KX7-333R and APIC

[septimus]

Well, I have been unable to achieve a stable system with APIC and MPS v1.4 enabled with this board. Has anyone bothered with this setting? I tried both Win2k and XP and they both exhibit the same problems, namely system instability over time and inability to use benchmarks at all...

Also, there is a setting in the CPU & PCI Bus Control menu called PCI Master Read Caching. When I enable this I get alot of graphic corruption and tearing within both win2k and XP.

Is anyone happily running their KX7 with these settings enabled? If so, what voodoo magic did you use? :D

[MrIcee]

Septimus:)

I have been having extreme stability problems also lately, after my initial testing of the 2200+. I do in fact have APIC enabled and installed both XP and 2000 as uniprocessor PC's in their installs. I cannot finish a 3Dmark bench either..even as low as 1699Mhz...I just finished trying...it just keeps kicking me out..and I've NEVER had THAT problem at such a low speed...at the extreme edge of an overclock...yes. I've been in a board swapping mess here of KX7's...been blaming the boards..but maybe you are onto something here. I just cleared out my old Win2000 install and will install it fresh with APIC disabled in the bios. My instability symptoms crept up slowly and are now unbearable....blue screens(ntoskernal among them)....not finishing benches...can't finish Prime at low CPU Mhz etc. I'll let you know how I make out.....

In the meantime...anyone else here having issues with APIC enabled?? I'm hoping we can resolve this so I can get back to O/cing this 2200 and do some 3D runs. Good luck and take care:)

Randi:D

[septimus]

Using APIC caused instability, but now I am experiencing the same instability without APIC enabled. I have tried re-installation of both win2k and xp and they both exhibit the same problems using the regular Advanced Configuration and Power (ACPI) PC hardware abstraction layer. I tried popping the battery out for an extended period of time in the hope that it would do something clever like fix all my woes but no cigar. The problems I experience the most is, when installing something like 3DMark or PCMark, or installing a game that spans more than one CD, are page_fault_in_non_paged_area BSOD or the machine just hangs.

When I install either win2k or xp with apic enabled I have to make sure that I have fail-safe defaults loaded otherwise i wont even get past the initial copying of files. After the install, with fail-safe defaults enabled, I get instability and hangs/BSOD, and I'm not even overclocking yet :)

I'm going to drop by the shop that I got this board from and make a swap. Someone who works for Abit drops by there every weekend so I'll see what he has to say.

MrIcee... you say you are swapping these boards alot? Did you have the same trouble with the KR7? :confused:

[MrIcee]

Nope...no problems at all with the KR7A...but then again..I only had WinMe or Win98 at that time too...WinXP for just a brief period in dualboot before I switched tho the KX7. My first KX7 was a 100% wonderful running and performing champ...none of these probs even when clocked at 2064Mhz with my 1700+XP. Benched 3DMark at 2034Mhz. Its voltage regulation circuits died...the 2nd one I bought works ok but seemed to get worse stability wise, I couldn't run 3Dmark at 2034Mhz...# 3 sent to me from Hawkeye was a total POS..as its voltages were ALL WAY TOO LOW.....+5,+12 and Vio were terrible...I checked my PSU and its output is still king:D So its definitely a regulation prob on my boards.....its just totally frustrating at the moment. I have my first board and Hawkeyes on the RMA trail..so soon I'll be swapping some more looking for the decent board voltage to return. In the meantime I saw your thread...so I'll give the APIC thing a try too.....when you can't run a bench at all at Mhz LOWER than the cpu's rated speed..SOMETHING is definitely NOT right.

Randi:D

[septimus]

Very interesting post Randi :D

I dusted off my DMM and had a look at my voltages and found that my somewhat older 350W antec supply did very well, all the rails were quite close to perfect... all within 2% of the needed reading. However, in the BIOS, the voltages are quite different, the +12 was down around 11.78v, the +5 at 4.85v... I swapped out the supply for a newer enermax 350W that i had in another system and go slightly better voltages, they all increased about 200 to 300 mV... oh well. I will still proceed to make an exchange if I can as I believe that my RAID controller is at fault somehow, as my machine always hangs when there is any HDD activity beyond a short period of time...

Well, I will get to the bottom of this APIC and KX7 problem as soon as I can, I tossed Abit an email and I hope it will be read ;)

[MrIcee]

As far as hangs with HDD activity let me offer this little tidbit...most do it but some don't.

When installing XP or 2000...it asks for the raid drivers...we obviously use the floppy to do this. The problem is..the drivers on the floppy are a generation old..for the previous version bios and controller...so be sure after you are up and running to install the drivers that go with the Highpoint 2.31 bios...which are on the CD. That eliminated hanging and deathly slow file transfer speeds and hangs.:)

Randi:D

[mackanz]

If this APIC is what i think it is, i might have a sollution that workes perfect in both XP and 2k, 2k for sure as i run it now.
Install 2k with apic DISABLED, and when everything is installed half an hour later, simply change the way you want your computer to be in device manager on the top choice, properties.
Choose update driver and instead of ACPI, choose either "normal" or "multiprocessing" i chose the latter.
Reboot and then ENABLE apic 1.4 in bios, been running perfect ever since, both usb and everything.
Be ready with the drivers though since they needs to be reinstalled.
Oh by the way, i serously suggest running the os partition from ide 1 when doing this as it needs to reinstall ALL drivers, even the raid ones, thats why.
After all reboots do an extra reboot to make sure that everything is installed in Device manager. THEN change the hd to the raidport for oc, and DO NOT do this APIC enabled and windows change on oc, just a tip....
I did this from an image that is installed with apic DISABLED so i cant see any reasons why it shouldn´t work from an fresh install.

Hope that made sense,

Mac

[KnightElite]

Umm... Okay, that sort of made sense.

So the gist of this is that OCes are more stable with APIC disabled? Should I do this on my new AT7 before doing anything else?

[septimus]

Mackanz,

I'll try that out. I remember doing such things with my old P3 500 and Win98 and how it went thru absolutely every single device and driver. I would always dread the machine hanging for whatever reason during the hardware re-install process as that meant a format and clean install :(

What I will do is make an image of the OS and then use your method, hopefully it will work :)

I also wonder about APIC and overclocking, which is best for OCing? Standard, ACPI, or APIC?

[mackanz]

As a matter of fact, im doing testing on that particular object as we speak.
I got more points on lower fsb with it enabled so far, thats for sure, but i also had some NV display bsod:s but i dont know if thats because of driver mixing or the APIC thing...time will show.
Stay put, ok?

Mac