ECS motherboard processor capacity?

[steve3562]

Hello, I have a question that I can't seem to get answered anywhere else. I have had problems before with my system moving really slow and with the feedback I've recieved, decided that Windows 98 is the main problem. Now my question is this: I have an ECS P6S5AT motherboard, SIS 635T chipset, and have changed from a Celeron 700 to a Celeron 1.0 gig. The system is only showing the new processor at 667 mhz. Why would this be happening? It is still running slower than frozen snail ****, the problem I was never able to resolve in my earlier posts, and I am getting extremely frustrated with the whole setup. The specs for the board are:
_____________________________
PROCESSORS
# Socket 370 supports the Intel® Celeron™ series processors
# Socket 370 supports FC-PGA Pentium® III series processors including the newest Tualatin CPU

CHIPSET
# SiS® 635T System Chipset
# Super I/O and LPC - ITE8705
# System Hardware Monitor: Built-in ITE8705
# AC97 Audio Codec

SYSTEM BIOS
# AMI 2MB Flash EEPROM
• Supports Plug and Play 1.0A, AMP 1.2, Multi Boot, DMI
• Full support for ACPI revision 1.0 specification
_______________________________

So where is the problem? Is it the board, is it Windows 98, is it the Celerons, anyone have any ideas before I break out the C4 and blasting caps? I would be most grateful and you would be my idol for life if you can help me fix this before I go completely psychotic!! Thank you very much.

[Peter M]

You possibly need to put the old processor back in and give the thing a BIOS update to recognize the new processor. And besides, you might need to set the CPU bus speed in BIOS. For a Celeron 800 or above, this needs to be 100 MHz.

[bushmaster]

upon booting hold the delete key, this will bring you to the bios set-up. Highlight CPU PnP Setup by using the up and down arrow keys, hit enter, top line, use the plus or minus keys on the number pad to select the proper speeds for your cpu/memory, hit Esc, then F10, then enter. But make sure you set the cpu fsb at 100 and the memory speed at what it's rated.

[herosrest]

That's good advice re the bus speed.

700 cel = 66mz x 10.5
1000 cel =100mz x 10

667mz = 66mz x 10

How much ram is fitted ... ?

[steve3562]

First, the RAM installed is 256 mb PC133. I changed the PnP to 100/133 and the system did a couple of things. Although the running speed increased a lot, it rebooted on two different occasions, and when the internet was going and I was in a browser, everything froze up. It registered the correct processor speed, it listed the processor as a PIII Xeon, even though it's supposed to be a Celeron (maybe that's what the 1.0 celeron is called). Then I changed the settings to 100/100 and when I restarted the system wouldn't boot giving me an error. It said the HEIMEM.sys had a problem, blah blah blah...and to restart. So I changed it to what it was originally, 66/66 and it booted up. It hasn't froze up so far, so it might not. Any ideas on this twist? Thank you.

[Peter M]

As I said before, the thing needs a BIOS update. With the old processor in, just to be safe.

When HIMEM.SYS is complaining (about unreliable memory, usually), it's time to check the RAM. www.memtest86.com - make sure the RAM is OK at least with the old CPU, at 66 MHz, else it's not a good idea to attempt a BIOS update.

[$1500-P4 gamer]

Listen to Peter he knows this stuff beter than anyone else here. Update the bios, but def. make sure its stable first. I also use memtest86 to do this. What himem.sys is checking is HIGH memory or basically yous system mem in this case pc133. You are having mem errors. This can be due to several things. Of which we need to eliminate some. 1st it could be a stick of mem is bad. 2nd it could be incompat. mem 3rd it could be too agresive of mem timings 4th it could be a bad mem controler meaning bad mobo. 5th it could be the bios outdated as peter said. See there isnt a 1 line answer. Its gonna take some testing. I wouldnt run 100/133 setting regardless. Its always better to run the mem synchronis (at the true fsb speed) not asynchronis (mem above cpu's fsb speed). So it would be 100/100 most stable or in your prob. right now 66/66.:t

http://www.memtest86.com/

[steve3562]

