Well, after a long time of thinking about it, I finally got myself a new computer. Well, a new case, motherboard, CPU, and RAM anyway. A Gigabyte K8-Triton series GA-K8NS Ultra-939 motherboard with an AMD 3500 Athlon 64 and dual 512 sticks of RAM. After several hours of putting it all together, I started trying to get it to boot. First, it was having a problem finding one of the hard drives, but I think I’ve got that fixed. I am now having two problems. The first is that it will not boot into XP, not even in safe mode. It actually started booting successfully into ME and started to find and load the new hardware when the second problem happened. This problem is that after about a minute, the system just loses power. The normal fan is working fine as is the CPU fan (I can’t seem to get power to the hard drive fan, but that’s a small problem for later.) I think the CPU is starting to overheat and the system is shutting down for self-protection. In fact, I’m sure that that is probably the problem, as it keeps going up in temperature according to the diagnostic CMOS but the fan speed isn’t rising in an attempt at compensating. The fan is running at a constant 3125 RPM. The computer then shuts itself down at about 98-99 degrees. To me, this suggests that I somehow have the heatsink/fan installed incorrectly, but I can’t really imagine how. I mean, the CPU comes with a heatsink/fan combo, with thermal paste already applied. All I should have to do is to seat it on the CPU.
Although I am taking the heat problem first, I would love to hear some ideas on my Windows XP problem as well. I’d hate to do a complete reinstall if I can avoid it.
Not sure there’s much we can do here, it pretty much has to be a hardware problem. Temp gauge faulty, CPU faulty, fan faulty or incorrectly installed … does it last longer if it comes up from cold (ie left off overnight)?
The thermal paste comes already applied to the bottom of the heatsink. It does last longer coming up from cold, but the temperature quickly begins rising. I was just wondering if anyone has any experience with that sort of immediate problem using manufacturer parts.
Also, does anyone have any idea on the XP? Could it be as simple as the hardware changes tripping the activation scheme and killing the boot?
Wait, do you mean a thermal pad? Get a razor blade or X-Acto knife, scrape it off, and use some fine-grit sandpaper and rubbing alcohol to remove the rest of the goo. Then get a tube of actual thermal paste, like Arctic Silver. Many of the pre-fab thermal pastes and putties just don’t do the trick.
Getting the right thermal interface between your CPU and sink won’t solve your current problem, but it will ameliorate it somewhat, and it will be better in the long run.
OK so it is definitely an (apparent or real) overheating problem. Short of swapping parts one at a time I can’t think of a way of telling whether it’s the fan, CPU, or temp sensor. If these were bought from a local shop see if they’ll swap them or otherwise help you eliminate possibilities.
I’d wait til the main problem is resolved before tackling this; it may just go away then anyway.
Well, I got the fan reseated properly, so that problem was gone. Turned out it wasn’t quite in complete contact and that was enough to give an overheating problem. I still might get the actual thermal paste, but I ain’t doing it right now. Getting that thing seated properly was really tricky and frustrating.
As for XP, I still couldn’t get it to work. I wound up doing a complete format and reinstall (not a problem as the OS has its own hard drive), which isn’t too bad, as I was meaning to do that anyway. Still, though, I would like to know if there was something I was missing and that I should have been able to do it without the format and reinstall.
