Recommendations for a motherboard

Executioner · Post by **Executioner** » Wed Sep 18, 2002 9:09 am

I'm looking for a motherboard replacement for my POS Abit BF6, which is causing my pc to either reboot randomly or lockup at random. I'm pretty sure it's the mobo because I've tried the following:
1. New 256 mem stick
2. New power supply
3. Reseated the cpu
4. Removed my SCSI, Turtle Beach sound card
5. Tried a different hard drive with a Ghost image from 2 months ago
6. Re-installed Win98 on top of itself

All of these resulted in the same problem - lockups or reboots.

What is really strange is it seems to work in DOS with no problems, as I was able to Ghost all my partitions before trying things again to determine the problem.

Anyway, I'm pretty sure it has to be the motherboard, so I would like some thoughts on a replacement. I would like to keep my existing PIII 1GHz coppermine cpu if possible, so I can continue to use my existing memory also. I know a few of you have used Asus mobo's, so if you can recommend a model number, or even a different brand. I've had somewhat bad luck with Abit mobo's.

two slow · Post by **two slow** » Wed Sep 18, 2002 10:23 am

I have an Asus cusl2 it is a pretty solid board. They don't make this version anymore, they went to an Asus tusl2. The only difference is it supports the Tualatin and Coppermine. There may be better boards, I'm not real familiar with Intel products.Here is a link to it.

fearfox · Post by **fearfox** » Wed Sep 18, 2002 10:48 am

Thats nice board there Asus cusl2. I use to have one thing never crashed one me and had great software from Asus for temps and rpms of fan and other things you hooked up to the motherboard.
I had Celeron 1ghz i was able to go up to 1.5ghz with that board.

Dude Kick ass product from Abit is the VP6 it supports dual coppermine chips up to 1.1ghz. She's solid as rock. Look at reviews for this thing its sweet. I has two raid and ide ports.

heres a link to the specs
VP6

wvjohn · Post by **wvjohn** » Wed Sep 18, 2002 10:59 am

for rock solid you might want to see if you can find an msi 6163 pro - it's an older BX board but i've used them for years (still have one) - it runs cumines fine with a msi slocket - my last fast one had an 800e @996 in it - you can find them remaindered for like $30 from time to time - the cubx series also had a very good rep - i'd stay with the bx line of chipsets

TruckStuff · Post by **TruckStuff** » Wed Sep 18, 2002 6:16 pm

Tried looking at FP's IRQ Channel sharing conflict thing? I ignored a similar problem for a long time and finally decied to check it out and found that that was the problem.

Executioner · Post by **Executioner** » Thu Sep 19, 2002 9:24 am

It's not an IRQ sharing conflict. I had all the cards removed except for the video and it does the same thing. Last night, I decided to slap in my spare Abit BF6 (yeah I kept a spare one on hand), and it has the same problem. So I took the board to my workbench outside of the case, and it had problems booting and rebooting or locking up as well with only a stick of ram, video card, and a hard drive. Just to make sure, I pulled out my old trusty BH6 and put the exact same componets (execept for the cpu) and it ran fine with no problems.

I also replaced every single componet in the the rig:
Video card
Hard drive
Power supply
Ram
CPU

I'm looking at getting this mobo for $49:
** Dual Socket 370 Celeron/P3 Motherboard by Acorp **

