Radeon 9700 Pro and Asus A8V. Keeps rebooting or locking up

  • Thread starter Thread starter David Travers
  • Start date Start date
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David Travers

I upgraded my system to an Athlon 64 3500+ on an Asus A8V.

However when I use my Radeon 9700 Pro is crashes,locks up the PC or reboots.

However it works fine with a GeForce 4 MX 440.

I tried the Radeon 9700 in my original motherboard (Asus A7V266-E) and it
works fine.

Anyone know how to fix this or are these cards incompatible with this board?
 
David Travers said:
I upgraded my system to an Athlon 64 3500+ on an Asus A8V.
However when I use my Radeon 9700 Pro is crashes,locks up the PC or
reboots.
However it works fine with a GeForce 4 MX 440.
I tried the Radeon 9700 in my original motherboard (Asus A7V266-E) and it
works fine.
Anyone know how to fix this or are these cards incompatible with this
board?
Click to expand...

Did you use the latest drivers from www.atitech.ca? Did you
install the latest BIOS for your motherboard?

Does the system work fine until you try to run a a game or something?
 
David Travers said:
I upgraded my system to an Athlon 64 3500+ on an Asus A8V.

However when I use my Radeon 9700 Pro is crashes,locks up the PC or
reboots.

However it works fine with a GeForce 4 MX 440.

I tried the Radeon 9700 in my original motherboard (Asus A7V266-E) and it
works fine.

Anyone know how to fix this or are these cards incompatible with this
board?
Click to expand...

I would try the Omega drivers first. Maybe an older version also if the
current causes probs!
 
"David Travers" said:
I upgraded my system to an Athlon 64 3500+ on an Asus A8V.

However when I use my Radeon 9700 Pro is crashes,locks up the PC or reboots.

However it works fine with a GeForce 4 MX 440.

I tried the Radeon 9700 in my original motherboard (Asus A7V266-E) and it
works fine.

Anyone know how to fix this or are these cards incompatible with this board?
Click to expand...

The first release of printed circuit boards for the 9700 had
an issue. That is why many Asus manuals contain this warning:

"If installing the ATI ® 9500 or 9700 Pro Series VGA cards, use
only the card version PN xxx-xxxxx-30 or later, for optimum
performance and overclocking stability."

And before you panic, if the digits on the end are -00, apparently
that stands for "100", or at least a later version than the defective
one.

Here is where to check on your card. This link should give you a
picture of the front side of a 9700 card. The P/N is upper left
hand corner, near the top edge of the card. I think it is written
in white letters and is part of the silk screen layer on the board.

http://abxzone.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=3702

I found this info here. After reading a number of threads on
Abxzone, it seems there is a lot of finger pointing, and if
you phone up ATI, they'll tell you this Asus warning is crap.
But, who are you to believe ?

http://abxzone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=42605&highlight=xxx-xxxxx-30

There are also warnings on Abxzone, to check that your power
supply can supply enough current for this combo. The A8V uses
+12V for the processor, so I'd want at least a 15 amp rating
on the +12V rail, and preferably a bit more. That is printed
on a label on your power supply. The other rails are usually
less of an issue. Only an AthlonXP board leans heavily on the
+5V rail, and not so much on the +12V, but Athlon64 and P4
boards like to use the +12V.

This site contains a power supply calculator, and it exaggerates
the power consumption of some components. If you believe the
answer you get here, your motherboard will never run out of
power :-)

http://takaman.jp/D/?english

HTH,
Paul
 
The code is PN 109-94200-11

Does this mean I have a defective board? Why does it only cuase problems on
the new motehrboard and not the older board?
 
"David Travers" said:
The code is PN 109-94200-11

Does this mean I have a defective board? Why does it only cuase problems on
the new motehrboard and not the older board?
Click to expand...

I don't remember all the details, but a thread like this indicates it
is hit or miss with the different motherboards. This thread is long
and I didn't read the whole thing.

http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?s=&threadid=33634403

If you phone ATI support, they may disavow all knowledge of the
issues, or blame it all on the motherboards, so gather up as much
info as you can from the Internet before you call.

Some threads I read, suggested disabling fast write or running at
4X, but with the damn SmartGART code in the driver, the user
loses control over those, unless you can boot the machine far
enough, to set the options in the SmartGART tab. I don't know if
ATI have changed their approach to this in later drivers or not.
On motherboards where you can set the AGP speed in the BIOS,
SmartGART will ignore the BIOS setting, and run at AGP 8X, if you
let it. As long as booting is not a problem, and your issues don't
happen to frequently, you might be able to configure the SmartGART
tab as you like, and maybe the settings will stick.

It could be that the AGP rate is slower on your A7V266-E, and that
is why the ugly issues never raised their heads.

Here is a lighthearted opinion from theinquirer:

http://theinquirer.net/?article=6207
"Quite a few reports on quite a few fora have suggested that
Radeon 9700 Pro cards conflict with quite a few chipsets."

Good luck (you'll need it),
Paul

P.S. The 6600GT-AGP version could be a good deal :-)
There are PCI-E (native) and AGP (bridged) video cards,
and so far only a few brands of the latter.
 
Note I dropped the AGP setting from 8X to 4X in the BIOS and now it seems to
be working OK (touch wood).

Must be a problem with the card not getting enough power at 8X.

Didn't notice much of a performance loss in Far Cry or Doom 3
 
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