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K7s5a forum for info
Visit the Overclockers workbench forum at http://forum.ocworkbench.com/ocwbcgi...?ubb=forum&f=4
for everything you ever might want to know about this motherboard. Also, the forum moderaters have a relationship with ESC which helps getting the right info.
Also, the problem with the led connector is well known. Either cut the connector in half, remove the pin, or leave it off.
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Its unfortunate to see so many complaints regarding the ECS K7S5A motherboard. I for one have had nothing but success with this board in terms of performance and stability.
The above statement was true only after learning a few hard lessons with this board.
I too at the start was having similiar problems with the K7S5A and started looking into the review forums for some similiar experiences.
First Up:
OEM failure rate for this particular model of board is extremely low, so why is everyone having these problems
Boot-Up and stability problems seem to be the main issue with this board. I had these too at first.
1. Make sure you have the DDR modules seated adequately. On my board the system would not boot occasionaly and when it did get into windows there were strange occurances at times as well as frequent auto re-boots. The DDR slots are tight to the point that i had to take the board out of the case and install-uninstall the dimms about a dozen times before i could get a solid snap seating of the modules. With regular SDRAM this was not as bad a problem as i really only noticed the boot and auto re-boot problem when using the DDR slots. I will state that it is impossible to install DDR modules in this board with it being installed in the case without bending the thin 4 layer board without damaging it permanently. Once the traces in the PCB are disturbed, you might as well throw it out.
2. Make sure that you have installed the board so that its not shorting out in the case or on the stands. This board is to be tested first on an open table just to be sure. 4 layer boards when on the manufacturing jig are straight, when they come off they appear warped which is normal. If the board is not put into a level case it will disturbe the PCB traces enough to cause intermittant problems such as the ones being described. This might seem like a no brainer but it does occur. When i had the board out on the open table i did not experience problems aside from many that i had when it was installed in a cheap or badly installed case scenario
3. The AGP card when it is being tightened down must be checked with this board to make sure its not pulling the card out of alignment with the slot. I checked over and over again just to be sure and at times just bumping the case a bir when placing it on the floor made the difference. Eventually i had to mount a small bracket to apply pressure to the front of the card. Seems like the slot fit specification might be a QA problem with this model.
4. Check the CMOS battery for the proper voltage. I had a bad one in mine and this has been mentioned in other forums a an issue to watch out for.
5. Check the CMOS battery first before flashing the BIOS. If the battery is no good, when you re-boot, you loose some of the bios information and for some reason it never gets flashed properly again leading to some dead units that never get past post. (Sound Familiar? )
6. Power supplys with 350+ watt output are not neccessary. I have had the best luck with just a generic 300 watt Shark unit. As far as the 2 pin HDD LED connector goes on this board, its an OEM configuration that was not caught be ECS on the retail revision so just modify the connector
7. XP CPU temps going to 50 or 60 degrees celcius under hard use is no problem at all. Mine runs at 55+ running serious sam for half the day without a hint of trouble. The Thermaltake 6Cu 5000 rpm fan is the best that i have tested for the money period. Get a good case fan. It makes a world of difference
8. One more thing to mention/ You know that nice little spring bracket that your connection ports go through out the back of the case that is susposed to stabilize the connection area, well if you dont take care to not put to much pressure on it when installing the board it will cause a short on the PCB traces by bending the connection brackets and lead to the mentioned headaches
9. Take your time and dont jump to conclusions like i almost did. I was ready to take a hammer to the whole computer before settling down on the solutions
10. This board is less forgiving than big name brand items and as such it must be handled with care. This board is from an OEM mentality company and assumes people know what there doing ( I guess at first i didnt either or still dont )
It will run for me all day at memory timings set to the max, and offers performance that cant be beat for the money period.
Cheap generic case...
K7S5A Board Rev 1.0
Shark 300 Watt power supply
XP1500+
Thermaltake 6Cu Fan
Maxtor D740X 40 gig
LG 16-10-40 Burner
MSI Geforce 2 MX 400
512 Mb Crucial DDR
OEM's have very strict quality control procedures for assembly and one should take the same care with this unit.
If approached cautiously, this board rocks
Good Luck and please keep the comments flowing...
Last edited by Denton; 12-12-2001 at 06:19 PM.
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built one in no time flat, no issues
i setup the board sitting on the foam that it was sitting on in the static bag, installed drivers everything worked fine.
its only running a duron 750 and PC133 SDRAM
a voodoo 3 and then a radeon 64MB
chip temp is 40-50C (not sure if its calibrated though)
No problems at all, system hardly every crashes
sorry to hear you guys are having so many problems.