Building a computer system is like constructing a house...you need a good foundation! Give your customers the foundation that they need to make a great system! This Acorp motherboard will give them the foundation they need to build a superior computer system. Featuring dual socket 370 for CPU support up to 1GHz and three 168-pin DIMM slots for a maximum 512MB SDRAM, they can blaze through their favorite video games or render complex 3D models. With one open 4x AGP slot and five open PCI slots, they can configure this system to their specific needs!
--> General Features:
- Two Socket 370 CPU Slots (see below for processor support)
- Three (3) 168-pin DIMM socket supporting a
maximum 512MB SDRAM
- One (1) 4x AGP at 66MHz
- Five (5) 32 bit PCI slots
- One (1) CNR slot
- IDE controller provides IDE HDD/CD-ROM with PIO,
bus master and Ultra DMA 33/66/100 operations modes
- Up to four (4) IDE devices
- One (1) floppy port supports 2 FDD with 369k,
720k, 1.2MB, 1.44MB and 2.88MB
- One (1) Serial port (also includes a cable to
add a 2nd (COM2) port)
- Two (2) USB ports
- One (1) parallel port supporting SPP/EPP/ECP mode
- Intel accelerated hub architecture with 266MB/second bandwidth
--> Processor (CPU) Support:
- Intel FC-PGA Pentium III 500MHz-1GHz or
higher with 100/133MHz FSB
- Intel FC-PGA/PPGA Celeron 300MHz-800MHz or
higher with 66/100MHz FSB
- VIA Cyrix III processor with 100/133MHz FSB
- Can run single or dual processors
- NOTE: ONLY PENTIUM III PROCESSORS ARE SUPPORTED
IN DUAL MODE
--> Chipset Features:
- Intel 815EP north bridge system chipset with
support for 66/100/133 FSB
- Intel ICH2 south bridge system chipset
--> BIOS Features:
- Award legal BIOS
- Supports APM 1.2
- Supports USB functionality
- Supports ACPI
- Plug and Play BIOS
- BIOS support for CD-ROM, SCSI, LAN BOOT,
temperature sensor, wake on modem, LAN, alarm bus
CLK setup CPU fan speed monitor
- System and CPU temperature monitor
- System voltage monitor
--> Retail Box Includes:
- Acorp Motherboard, Model 6A815EDP1
- Two (2) HDD UDMA 66/100 cables
- One (1) FDD cable
- One (1) COM2 cable
- One (1) Acorp 6-in-one-Bonus Pack CD-ROM for
system setup
- One (1) Acorp 6A815EDP User Manual

What do you guys think of the Intel 815EP north bridge system chipset with support for 66/100/133 FSB - Intel ICH2 south bridge system chipset?

Shadow250 · Post by **Shadow250** » Thu Sep 19, 2002 10:57 am

you may have a corupted file/s in windows, reinstalling windows 98 over top of itself rarlely corrects issues like that in my experiance. ive found that a format and clean reinstall is usually what works. ghosting the hdd doesnt get rid of the corrupted files just saves then restores them as is.

Executioner · Post by **Executioner** » Thu Sep 19, 2002 11:11 am

It's not a HD problem or a Windows problem. After installing the motherboard and a NEW hard drive with nothing on it, the pc would not boot, and if it did, it would reboot booting from a floppy disk. Trust me, it's the POS Abit BF6 mobo. A good friend of mine told me to stay clear of this board as he had problems like this with his. This was almost 2 years ago he told me. Having the mobo on the bench top with nothing on it except a video card, stick of ram, new HD, and floppy, and it still reboots or has trouble starting up - it's the mobo.

Shadow250 · Post by **Shadow250** » Thu Sep 19, 2002 6:08 pm

sorry, i didnt mean to imply that you were stupid or anything, its just when you wrote you installed over windows and not a clean install i just thought you overlooked a cheaper solution.

Executioner · Post by **Executioner** » Thu Sep 19, 2002 10:16 pm

No offense taken

Sometimes though, I do forget something simple and it's usually the solution.

I installed the mobo mentioned above, and all is well except for a yellow question mark in device manager. It wants a driver for "PCI System Management Bus". Since this is a different chipset than the BX I was using, I ran the Intel setup program and it copied a boat load of drivers and upgraded several devices. I also had to isntall the UDMA driver as well. After rebooting, it still is looking for this stupid driver, and I can't find it on the CD. I've emailed their tech support for an answer.

Other than that little problem mentioned above, I did notice a difference going from DMA33 to DMA100 on my HD. Not a bad mobo for $49 new.