New Build Up and Running Today -- WindowsXP Spontaneously Reboots Periodically

[Fluidstream]

Build:

Asus Crosshair V Formula Z
Kingston HyperX DDR3 @ 2133 MHz
AMD FX-6300 Vishera six-core
BFG Tech GeForce 7950 GTOC
Thermaltake Smart-M Series 850-watt PSU (Purchased in July 2012)
WinXP SP-3 (no updates installed yet)

I just put this system together on Friday, and after getting an invalid product key for Windows 8 from Newegg.com, I decided to install WinXP with a slipstream SP3 disc. Everything works nicely except for the periodic reboots. I disabled "Automatically Restart" in the advanced system settings so I could get a blue screen, but I get no blue screen... just a sudden reboot.

Now here's what happened. The memory I'm using (Kingston HyperX 4GB x 2 - KHX2133C11D3K4) is listed in the QVL and is in the manual that came with the motherboard.

I had the BIOS set to run the memory at 2133MHz, timing was 11-12-11-30 as per the book and QVL, and I had the voltage set to 1.65v. After the spontaneous reboot, I went back into the BIOS and noticed that all my memory timings and frequency had been set back to the defaults I remember seeing when I first turned the computer on (1333MHz and 9-9-9-24). And the voltage had been lowered to 1.60v, which is still higher than the 1.38v or so that was the default.

I'm wondering what the BIOS is doing here. Is it running some kind of analysis and lowering the voltage on my behalf? The book specifically lists the voltage when running four DIMMS. I have four DIMMS, but I only have two installed because the book said I should get a premium memory cooler if I want to run a full memory load. I can't get a memory cooler right now because I spent all the money I had to spend getting the other hardware and Windows 8. Should I change the voltage to something else with only two of the four DIMMs installed? Or maybe I should go ahead and stick the other two DIMMs in and see if that works? I've never had a memory cooler before, but I've also never built a computer with all four DIMM slots filled. I'm not sure how to proceed.

So I'm wondering if these BIOS settings are possibly causing my reboots. Since I can't get a blue screen for an error code, for now, this is the only thing I can think of that could be causing problems. When the BIOS was set to the defaults, spontaneous reboots happened far more quickly, like within ten seconds of trying to install Windows 8. (By the time I got to installing WinXP, I had configured the frequency, timing and voltage for the memory so I didn't have a reboot problem.)

What suggestions do you guys have at this point for stopping the reboots and/or what explanations do you have for these strange changes to the BIOS?

Thanks,
Fluidstream

[Chino]

Sorry to hear that you're having problems, Fluid. I remember reading a thread of yours from the Build Advice forum. Didn't see this thread until now.

What version BIOS are you running?

[Fluidstream]

Chino wrote:
Sorry to hear that you're having problems, Fluid. I remember reading a thread of yours from the Build Advice forum. Didn't see this thread until now.

What version BIOS are you running?

Bios version is 1101. I flashed it to that version using a USB Drive and the RoG connect... very convenient! I received the motherboard with the 0508 beta version of the BIOS. Also, I haven't mentioned this in any other posts yet, but you know about the two connectors at the "top" of the motherboard above the CPU? There's an eight-pin connector and one with four. I'm wondering if I should separate my plug and use the one with four to see if it makes a difference. I've read that there's not much difference in using one or the other, but I thought that since my power supply has an eight-pin connector that can be divided in two, I might as well go ahead and use all eight, so I did.

I've got some floppies ready to try Memtest86, but I'm sleepy and I hate to leave it running all night. If I smell something burning, I want to be able to turn the computer off. Heh. I have never used Memtest86. I wonder if there's a way to just run one pass and see how that turns out. I've read stories about people overheating their memory running Memtest86 and that's the last thing I want to do.

I haven't tried all four DIMMs individually yet. I've tried two of the four I have and those two have exhibited the same problem.

[Fluidstream]

I just made a signature, finally, so I won't keep having to retype everything when I'm posting messages. I looked for several minutes to find a way to post it and didn't realize the option to show it was on individual messages.

[Chino]

Connecting just the 8 pin power connector is fine. The other 4 pin isn't needed since we won't be doing any crazy overclocking. I'll leave you this Memtest User Guide For ROG Motherboards written by one of our experts.

