FIC VA-503 problems

[redstorm]

I have a FIC VA-503+ motherboard and
a AMD K6-333 CPU. When I boot up
the machine, the BIOS recognizes
my CPU speed and my RAM. Then it detects
my harddrive. Then it hangs. Usually,
the next step is the second Award BIOS
screen giving you the information of
the computer like LPT port, memory, etc...
Does anybody what is the cause of this problem? Thanks for any help.

[CMonster]

This may sound simple, but it certainly must be a hardware problem. I think maybe the configuration of your drives, master/slave, or perhaps an improper cable connection - forgot to put power cable on CDROM etc. Also double check your memory and CPU jumpers and BIOS settings.

Good luck

[redstorm]

Thanks alot. Disabling the L2 cache
did the trick. But now what? Does
this mean I will see a significant
performance decrease? Is there a way
of fixing this problem. Thanks again.

[jusafan]

try disabling the L2 cache. you didn't mention what your OS is (w95/98,etc). I'm also having a similar problem (VA-503+, rev 1.1B, MGA G200 AGP). I'm still trying to find the patch. No problems existed with W95, only when I installed W98.

[jusafan]

No, you won't see a significant decrease in performance. But, I'm also under the assumption that I didn't spend extra for 1MB of cache just to disable it. Windows Setup flushes the L2 cache upon intializing the PCI-to-AGP bridge and this is where the hang occurrs. For additioanl info, go to http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q187/6/12.ASP

[CMonster]

Yes, turning off the L2 cache causes a considerable performance hit while running many applications -

I just finished reviewing the link Justafan provided - it seems a defective OS is to blame after all. And Microsoft suggests using a PCI video card if you do not want to turn off the L2 cache - how nice of them. I knew I didn't like Windows 98 and now I am glad I didn't install it on either of my FIC 503+ boards. Although W98 seems a lot more user friendly after visiting www.98lite.net (http://www.98lite.net) and making use of the available tweaks and tricks. It won't fix the L2 cache flush - but now I am IE40 free and using a less intrusive IE4.01 without all the Craptive Desktop slowdown.

[redstorm]

Thanks alot guys. You really cleared things
up for me. So right now is my L2 cache
totally lost. If I upgrade the BIOS would
I be able to gain use of the cache. Then
afterwards use only DOS, Win95 or WIN NT and
avoid Win98. If it's not the case and I
lost total usage of the external cache I
guess the motherboard is basically a 486
with an expensive AMD K6-2 333 CPU.

[TonyMan]

I'm a little confused by all this. I have the same mobo & no problems like this running Win98. I have an STB Velocity 4400 AGP board installed. I would suggest going to the FIC web page & reading through all available drivers. I believe there is a driver called the miniport driver that had a patch for redirecting IRQs for the PCI bridge. Not suer if that would solve your problem, but I would check out all available updates. I'd also recheck all the jumper settings and connections as mentioned earlier. Actually, I've got two of these boards in use with AMD 350 CPU & AGP cards with no problem and a friend of mine also uses it.

[Mark]

You didn't list all of your specs but I had to remove my PS2 mouse, use a serial mouse and disable com2 in bios to get Win98 to completely install. If none of that applies try setting your bios to the most conservative settings and if it works increase them one at a time until you find out what your system's choking on. There's no reason to have to operate a system without an L2 cache.

[TonyMan]

I totally agree with Mark. Go to the FIC web site & read the FAQs concerning installing Win98 and there is also some info on AGP cards.

[CMonster]

Update: I have two FIC 503+ boards, one early revision, just before the 95mhz bus, and one recent revision. They both work fine under Windows 95C, AGP, PCI and ISA sound, modem, printer, scanner, net cards etc..

But if you have any serial ports or printer ports you are not using be sure to disable them in BIOS. Also go with PCI sound if you can,it can free up an IRQ; and do not put anything in the PCI slot next to the AGP.

I have downloaded all the latest drivers and patches for these boards, but the Busmaster IDE drivers prevented me from DAE (Digital Audio Extraction) for my CDROM - however the Highpoint drivers work just fine.