2 questions

[ShunNakamura]

Anyone who has been paying attention to this forum has prolly realized.. some comp trouble I have been having. I can usually fix them up fine.. but I have had several curves thrown my way as of late. Mainly that if something goes wrong with hardware I don't have spares to check.. and if it is a newer comp I am fixing parts from mine won't be compatable.

However the 2 questions deal with my friends computer that I have been trying to fix. First I finally got a chip I could test in it. My dad's new server will be a bit till it is up so I took a chip from it and put it in my friends. The long beeps I didn't hear any of.. but I don't generally with his chip nowadays anyways. However, even with the new chip his comp is touchy as can be. Walk past it and you can lock it up.. actually it locks up randomly quite often. I just figured it had to do with why the ram chip keeps randomly doing the long beeps. But since it has mostly quit that(completely as far as I have see with the other chip) it is obviousally not the ram chip.

So now I am left looking at the mother board. Not a good thing. My friend is tired of putting money in it. they got 300$(or so) in it now(or thereabouts.. AMD Athlone 2400+ processor, 512 2700pc ram, AOpen mother board, a g-force card(have to double check think it was 64 megs of video ram though), Cobra sound card, DVD player(duals as a cd player/burner/ripper), some lights for it's inside etc. Power supply is a 300W(I have been eyeing it wondering if it could be the problem).

Anyways What all could make a comp touchy like that? I am going to try resetting the mother board. Perhaps try another case If I can find one.. this one they use now ain't the best(the pulled it out of someones trash :rolleyes2).


Problem 2: Friend wants 98 on it(he had it on it originally) however anytime I get 98 on it(a difficult task when the slightest bump can shut it down) I end up with windows protection fault. Grr... the new chip didn't help that at all(both new and old get the fault). I played in the safemode settings and nothing seems to help. Dad tells me he had a similar problem with AMD processors before and using ME was what he resorted to. However my friend hates ME nearly as much as I do. And I don't think I could talk them into getting XP for 200-300$ how much ever it is in my area at the moment.

So do some AMD processors fluke with win98 SE(I have heard some say so.. but first time I have seen it first hand)?

Thanks in advance... will have to play with it later tonight when I get some free table space.


p.s. in regard to those who wonder... that was my dads response to the broken old server(the dead power supply one) go out and by a new one... while we wait till he gets a good deal on a power supply. He was going to let me play with the new one after the old is back up.. but I don't wanna play with it... that thing is made to annoy anyone foolish enough to try and change anything in it.. tight, cramped the power supply is mounted on the side.. Basically microsized tower(close anyways) with an ATX form mother board... bad bad bad ... it does have some nice ram that I could find useful though... processor ain't uggly either but the cass... :cry:

[Shoeberto]

Is the RAM completely locked in? It sounds like it might be sitting a bit loose. If you're locking it in tight but it's still happening, there could be something wrong with the RAM slots - if your friend can, try sending it back and getting it replaced.

As far as the OS situation goes...trash 98. No good can come of it, especially with new hardware. What kind of thing does he want to do with the computer? If it's gaming, try and get a copy of XP. See if you know anyone you can bum a copy off of, or failing that, hit up the torrent sites. If they just want standard desktop applications, try a Linux distro (I recommend Ubuntu).

[ShunNakamura]

He actually was trying to talk me into trying linux on it, mainly cause windows had been crashing up bad on him(and I have been thinking about even before I mentioned it to him).

As for the XP deal... while I may not be big on MS.. I also ain't big on downloading it through torrent. I am willing to put 98 on it since he already had it(and I saw that... if he had had xp, I wouldn't mind using a torrent for it but meh.. I don't have 200-300$ to spot for it right now.. I may be able to spot him a new cheap mother board, however.

I am certian it is in right. I have set it several times. My dad has.. and even my freind has. However the motherboard came cheap(with the proc and mem) so I feared from the start that something might not be up to par.. though Data Eclipse told me everything worked.. so that still puts maybe the motherboard is somewhat loose.

The computer's purpose is email for connectivity, gaming for my freind, and multi-media for him and his dad.


As for 98 I do a fair amount of gaming(what I can with my specs anyways) and it actually works better for me then 2k, ME, 95, and even the XP my sisters have(it came on their comp). Course I do not really care for many of the newer games so my perspective is skewed. XP just eats up too many resources for my computer. Heck it seems to eat up too much on my sisters' computer... and thiers is almost as powerful as my freinds newer one.

[Shoeberto]

Try returning the mobo if possible.

If your friend is like you and plays somewhat older games (as in, not bleeding edge) Linux would be fine. There's usually some good support for older games via emulation, it's just when you want to do newer stuff (say, two years old or so) that it gets to be the problem.

[ShunNakamura]

Well he is somewhat into older.. and newer games. We both love Transport Tycoon.. but whereas I can do with out the demo car type games he does play them.. all of them ran fine on 98(while it ran... I really don't like protection error.. could they have made it a bit more helpful... one error for all the pausible causes is quite annoying(no clue the number but the list looked unending on one site).

Nope they won't take it back. An as is policy. I had warned them that this was cheap(150$ for at the time(I checked as soon as I got back what it would normally cost) for a 100-200$ processor and 103$ of ram.. not to mention whatever the AOpen mother board would cost.

Anyways Data Eclipse has lost what respect I had for them(they used to deal well with older parts(meaning it was easy to repair damage to my older computer.. and cheap)). Their prices now are quite absurd.. I can get things for half the price they charge online. Other then that what older parts they do sell now.. seem not to work once you get them.. and with a no return policy on them yet to boot... when you say it works and you are a store.. you know I expect it to work. That is what really erks me.

[Samuraid]

For the record, XP Home is around $90. Just get an OEM copy with a tiny bit of cheap hardware.

[ShunNakamura]

Hmm.. Well I wouldn't know about the home edition.. haven't seen a copy for sale around here in ages. One way or the other I don't got 90$ to spot.

As a quick disclaimer I ain't a hater of XP.. it is just that I haven't had any good experience with it.. however I have never had it on my computer so that definately skews things.. if I ever do get a copy I'll be sure to test it and play around a bit. However, there are other things I could spend the 200-300$(office max price in our area for the pro edition(as said haven't seen a home for sale in ages)) on.