Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Common Interests Duron 1.8ghz question

I had an older Socket A motherboard in my basement, My aunt needed a newer computer... I offered to build her a decent computer system for everyday computing for under $300. I had too order another Socket A processor (obvesiouly). The only one I could find was a Duron 1.8hhz Applebred. Only problem is that the motherboard sees it as an "unknown processor" but at the right frequency and such. Then I started to have some "blue screen" issues every time I would go to install windows. It would get too a certain point, then I would get a blue screen telling me a file that was causing the problem and quiting the install... the last line of the blue screen said something about a memory dump. Now, I know this memory is good because it was in my mom's computer for over a year, and I JUST pulled it and gave her new ram. I suspected that it had to do with the hard drive, so I swapped in another 40 gig I had laying around and windows installed flawlessly... So I figured hard drive problem. AS I was in windows I was SUPER multi tasking, running installs and file transfers like crazy. Then the blue screen pops up and the comptuer just restarts... Anybody have any idea what this might be? Im thinking a Bios update is in line... But I dont know if it will do anything.

How sure are you it's not the Ram? If it boots up, run memtest

Are you sure the motherboard supports that processor? You know, just because it's socket A doesn't mean it supports all socket A processors. You might be totally out of luck, or you might have to re-flash the BIOS with a newer version before you get that processor to work properly. IMO you should have bought a newer motherboard/CPU combo with a budget of $300.

-Update the BIOS
-Run memtest, overnight

I have never heard of a CPU really being bad, I have had pretty much everything go on a computer. Never a CPU tho.

Why not let the Mobo detect and use the default settings? If you are tweaking it, I'd recommend checking out the specs of the mobo, cpu and ram to determine what fsb to use.

Also when troubleshooting a problem, strip it down to the bare minimum. BSOD could be caused by a defective device. Sometimes it could be your Optical Drives, PCI card etc. Through the process of elimination, you can determine what is causing the system crash.

Meanwhile, run memtest to see if it crashes. If it does, most likely it's your ram.

I was thinking the same thing but a BIOS flash will usually take care of that. Heat will cause spontaneous reboots too. Check your fans.
What kind of board is it?
Did you forget to grease it? Sorry to ask but it happens.

What is the motherboard? Have you checked the specs match both the CPU and the RAM you have ?

CPU failure is pretty rare on a new CPU, and you are only likely to have a dead CPU. CPU failure of any other type is only likely on old stressed CPU's and even then is very rare. Pretty much they work or not!

Personally I would just replace the board, that's the most likely source of error in your situation. Also posting the error message might give a little extra insight.

also, try updating the bios for the board you have. They might have added (better) support for the cpu you have there.

So I tested my good ram in the new computer, but this time I get windows installed and I turn it off for the night. Come back today, turn it on, and it goes to boot the OS and I get "NTLDR is missing... ctrl+alt+del to restart" On a fresh install of windows. Now what do I do? I have a high performance Thermal compound on the processor, it is running nice and cool at 30 Degrees Centigrade. I have 2x256Mb DDR PC2700 Memory in it. I had 1 512mb PC2100 Stick, but the computer didnt like that memory very much.