Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 15:18:23 -0700 From: Garrett Cooper <youshi10@u.washington.edu> To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Making a L440GX+ work (was "Trying to revive a server... AIC-7896 freezes pre-POST completion") Message-ID: <44908B2F.6070103@u.washington.edu> In-Reply-To: <6.0.0.22.2.20060614164104.026ac018@mail.computinginnovations.com> References: <448F9A87.3070809@u.washington.edu> <6.0.0.22.2.20060614103744.0271cf10@mail.computinginnovations.com> <44907122.8000801@u.washington.edu> <6.0.0.22.2.20060614164104.026ac018@mail.computinginnovations.com>
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Derek Ragona wrote: > The halt could be anything from bad RAM, or other IRQ issues. This begs > the question as to why this board is not in use? > > You should be able to update the BIOS from a floppy or cd-rom boot > disk. You can take your pick at bootdisk.org > > The general rule with ram is you can run faster ram than you need, just > usually wastes money that faster RAM costs. But speed isn't the only > issue with ram, some are ECC or non-ECC, plus the CAS timing can be > different. So your RAM while it seems to work,may not be quite right. > > -Derek > > > > At 03:27 PM 6/14/2006, Garrett Cooper wrote: >> Derek Ragona wrote: >>> IF you can find the documentation for the motherboard, see if there >>> is a reset jumper. That jumper should reset the BIOS to factory >>> defaults to allow it to get through the post and into setup. Some >>> motherboards actually take you into setup with the jumper moved to >>> reset bad configurations. >>> Also, unplug any cards and drives, leave the system board with just >>> ram and cpu and video (unless it is built in) until you get it >>> configured. >>> -Derek >>> >>> At 12:11 AM 6/14/2006, Garrett Cooper wrote: >>>> Hello again all, >>>> I know this isn't a FreeBSD question really, but I just >>>> started up a motherboard with onboard SCSI (Adaptec AIC-7896), and >>>> for some odd reason it freezes pre-POST before it attempts to boot >>>> and there isn't any way where I can get into the BIOS to change the >>>> settings it seems. Does anyone know how I can maybe disable the >>>> onboard SCSI controller since it appears to hang while detecting disks? >>>> Thanks a million! >>>> -Garrett >> >> Thanks all for the help. It turns out after a bit of >> researching and seeing some numbers on boot, I was able to find the >> documentation for the motherboard. It's an L440GX+ motherboard which >> does appear to still work properly, but here's the clincher. I read >> that the processors I have installed are compatible (2xP3 600E CPUs), >> _but_ only if the BIOS is updated past a particular version and I >> don't know if that is true or not. Plus I don't know what is causing >> the thing to halt because it appears to work on occasion--got the >> system to boot once but halted it since I couldn't get into the BIOS >> and change the settings. I cleared the CMOS--both by setting the >> jumper and removing the battery, and all it appears to have done >> superficially is make the original splash screen come up during boot. >> So, my question is has anyone experienced anything like this >> and if so how did you solve this problem, or does anyone know how to >> fix this situation apart from (maybe) installing Windows and updating >> the BIOS with a different processor? >> Also, I have a horde of PC133 SD RAM and only one stick of >> PC100 RAM, which doesn't appear to work in the motherboard, and the >> motherboard is rated to _only_ support PC100 SD RAM. Is it all right >> for me to use RAM which is rated 33MHz faster than recommended? I >> think it's possible with some motherboards but I'm not sure about this >> one. >> Thanks again for all your help guys :). >> -Garrett Thanks for your concerns. Supposedly when I received it last year in a trade, this motherboard was a spare that was not used by the owner because I don't think he had a reason to use the antique hardware. The thing is that I need a replacement motherboard with working IRQ/PCI slots because my previous motherboard (Tualatin ECS board) may have been partially fried thanks to a bad PSU and a series of SCSI hard drives drawing too much current within the case. Needless to say I fixed the PSU issue, but the issue with the original motherboard still may linger on. I'll see about using a BIOS flash boot disk, but there is a list of procedures that Intel gives on their website, which seems to involve Windows a bit more extensively than I originally thought. Thanks again about the RAM part. I know that mixing and matching is the only no-no in RAM-land, but other than that the motherboard says it supports both flavors--either ECC or non-ECC. -Garrett
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