Intel and AMD thing, don't blame it on the chip folks. If it was the chip it would not even boot up! Get real! I have 2 AMD systems here that run flawless. I would guess its a soundcard issue or a problem with a background software application. Remove soundcard and drivers and see if problem goes away. Get rid of any unecessary applications that run in the background. You should only have firewall, virus, motherboard monitor and the basic operating system running at startup.
I removed the sound card and uninstalled the drivers yesterday, and I still had problems. But I'm updating the SoundBlaster drivers today. And the # of programs on startup is minimal.
No offense taken. I'm no expert, but I think I'm fairly knowledgeable. AFAIK, I loaded everything in the proper sequence, but I may reinstall again with a new mobo. The thing that has me baffled is that this machine ran flawlessly for 8 mos. before it acted up. That's why I'm thinking it's a hardware problem. Thanks for your post.
I've been lightly following the thread here and as a tech I am impressed with all the general amount of valid possible solutions here. Let me throw in my $0.02 worth. First, determine what was the last software and hardware that you installed on this machine? They may have caused an OS issue. Second, how hard do you tax this puppy? There is the possibility that some where in the OS you now have an issue/conflict that needs to be addressed through a complete wipe and re-install. Third, don't put too much time and effort into solving the trouble. Time is money. I realize that there are many who like to play with this as a hobby, but as you can see the solutions are (appearing) endless. Being in the field professionally, I can tell you that the "computer kid inside" gleefully dances at the opportunity to find new solutions to your problem. But the internal "time manager" says to keep him in check. He could run rampant with all the checks-of-the-checks searches. There are virtually a few hundred things that come to mind. The time effective, cost effective, solutions seem to have been tried. I would personally say that your motherboard/processor have some issues. Hardware is cheap today, replace them. Rather than anguish over the current dilemma, plan that next machine. Maybe in a new case, with an upgrade in the motherboard, more RAM, etc. You seem comfortable tooling around the mechanics, put that research to use in a different positive fashion. Good luck!
It is the odd problem that a lot of customers could live with, and it might have been very difficult to catch in the testing phase of the processor development. Intel sets the standard, maybe they did not quite share all the information necessary for AMD to meet the standard. I have never worked for a company that used AMD processors in their office equipment and I have never had a machine with a problem like that except for my AMD K6-2 machine which is giving me fits. I gave up on it (it's a little past it's prime anyhow) and have a new laptop on order, no AMD parts in it. Max
Canyonman, thanks for a refreshing post! I'd already considered a new mobo, but a new chip isn't that much more for a little peace of mind. Yes, sometimes this "puppy" gets taxed pretty hard. 100% cpu for a few hours, e.g. The new hardware will be ordered today.
Get real. IBM has always set "the" standard. As far as AMD quality control, Dirk Meyer designed the Athlon chips (genius may ring a bell ) and Hector Ruiz came from Motorola because of his quality control and execution expertise. Intel sets the standard for ASP's. Maybe you don't remember this " After being stirred up by an article on The Inquirer, Intel has issued details that their US$3,692 900MHz PIII Xeon with 2MB of L2 cache is not being sold, and has not been sold since April--one month after it was released this year. A customer found a glitch which Intel verified, and a new version will not be ready until August, capping the PIII Xeon (with 2MB L2 cache, quad processor capability) at 700MHz. I can't see how this will not affect Intel's bottom line this quarter, but so far they haven't warned. This recall is the latest in a series of debacles that makes me wonder if the Itanium chip and the new P4 Xeon will be able to handle it in the marketplace. As chips have more transistors, it gets harder to test them. Is Intel just being really sloppy, or will AMD have similar troubles once it tries to up the L2 cache size of its chips to large levels? AMD had planned to do that in late 2000 with the "Mustang" chip, but instead decided to ditch that effort. Until late 2002, I wouldn't even expect AMD to have to worry about multiprocessing issues with big-cache chips, as they won't have any (just the Athlon MP with 256K of L2 cache). Maybe Intel can just blow off the whole 900MHz PIII Xeon problem. They succeeded in keeping it from the public for three months already." Quality control issues with AMD? NONE since the aforementioned people have joined the team to design and implement the Athlon and beyond. You should really get your shit straight before offering an opinion and trying to make them facts as some people here might believe you.
I built a AMD XP1900 roughly a year ago and it's very good. Gigabyte mobo. More than anything I think the operating system is the major problem. I guess Bill doesn't want a perfect os 'cause no-one would upgrade then.