For now, shutdown your system. Disconnect the power cable from your UPS. Remove the battery from the motherboard. Wait 5 minutes before putting it back in place. Then I want you to power up your system and go into the BIOS. Set up your RAM manually again to run at it's rated 2133MHz. You can find a simple guide in my sig if you need any help. We maybe using different boards but the concept is the same.

[Fluidstream]

Chino wrote:
Connecting just the 8 pin power connector is fine. The other 4 pin isn't needed since we won't be doing any crazy overclocking.

Well, I thought maybe the 8-pin connector, itself, might be bad. I was going to try just the 4-pin connector and see how it runs with that, without having the 8-pin connector connected, too.

I'll leave you this Memtest User Guide For ROG Motherboards written by one of our experts.

Thanks!

For now, shutdown your system. Disconnect the power cable from your UPS. Remove the battery from the motherboard. Wait 5 minutes before putting it back in place. Then I want you to power up your system and go into the BIOS. Set up your RAM manually again to run at it's rated 2133MHz. You can find a simple guide in my sig if you need any help. We maybe using different boards but the concept is the same.

I'll try that, but isn't that overclocking, or is it overclocking to go above 2133 MHz? I found out by reading AMD's DDR3 Memory Frequency Guide that this memory's standard speed is 1333 MHz. It has only been tested and found to run as high as 2133 MHz. I'm certainly not refusing to try this because it did run better with the other graphics card with higher memory speed settings. But I only have QVL to know how to set all four DIMMs. That guide uses an example of two 2GB DIMMs and says, "If we take the OCZ3G1866LV4GK as an example, we will need to set the memory timings to 10-10-10 and the memory voltage to 1.65 and we will be limited to a maximum of 2 x modules e.g. 8GB. Using more modules may require us to reduce the speed." I can put all four DIMMs back in, however. I'll want them all in when or if I ever get Windows 8 running.

I don't think I've tried those 2133 MHz settings with all four DIMMs in, only two, because at the time, I still believed I needed a premium cooler because Asus's own manual says I might need one for a full memory load. Yet most of the web research I've done has people asking if they need a memory cooler and out of about ten people, nine said it's not needed except for serious overclocking, and the one that was left only said you MIGHT need one.

I do really want to make sure this isn't actually overclocking, though, to go beyond 1333 MHz. I touched one of the heat spreaders after turning my computer off and it was actually cool to the touch. (Even if it is overclocking, I'm going to do it while waiting on responses. I'll end up leaving the battery out for longer than five minutes because I need to wash some dishes.)

[Fluidstream]

Chino wrote:
Set up your RAM manually again to run at it's rated 2133MHz. You can find a simple guide in my sig if you need any help. We maybe using different boards but the concept is the same.

I was just looking at that guide in your signature, particularly at XMP. I haven't tried loading any of the XMP profiles because I wasn't sure what that was, though I know my memory has XMP. Perhaps XMP changes that slew of other settings under the normal timings for the memory. Also, I was looking at my memory specifications on a PDF on the Kingston website. It gives timing of 11-12-11 for 2133 MHz, which is what I was using after someone suggested it a couple of days ago...maybe it was you in another thread. The QVL in the motherboard manual (and in PDFs on the web) have 11-12-11-30. I had been setting that 30 in the DRAM RAS# ACT Time, but it's strange that the Kingston PDF doesn't even mention the RAS# ACT Time, like it's not important or something.

Anyway, I'm going to try manually setting the timings in a bit, but I may have to wait until tomorrow. I'm very sleepy because I've been staying up working on this, and I'm about to implode. The CMOS battery has been out of the motherboard for probably two hours as I try to get other things done around the house (even though I'd rather be working on the computer, lol).

Thanks again. I'll reply here again when I've followed your instructions and have run the computer for at least five hours.

[HalloweenWeed]

Could be you are losing power from your AC power chain somewhere too. Try plugging in directly to the wall outlet, somewhere else in the house, preferrably far away from your present outlet (another circuit). In the garage is even better. See if it does it there too.

[Fluidstream]

HalloweenWeed wrote:
Could be you are losing power from your AC power chain somewhere too. Try plugging in directly to the wall outlet, somewhere else in the house, preferrably far away from your present outlet (another circuit). In the garage is even better. See if it does it there too.