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Ultimate Member
hey, i would like to know how to calibrate the temps and i would like to thank everyone for the excellent replies in this thread. also, what is the seggested heat range for xp's since they have fiberglass, and how to i get the memtest 86 thing. THX in advance
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Member
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CPU speed reported incorrectly?
I just happened to stumble onto this topic. Just last night I put together a new system using the K7S5A ECS board. Everything is running very stable right now. The only problem I seem to be having is the CPU speed is reported as 1.0GHZ but it is a 1.4 Athlon. Do I have something set wrong in the BIOS? Or is there a particular jumper setting that I missed? I feel like this is a stupid question but I am pretty new at this myself.
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Ultimate Member
Go to your bios and set it to 133 MHZ...that should speed it up correctly
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I had exactly the same problem, I would try a different CPU and the board would work.
I was convinced it was a dead CPU.
After having it checked by the supplier and having them supply a K7S5A that supposedly worked with it, I tried it again with no luck.
Finally at the end of my rope I tried releasing the lever holding the CPU in the socket and put moderate pressure on the CPU forcing it into the socket, while holding it down I locked the lever and replaced the heatsink, and voila', it worked.
I seems that the CPU has a slight warp or something and needed the extra pressure to get all the pins to connect.
I have assembled many systems and have never had to apply that much pressure to get a CPU to seat properly, maybe thats your trouble too.
Hope this helps, Bob.
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k7s5a
Well after staring at it long n hard I figured out what to do about the power led thing....but thanks for the help anyways everyone, if I had checked the forums yesterday I'd a learned it from you's. As a side note I just installed a sound card, DDR ram 2 case fans, and replaced the thermal pad with some good paste. My operating temp has dropped from around 56 with the case side off to around 46 with it on . thx again people
I've learned alot here in the week or so since I found this sight...goood timing. Now it's time to learn about overclocking
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ECS K7S5a Problems?
Hi to everybody here,
I personally have an ECS K7S5A MB with a Duron 1300MHz, 320Mb of PC 133 and a GeForce 2 MX running on Win ME. This system is running for four months now without ANY problem. The case is a standard one with a Sparkle 300w power supply and the heatsink is a CoolMaster DP5-6131C. I have one floppy, one CD-Writer ( LG 12/8/32 ), one DVD player ( Asus 16X ) and two HDD ( Maxtor 30 Gb and Fujitsu 4 Mb ) attach to this board without any problem. System temperature is around 30 Celsius and CPU temperature is between 42 and 48 Celsius depending on the task. Best of all, I don't have a case fan!!!
My system is running 24-7 with no worries.
I have bought the same MB for my wife with a Duron 1000MHz and an Antec case ( Win 98SE ). I also have installed another K7S5A for a friend with a Duron 800MHz ( Win ME ). Both systems running perfectly.
I would recommend that board to anybody, except overclockers. This is not the purpose of that board anyway.
I'm sorry for all the people here having problems. But I think that you may already find a lot of solutions in this forum.
This post is only to say that for me, that board is fantastic!
I have build/repaired a lot of computers during the last 5 years, from 486 to the actual Duron 1300 and I can say that the ECS K7S5A worth every dollar it costs.
Last edited by guaf; 03-05-2002 at 01:20 AM.
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I'm about to build a Duron 850 system with this board and 256MB PC133 RAM for christmas, and after seeing this i'm not sure I want to anymore. at least my operating temp will be better than all you guys wasting money on processing power which isn't needed for most applications or games.
i build "budget" systems, but i must say that i've never experienced anything bad from ECS in my 6 years of building/repairing systems. after hearing about the problems here though, i think i'm going to start wearing the anti-static wrist strap when working with this board in 2 weeks time. you can never tell what might happen.
p.s. i'm going to be using a geforce2 with t.v. out too, and this is my first time with an AGP slot at 64MB. i'll let you all know how it turns out
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No problems!
I have built a half-dozen systems with this board and have yet to have any problems. I always buy Crucial memory so setting it to 133/133 works for the Athlon XP systems, and the Duron and T-bird B processors have given me no trouble. Have had issues in the past with booting with other boards, it always ended up a switched cable, grounded out board, or AGP card sitting incorrectly.
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RE: ECS MOBO
No probs for me and I have the same board. Most likely your problem is shorting (your mobo is tuching the metal parts of your case)
Be extremely careful wit that.
Also ATHLON's are designed to run hot, even on the high end of the temp scale (60C) it will run no prob as long as the heatsink and fan are both working. Also ensure the power supply fan is grooving too.
I keep my system running 24-7 with no worries.
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Ultimate Member
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