without overdoing it of course).

At the factory, one method used to detect bad soldering, is an
X-ray machine. After the board is passed through the wave solder
machine, an X-ray machine with a camera connected to it, takes
pictures of each BGA chip (like the Northbridge and the Southbridge).
The angle the camera makes to the board can be varied, to look on
either side of the tin/lead ball of solder. By using optical
comparison, this machine can even be automated, so the machine
can identify and reject badly soldered boards. Once the soldering
process is refined, the need to X-ray every motherboard can be
reduced to statistical sampling, where every one of N boards is
checked. Another test, using a continuity tester, is an additional
test, that is cheaper than X-raying, and is likely to be used on
every motherboard. This is done with a "bed of nails" tester,
equipped with a vacuum head, to hold the motherboard against the
spring loaded nails.

The larger the number of pins on a BGA, the higher the probability
that one of the balls of solder will make a bad connection. In a
report I read some time ago, a 750 ball BGA is considered to have
a lifetime of around 10 years or so. It is still possible for
an earlier failure to occur, but based on the small number of
failures you hear about in this newsgroup, the problem isn't
widespread.

Another place for problems, can be the ZIF socket for the processor.
If the contacts are bent or distorted, either due to a bad ZIF
socket from the ZIF manufacturer, or due to handling of the ZIF
by the end user, then that can be a source of intermittent problems
as well. As your board appears to be dead, if you don't think it
will ever be alive again, you could look at the plastic "lid" that
fits over the base of the socket. It may be possible to pry the
lid off, if you are careful. You could then, at least, look to see
if any of the socket pins are disturbed. I don't think it is
really practical to fix a distorted pin, because the act of bending
the metal would ruin the shape of the contact surface, and only
make matters worse.

You might also examine the pins on the CPU, to see if any are bent.
Maybe that is the problem ?

HTH,
Paul
 
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