need advise on setting up a system properly

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tomera69
Posts: 6
Joined: Sat Sep 15, 2007 2:48 am

need advise on setting up a system properly

Post by tomera69 » Mon May 19, 2008 7:29 am

hi all,
i have just built a new setup, and i m having quite few problems with it.
i was wondering if anyone could guide me through the correct setup by detailed step by step.

my setup is:
skyhawk case with 7" touchscreen lcd built in.
mb: gigabyte ga-ma78gm-2sh
cpu: amd athlon 3800.
gpu: saphire ati radeon 3450 512mb
4gb 667mhz memeory
psu: normal
250 gb hdd.

the problems i have r as follows:

1: as i read in the article on this site, i crossfired the 2 gpu's. also tried to tell bios to give 512mb of mem to the onboard gpu, but for some reason it would only give 256mb. when its in 512mb, the computer would crash to a blue screen.

2: i overclocked the onboard gpu to 950mhz speed but even that was problematic and the computer would crash.

3:i have noticed, on the catalyst screen that stock speed is 333mhz, where at the article written by this site it would show 400mhz.

my screen is a 46" fullHD SAMSUNG LCD MODEL LA46F81.

when i change the resolution to 1920x1080 the screen does not look good and there is interferance.

basically, what i need is, by all means, a step by step guidance how to setup and define everything correctly.
i dont know for example if the crossfire is working properly. is there a way to actually know if the computer is working in crossfire?
also please guide me through the right definition on the bios.

the blue screen i get shows: driver_irql_not_less_or_equal

also: *** dxgkrnl.sys - adress 8972ed21 base at 8972a000, datestamp 47918c64.

also what is the best way to work with both screens( the touc and the samsung)

any help would be much appreciated.

tia.
tomer.

ps.: i m cahnging the cpu to a hugher one. above 4200.

NeilBlanchard
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Post by NeilBlanchard » Mon May 19, 2008 9:06 am

Hello,

I would run everything at stock speeds. Very often, running 4GB of RAM forces the RAM speed to drop -- you may either have to bump up the RAM voltage, or drop back to 2-3GB.

Are you running a 64bit OS, BTW? Have you enabled the RAM above 3GB in the BIOS?

sjoukew
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Post by sjoukew » Mon May 19, 2008 1:23 pm

The source of the interference could be your cable that you use to transport the data. If that one is lying close to a power cable of such a thing, "strange things" like interference could happen.
Further more, I don't know if it is possible to power 2 display devices if vga cards are running crossfire. Therefore I wonder how the 2nd touchscreen display is connected.

Which operating system are you using?

tomera69
Posts: 6
Joined: Sat Sep 15, 2007 2:48 am

Post by tomera69 » Mon May 19, 2008 10:17 pm

sorry i forgot to mention. i m using vista premium 32bit.
how do i set the bios for 4gb of ram?
please can u guide me, step by step how to set up everything?

sjoukew
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Post by sjoukew » Tue May 20, 2008 1:45 am

A 32 bit OS like vista has 4GB address space available.
In this space all available RAM is mapped, therefore if you have 4GB ram, the address space is completely used.
However:
A lot of hardware uses memory addresses for memory mapped IO.
The hardware claims a piece of this address space. If the cpu writes to these addresses it doesn't write to the RAM, but to the hardware which has claimed the address space.
So bottom line, each piece of hardware you add, will be removed from your available memory. If you add a vga card and assign 512mb address space to it, this address space will be subtracted from the amount of ram available to you.

I wouldn't spend 512 mb ram to the onboard vga chip, I think it can't use it, I would start with 128 mb, and if that isn't enough add a some more.

Windows Vista 32bit and your machine will probably be able to use 3gb of ram, and the last GB will be used for hardware.
In 32 bit you can't set your "bios for 4gb ram".

This post has become a little bit chaotic unfortunately, but I hope it answers some of your questions.

tomera69
Posts: 6
Joined: Sat Sep 15, 2007 2:48 am

Post by tomera69 » Wed May 21, 2008 4:42 am

thanx for the detailed explaination/
but i already know that.
this specific chipset is able to draw up to 512mb from ram.
it is also explained at tom's site.
the beauty of this chipset is that it is crossfire able, and many more features.

since i last posted i replaced the memory modules and everything is fine now.
thanx

sjoukew
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Post by sjoukew » Thu May 22, 2008 1:18 pm

:D it is good to know you solved your problems :)

Michael Sandstrom
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Post by Michael Sandstrom » Thu May 22, 2008 4:01 pm

There is a wealth of free info available for free PDF download at the Tweak Guides web site. There are both XP and Vista Tweaking Companions that cover hardware and software. Head to Tweak Guides and check out its large set of resources.

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