At 10:11 PM 05/14/2000 , you wrote:
>Y-ellow Y'all.
>         I'm new to this list. Usually I'd wait to see a few posts before making
>one myself but I have an immediate and distressing problem.
>
>To be honest I'm not 100% sure it's a hardware problem as such. Could be
>the OS. (Win98) or it could be something in the system the OS doesn't like.
>But I'm tending toward hardware as this is now a fresh virgin install.
>
>I have an EPoX EP-6VBA2 Mo-bo. VIA chipset running a 600 meg coppermine
>core 133 meg FSB proc. + 133 meg RAM. It tuned out to be the only mo-bo I
>could lay my hands on that would actually support this config. And support
>it, it does. The original system came up from A BX chipset however. The
>first Mo-bo we got was An MSI (Microstar) BX board to upgrade from a
>Celeron. However there was a problem.
>
>As you'd expect the OS didn't take too kindly to having it's BX environment
>shipped out from under it and replaced by a VIA chipsset. even so I managed
>to rid it of all BX like things and replace it with VIA. What followed were
>a string of random hangs. Usually when manipulating files using Explorer or
>even just using the start menu. Often on boot from cold, it would report an
>error finding the registry and try to replace it with the usual
>non-existent or ancient backup. I'd simply reboot and it would be fine. I
>then replaced all drivers with the latest. Replaced the network card,
>replaced the pointing device (drivers) and re-installed the OS. Nothing
>helped.
>
>Realizing that there was probably an unavoidable legacy I got myself a
>little 3 gig drive and began the arduous task or bringing up a virgin
>system entirely from scratch. No easy task given the system in question.
>However everything seemed to be coming up roses when I went to bed last night.
>
>Imagine my surprise when I booted up this morning and as soon as it got
>into the OS it reported that the reg was corrupt and it wanted to re-load a
>backup. I rebooted immediately of course and after that it came up but I'm
>really hoping for some advice on this.
>
>On the face of it, it would seem that there is a controller problem of some
>sort. Perhaps it doesn't like coming up  from cold but I fear that when I
>start manipulating files again it will hang again. This level of anxiety I
>could do without.
>
>For succinctness, I've FLASHed the BIOS in this board with the latest. I've
>  also loaded the latest MO-bo resource drivers. Everything is up to speed.
>Perhaps there's some settings in the BIOS I'm overlooking.
>
>All drives support UDMA. However only 1 is a 28 gig ATA66. This lives on
>the secondary primary controller. Controller number 1 usually runs a 5.4
>gig drive but a 3 gig drive is currently the only one running in the system.


Typically, when I have seen these issues in the past they are related to
the ram memory.   One of two issues probably are the culprit:

1)  The ram will need to have the waits states lowered in your BIOS, as
     it is not completely compatible with the motherboard and CPU.  Lowering
     the wait states will allow for the incompatibility to be less apparent.  Typically,
     you will not see any performance hit on the system unless you run a benchmark.
2) The ram is faulty, in which case you need to have it tested and if it
      is going bad, have it replaced under warranty.

Try first lowering the wait states in your system's CMOS settings of the BIOS
before going to the effort of testing the ram.

      Bob Wright
The NOSPIN Group

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