Warranty Issue

[PacketThirst]

I had an A7N8X-VM/400 motherboard. Last month it stopped functioning and i gave it to my reseller. The warranty for this product is valid till the August of 2007. After 2 weeks i was notified that my motherboard could not be repaired i would be given a replacement. I was given an A7V8x board(which is so lame!) saying that ASUS stopped the production of my old board. This board sucks and it freezes on Windows Xp all the time. It would be of great help if you guys could suggest me what to do. :-)

[Raion]

Well, personally, I would just sell it on ebay and buy the one you had back OR buy a better one. But that's just me.

[nihil]

Did you do a clean install of XP and re-register it?

What make and specification of RAM have you got?

What video card are you using?

[PacketThirst]

raion: well, i'm a student and i still haven't got a job yet. This will require me to do a lot of convincing to do with my parents :-( !

nihil: I've got 512 MB Ram and a GeForce 6200 256 MB card.They worked just fine with my old board. Yup, i did a clean install too. I had done some googling on the "freeze" issue. Its very common with that board. I've come to the conclusion that its not a hardware issue because they get along well on Linux. I also have the latest drivers for my card and motherboard too. Most of the solutions that i've seen, i have tried in vain. My HD strangely got screwed up (as u know) too.Thats why i want to return this "child of misery" back to its mamma...

[cgkanchi]

See if they have a BIOS upgrade available for the board...

Cheers,
cgkanchi

[PacketThirst]

cgkanchi: Do correct me if i'm wrong. If it were a BIOS problem, it wouldn't work on Linux right ?.

I'll be more specific about what happens. The pc just freezes after a random period of time. But some events (like when a van explodesin the game half life 2) always causes it to freeze. It starts with something which sounds like powering on the pc. Then my Cd drive and Dvd drive starts blinking. The keyboard stops responding.

[PacketThirst]

Forgot to add that my 1.9 Ghz Amd Athlon runs only at 1.1 Ghz on this board !

[nihil]

Several points to note:

1. The make and type of RAM matters.............some are incompatible
2. Same goes for video cards and probably sound cards as well. [Also update all drivers for these]
3. Did you re-validate/activate the Windows with Microsoft?
4. Your system is operated by the BIOS and the Operating System (drivers) It is thus quite possible for things to work under Linux and not Windows. Physically there is nothing wrong it is just the information that the BIOS passes to the OS and how the OS interprets it.
5. What model of Athlon processor do you have? I presume that you know about clockspeed and the multiplier?

Basically, if the motherboard is not compatible with your processor, video card or RAM, then it is not a valid replacement under the terms of the warranty.

[PacketThirst]

I've updated the drivers for my video and sound. My windows is also activated. I have an Athlon 2600 processor with operating frequency 2.13 Ghz and i guess the multiplier is 16.0X. The FSB of the new board is just one half of my previous one.

[nihil]

The board is supposed to support 100/200, 133/266, and 166/333.

So a setting of 133 and a multiplier of 16.0 should give you the proper speed? or 166 x 13.0

In the BIOS, do you have those settings as an option?

It sounds as if your setting is 100 x 11.0 which would be right for a Duron (Sempron?) processor. Where I have seen boards that support the Athlon and the economy processor the default setting is usually for the inferior processor and you get what you are describing.

Also if you have a PCI soundcard, have you disabled the onboard AC97 in the BIOS?

There is also the slight possibility that the new board is defective?