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Well I built myself a new Phenom II X4 940 system last week to replace my ageing socket 939 build.
The mobo came with the FA version of the BIOS, and upon installing everything it didn't recognise the Phenom II CPU, but other than that the system was stable.
Installed windows and everything and ran CPU-Z, it identified that the CPU was running at 4x2.3GHz, with the memory running at just 400MHz, but the system was stable.
Anyways, a few days ago Gigabyte released the FB version for the BIOS, which I promptly used, using the Q-Flash utility. After flashing and rebooting, the system would not even start up, not even get to the BIOS screen.
Contacting gigabyte tech support, they said to remove the power cable and pull out the battery to wipe the CMOS. This succeeded in getting my PC to reboot. The POST screen could identify my CPU now. It gave the CMOS checksum error, and selecting the default profile resulted in my computer not being able to boot or even get to the POST screen.
Now I can wipe the CMOS every time, and it will allow me to boot up that one time. If I go into the BIOS and set the date time, or any other settings save and reboot, it won't boot up. If I'm on the checksum error screen, rather than selecting a profile or entering the BIOS, I can select to continue booting, and load up windows fine. The system was stable, with CPU-Z reporting my CPU correctly and running at 4x3GHz, and the memory running at 400MHz (or maybe 800MHz I can't remember now) but not 1066MHz. Windows was perfectly stable, and even let me play Crysis for 2 hours without a problem. Of course, rebooting the PC when in windows causes the PC not to boot at all again.
I was wondering if anybody had any suggestions on what the problem might be? Perhaps there's some setting on the BIOS screen I'm not seeing. It's really doing my head in, as the BIOS works and recognises my processor, but it will only let me boot up the one time after every CMOS reset, and then everytime afterwards, nothing!
Here is a list of the components in my build, in case it might be something here causing the problem (Most of the stuff is brand new so should not be any problem there):
GA-MA770-DS3 rev 2.0 mobo
Phenom II X4 940
8GB Kingston HyperX 1066 DDR2 RAM
Asus 4870x2 GFX
Creative Audigy Platinum eX (I wasn't sure if this sound card was better or worse than onboard sound)
Thermaltake 750W PSU
2 x SATA II HDD 2 x SATA HDD
Also on a related note, how does my ancient Audigy Platinum eX soundcard compare to the onboard realtek sound? I've always had bad experiences using onboard sound before, but I was wondering if it would be better using the onboard sound on this new mobo compared to my old stand-alone soundcard.
The mobo came with the FA version of the BIOS, and upon installing everything it didn't recognise the Phenom II CPU, but other than that the system was stable.
Installed windows and everything and ran CPU-Z, it identified that the CPU was running at 4x2.3GHz, with the memory running at just 400MHz, but the system was stable.
Anyways, a few days ago Gigabyte released the FB version for the BIOS, which I promptly used, using the Q-Flash utility. After flashing and rebooting, the system would not even start up, not even get to the BIOS screen.
Contacting gigabyte tech support, they said to remove the power cable and pull out the battery to wipe the CMOS. This succeeded in getting my PC to reboot. The POST screen could identify my CPU now. It gave the CMOS checksum error, and selecting the default profile resulted in my computer not being able to boot or even get to the POST screen.
Now I can wipe the CMOS every time, and it will allow me to boot up that one time. If I go into the BIOS and set the date time, or any other settings save and reboot, it won't boot up. If I'm on the checksum error screen, rather than selecting a profile or entering the BIOS, I can select to continue booting, and load up windows fine. The system was stable, with CPU-Z reporting my CPU correctly and running at 4x3GHz, and the memory running at 400MHz (or maybe 800MHz I can't remember now) but not 1066MHz. Windows was perfectly stable, and even let me play Crysis for 2 hours without a problem. Of course, rebooting the PC when in windows causes the PC not to boot at all again.
I was wondering if anybody had any suggestions on what the problem might be? Perhaps there's some setting on the BIOS screen I'm not seeing. It's really doing my head in, as the BIOS works and recognises my processor, but it will only let me boot up the one time after every CMOS reset, and then everytime afterwards, nothing!
Here is a list of the components in my build, in case it might be something here causing the problem (Most of the stuff is brand new so should not be any problem there):
GA-MA770-DS3 rev 2.0 mobo
Phenom II X4 940
8GB Kingston HyperX 1066 DDR2 RAM
Asus 4870x2 GFX
Creative Audigy Platinum eX (I wasn't sure if this sound card was better or worse than onboard sound)
Thermaltake 750W PSU
2 x SATA II HDD 2 x SATA HDD
Also on a related note, how does my ancient Audigy Platinum eX soundcard compare to the onboard realtek sound? I've always had bad experiences using onboard sound before, but I was wondering if it would be better using the onboard sound on this new mobo compared to my old stand-alone soundcard.
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