Well, if that were happening, the modem, router and monitor would all also shut off because they're all connected to the same UPS. I don't trust the wall outlets around here. The power fluctuates a lot ... lights dimming, surging, sometimes pumping like a disco hall if my roommate forgets that the heater is broken in the bathroom. If it gets turned on, it tries to power-cycle the heating element and that causes the disco effect. Some days we have three or four power outages that last about three to five seconds. One time three quick power outages in a span of ten seconds hosed a computer. I had to replace the motherboard, and naturally, the CPU and memory, too. Having a UPS has been the best thing I've ever done, but it'll need to be replaced before long. It's beyond its three years, but when the power does go off, it shows 25 minutes of uptime remaining...20 minutes with my old 22" CRT.

[HalloweenWeed]

Your UPS does a better job of powering your other things, and those will run longer on the power capacitors inside. Your computer is the "weakest link" so-to-speak in that chain. It's power-hunger makes it power down quicker than anything else, and what's more the mobo senses when the voltage begins to drop, in milliseconds, and actually parks your HDDs and shuts everything down; your other components don't do that. So try plugging your computer directly into the wall, what can you lose by trying it? Your UPS may be going bad.

[Fluidstream]

HalloweenWeed wrote:
Your UPS does a better job of powering your other things, and those will run longer on the power capacitors inside. Your computer is the "weakest link" so-to-speak in that chain. It's power-hunger makes it power down quicker than anything else, and what's more the mobo senses when the voltage begins to drop, in milliseconds, and actually parks your HDDs and shuts everything down; your other components don't do that. So try plugging your computer directly into the wall, what can you lose by trying it? Your UPS may be going bad.

I'm sorry if I sounded dismissive before. Since I had tried over a dozen different timing settings with no luck, while washing dishes I thought about everything and decided to try your suggestion before Chino's. The CMOS battery was out for several hours. Strangely, this did not seem to clear the BIOS. Normally, clearing the BIOS would reset the system to display the RoG logo during the boot, but it was still disabled when I put the battery back in. I never pushed the Clear CMOS button with the battery in or out.

Anyway, I put the GeForce 7950 GTOC back in since the GFX 650 sucks hard in comparison (big disappointment there, and a surprise, too). Before, with automatic settings and a GeForce 7950 GTOC, I could barely get 10 seconds past the exit from the BIOS and a boot without starting a continuous reboot cycle. I thought... well, the 7950 might be drawing more power than the GTX 650, so if the battery backup is going bad, maybe its imminent failure is expressed through the behavior of my computer. Well, so far, and this is a first with automatic BIOS settings and a 7950 GT, I've had it up and running Windows XP for about an hour and a half or so. I really hate to get too optimistic here. I thought the same thing about having the GTX 650 in with automatic settings and after about 3.5 hours, I had another Reboot Event, capitalization deserved. While I hate running my PC without a battery backup and its surge protection, at least it works. I do have the tower plugged in to a basic surge protector, however, so maybe I'll be sufficiently protected from that kind of damage. I still have the monitor, satellite modem and router running on battery plugs, while the scanner and something else is plugged in to the surge protection-only plugs that are also in the battery unit. I don't have enough plugs and I don't have another surge protector to use at the moment.

I know that when I would try to run a test of the battery backup with the APC software in my temporary rig, my monitor would go dark for a moment and my system would hang. The power on the tower remained on, but the keyboard was frozen, too. My capslock wouldn't activate. I guess it was a big coincidence that my battery started acting up only two days after I got a new monitor. The whole time, I thought the monitor was overpowering a bad capacitor on my old Fatal1ty motherboard, when it may have just been the battery backup all along. I may not have even needed to build this new rig, but it's too late now. I threw the Fatal1ty board in the garbage can.

Yeah, I wanted a new computer anyway, but there were other things I could have done with that $700 that would have made me extraordinarily happy and satisfied, but that being said, the old Fatal1ty did have a problem...I think. I'm about to test that theory as I become comfortable with any stability that might come out of this new arrangement of power cables. My Fatal1ty board had a weird animation problem, but I never knew exactly what the real cause was. Pages of animation in some game would appear to render out of order. Like Deus Ex looked like pages ordered sequentially from 1-30 would play like 1, 25, 13, 2, 29, 5, 27, 12, 15, 16, 17, 5, 29, etc.... It was hard on the eyes, but I lived with it for six years and only played games that weren't affected by whatever was causing that to happen. Final Fantasy XI had no problems, but the PlayOnline Viewer used to start FFXI did have the same animation paging problem.

I'd better post this now in case I suddenly reboot.