Peter and others, I really appreciate all of the help I'm getting here. This is such a pain, I can't imagine having to figure this all out on my own. My next question is which BIOS update to download and install? I have pasted those that are available from my MB manufacturer's website here:

01/09/14 09/28/01 AMI® BIOS.
1. Fixed USB can't work well in OS when PS/2 mouse disconnected

2. Remove TREND_ANTI_VIRUS

3. Support Celeron Tualatin 222KB Flash AMI

01/11/02 12/03/01 AMI® BIOS. Fixed the "standby" selection of start menu becomes to be inactive action after installing Windows XP 222KB Flash AMI

02/08/30 09/09/02 AMI® BIOS. Support 1.4GHz CPU 222KB Flash AM


I'm going to download the memory tester and see if that might be the problem even though the sticks I bought were supposed to be brand new. I guess they still could be defective. I'm running the system at 66/66 and there doesn't seem to be any problems (it's still only showing 667 mhz but) except for one thing. This started happening when I had changed to the 100/133 setting or maybe the 100/100 setting (after the computer sat a while it started the memory error and not booting) The problem is that when I'm connected to the internet my browser(s) freeze and I have to reset the system with the reset button. (Both IE and Netscape) ctrl-alt-del won't reset it nor will it bring up the "running program" box, it just freezes solid. And to think I just wanted my system to run a little faster... Thanks again for the help.

[$1500-P4 gamer]

New doesnt mean OK. I just looked at my bros. system last night. He was getting VxD errors on loading windows. Went through the norm. routene for troubleshooting. Took it home then and ran memtest86. 80-184mb address failed. Got 54,800 errors in one passs. So yanked stick one (as it was 256mb stick it was all in the first one) errors were gone. Moved stick two to dimm1 and still ok. Was a bad mem stick not the mobo's dimm. Twas only 2months old. when removing I saw the last 3 mem chips were hazed white. Sounds like they overheated. Heres the kicker though. Its pc2100 cas2. I run it at synchronis with his tbird so it was running as pc1600 and had it at cas 2.5 witht he most laxed timings. If you ever get mem with elixer chips beware. Told him to get samsung. Got my mom the samsung mem the same day as him and hers is still running great. Cheap mem='s lots of headaches. Just thougt I'd mention that.

[steve3562]

I installed and have run the memtest86 today but I'm wondering how long does the test take? When I left for work tonight, the test had been running for 13 hours and hasn't stopped. Is is just looping the same tests over and over or does it actually take that long? The line that has "errors" listed on it shows no errors to this point, but as I said, it's doing the Energizer bunny thing. If it is just looping, why then would the HIMEM.sys error be coming up? That is assuming that the memory is as shows, error free. This is really getting frustrating as I'm sure you can imagine. I'm about to just reinstall everything and go back to running slow and having the processor run at 667 mhz. I've even thought about buying a new MB but so many of the one's I've looked at use the same SIS 635T chipset, so that would be a waste of money. But, if the memory is error free, the HD runs at the same speed on two different drives, Windows gives me no errors except when I change the settings, the CDROM, CDRW and floppy run with no problems, the Voodoo 5 video and C-Media audio cards both seem to run fine, all hardware has what I believe to be the most recent drivers, I didn't find a BIOS update that really looked like it would pertain to my situation, what's next??? Any ideas before I start all over?? Thanks.

[Peter M]

What's the HIMEM error saying, anyway?

[steve3562]

I don't remember exactly. Something to the effect of HIMEM.sys has caused a system error press ctrl-alt-del to restart your computer. I tried to get it to happen again but the systen just kept freezing up on the 100/100 setting. I finally shut down the memtest86. It had been running over 23 hours and there were no errors showing on the screen so I'm assuming there weren't any errors or problems with the RAM. I'm throwing in the towel as far as getting the system to ever run the right way with the hardware configuration it has now and will likely be starting over after the first of the year. Thanks anyway for the help.