Problems with ATI 9800 Pro

  • Thread starter Thread starter Faluty User
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Faluty User

Any one have Problems with ATI 9700/9800 Video cards Crashing when using
more then 1 Gigs of ram ?

Works fine when using 1 Gig of ram or less, but with 2 Gigs it Craps out

But When using a Nvidia Card the system Runs fine.
 
Before you blame this on the vid card, run memtest, available from most
download sites. Defining "craps out" with some more detail and listing your
system info may also help.
 
Flys through Memtest 86 Fine with NO errors,
MB: Microstar 875P Neo-FIS2R
CPU: P4 3Ghz
RAM: 2 Pairs OCZ Dual Channel Optimized 2X512MB PC3200 EL
w/Copper Heatspreaders
Video Card: ATI Radeon 9800Pro 128MB DDR AGP8X Video w/VO/DVI (Retail)
Sound Card: Creative SoundBlaster Audigy2 ZS Platinum Sound Card (Retail)
Power Supply: Antec True430 430W TruePower Power Supply Dual Fan
Capture Card: Pinnacle Studio Deluxe
Modem: 3Com Modem
C Drive: Maxtor 120Gig SATA
D Drive: WD 200GB 7200RPM ATA100 EIDE HD w/8Mb Buffer
E Drive: Sony DRU510A Internal IDE DVD+RW/-RW Drive
F Drive: Lite-On LTR52327/B 52X32X52X IDE CDRW w/Software

With Both Pairs of Ram "2 Gigs it", Drops to desktop, Reboots it self, but
with 1 Pair "1 Gig" it runs fine,
Place a Nvidia Video Card in it run fine with 2 Gigs of ram.
 
Flys through Memtest 86 Fine with NO errors,
MB: Microstar 875P Neo-FIS2R
CPU: P4 3Ghz
RAM: 2 Pairs OCZ Dual Channel Optimized 2X512MB PC3200 EL
w/Copper Heatspreaders
Video Card: ATI Radeon 9800Pro 128MB DDR AGP8X Video w/VO/DVI (Retail)
Sound Card: Creative SoundBlaster Audigy2 ZS Platinum Sound Card (Retail)
Power Supply: Antec True430 430W TruePower Power Supply Dual Fan
Capture Card: Pinnacle Studio Deluxe
Modem: 3Com Modem
C Drive: Maxtor 120Gig SATA
D Drive: WD 200GB 7200RPM ATA100 EIDE HD w/8Mb Buffer
E Drive: Sony DRU510A Internal IDE DVD+RW/-RW Drive
F Drive: Lite-On LTR52327/B 52X32X52X IDE CDRW w/Software

With Both Pairs of Ram "2 Gigs it", Drops to desktop, Reboots it self, but
with 1 Pair "1 Gig" it runs fine,
Place a Nvidia Video Card in it run fine with 2 Gigs of ram.
Click to expand...

Have you tried yanking out anything else and seeing if the Radeon will
work. With everything you got in that rig it might be taxing even the
sturdy Antec 430W PSU.
You don't say what kind of nVidia card works. Is it a card that
requires less power than the Radeon 9800?
Is the nVidia card a 4x compared to the 8x AGP of the Radeon? Try
running the Radeon in 4x mode.
I'd take everything out but the system drive the RAM and the vid card
and see if it works.

You might just have the most power hungry system I've ever seen, and I
know lots of people who would automatically tell you to go out and get a
550W PSU.
 
Faluty said:
Any one have Problems with ATI 9700/9800 Video cards Crashing when
using more then 1 Gigs of ram ?

Works fine when using 1 Gig of ram or less, but with 2 Gigs it Craps
out

But When using a Nvidia Card the system Runs fine.
Click to expand...

Yes I have experienced the same problems with 1.5GB of RAM and my Radeon
9700 Pro recently. Lockups in games, lockups on the desktop, internet
explorer, down to hard reboots on windows startup.
I thought it was faulty RAM, as replacing it with 1GB solved the problem. I
also noticed I could use AGP 8x with only 1GB of RAM without problems,
whereas with 1.5GB of RAM I would get garbled text in games.
But now that I read your post, I tried to switch out my video card to a
GeForce 3 and used it with 1.5GB without any problems!
Relaxing memory timings to the maximum didn't change the situation either.
First I though Catalyst 3.8 might be the problem, but it really isn't as I
had used it before without problems. Also, reverting to Catalyst 3.4 didn't
solve the problem.
The only things that my system has in common with yours is a Radeon, Audigy
2 and 12GB Maxtor HDD:
Has anybody else encountered this?
 
Power Supply: Antec True430 430W TruePower Power Supply Dual Fan
Click to expand...
I actually have the exact same power supply and I know its a good one,
but it's one place to look.
 
Glzmo said:
Yes I have experienced the same problems with 1.5GB of RAM and my Radeon
9700 Pro recently. Lockups in games, lockups on the desktop, internet
explorer, down to hard reboots on windows startup.
I thought it was faulty RAM, as replacing it with 1GB solved the problem. I
also noticed I could use AGP 8x with only 1GB of RAM without problems,
whereas with 1.5GB of RAM I would get garbled text in games.
But now that I read your post, I tried to switch out my video card to a
GeForce 3 and used it with 1.5GB without any problems!
Relaxing memory timings to the maximum didn't change the situation either.
First I though Catalyst 3.8 might be the problem, but it really isn't as I
had used it before without problems. Also, reverting to Catalyst 3.4 didn't
solve the problem.
The only things that my system has in common with yours is a Radeon, Audigy
2 and 12GB Maxtor HDD:
Has anybody else encountered this?
Click to expand...

No, but I find it very interesting.

There have been articles lately at www.firingsquad.com and
www.lostcircuits.com about having all DIMM slots full on a motherboard with
an Intel Springdale or Canterwood chipset can actually slow it down.

On my Abit IC7 I just went from 2x256 to 4x256. I don't have any stability
problems with my 9500, modded to 9700 and clocked to Pro, or with anything
else in my system. It's still a rock.

But my Sandra memory benchmarks dropped from 5800+ to 5000+. I did a little
research and discovered that Abit and other mobo makers made an undocumented
bios programming decision to disable PAT when all four slots are full --
apparently a shortcut to avoid having to fine-tune for the higher memory
addressing overhead.

It may be totally unrelated, but I'm beginning to suspect that too much ram
can topple an otherwise stable system like a house of cards.
 
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