OMG..what a friggin nightmare

[[F.E.A.R]Cicada]

so there i was playing BF2 with a bit of startup lag, my 1gb Dual Channel DDR 400 not quite cutting it so i think...think i'll go 2 gig. Now instead of doing the sensible thing and replacing all my ram with 2 1 gig chips i figure.." nah....i've got 4 ram slots, i'll just get 2 512's and have 4 ram slots full of 512"..

10 minutes later i found out my original ADATA ram isn't available in the UK anymore, so i have to get a different type. After some reccomendations from friends i decide to go for a dual pack of 512's GEIL ram... looks nice, nice price. So it arrived this morning and i fit it immediatly as you'd imagine..

detects fine, ddr400, dual channel 2 gig....could i get the ****er to boot into windows - i think not. crashing and rebooting before windows loads. i think "****" faulty ram.. OH NO...boots fine on it's original 1 gig and on the new 1 gig, but on their own no joy.. so i can't even send it back for a refund :/

so then after doing a memory test using my UBCD to find if it is actually faulty ram, it isn't...and since it's detecting fine, to only explanation is a motherboard issue. Tested the ram slots all fine. Last resort BIOS upgrade. Bear in mind i've never done one on this Mobo, and it's 2 years old, since i've never had problems with it before. So they'res 9 bios revisions out for it. Anyway to cut a very long story short, after doing the bios update (problems since i don't have a FDD in the system, or a FD in the house) and eventually getting the machine to boot (2 x SATA drives, 2 X IDE drives, 2 x IDE CD-Roms and a full IDE controller card (4xides) creates some problems, it boots into windows. And whats more...performance is incredible, and i'm not just talking BF2. Transfer rates through windows, especially on and off the SATA's are incredible...

So the moral of the story....KEEP YOUR BIOS UPDATED. I'm a PC technican and i didn't, and i've had to spend 1/2 a day of my holiday regretting it.

[Talus]

I'm always afraid of upgrading my BIOS...

Is the ASUS update software good enough to update the BIOS? Or should I download manually, set up a boot disk, and flash the BIOS from a boot disk??

[[F.E.A.R]Cicada]

best to do it from a boot disk, but as long as you make sure you've got the right bios for your mobo..it'll be fine.

i upgraded the firmware for my ASUS gfx card using the asus software...worked fine, but my mobo is ABIT so i don't know if the ASUS works the same...

[Talus]

I'm having a hard time figuring out with BIOS flash utility I want.

Man...they shouldn't make it so confusing when the consequences of a mistake are so great!

http://support.asus.com/technicaldocuments/technicaldocuments.aspx?root=198&SLanguage=en-us

My motherboard is ASUS A8V Deluxe and is NOT listed there anywhere that I can see

[maforduk]

How do you upgrade your BIOS etc? Boy I sound dumb! LOL

[[F.E.A.R]Cicada]

I'm having a hard time figuring out with BIOS flash utility I want.

Man...they shouldn't make it so confusing when the consequences of a mistake are so great!

http://support.asus.com/technicaldocuments/technicaldocuments.aspx?root=198&SLanguage=en-us

My motherboard is ASUS A8V Deluxe and is NOT listed there anywhere that I can see

was it a PC you built yourself of bought. If it was pre made, the mobo may be specific, in which case any bios updates should be on the manufacturers website. If not, look on the side of your last PCI slot. It should have a label with a specific model number on it, and version which is the ref you should use, as sometimes the identifiers on the mobo can be midleading. I've seen Sony Vaio PC's with ASUS mobos with NO identification at all as to what they were...

[buglenutsman]

hummmm, wishing i kept that old floppy drive about now, so i could boot straight from it.....but ive always had problems mixing ram....is it bad to mix, cus i have kingston 533MHz hyper x ram ( one 512 stick) and 2 512MB kingston valueram....would it be bad if i slapped these together on the mobo, or just wait until i can afford 2 more hyper x's??

[[F.E.A.R]Cicada]

http://support.asus.com/download/download_item.aspx?model=A8V%20Deluxe&type=BIOS&SLanguage=en-

looks like that is your bios update info btw...

[[F.E.A.R]Cicada]

hummmm, wishing i kept that old floppy drive about now, so i could boot straight from it.....but ive always had problems mixing ram....is it bad to mix, cus i have kingston 533MHz hyper x ram ( one 512 stick) and 2 512MB kingston valueram....would it be bad if i slapped these together on the mobo, or just wait until i can afford 2 more hyper x's??

if you do you'll lose dual channel...which isn't good...

better to stick with the same manufacturer - but it depends on the quality of the mobo really..

abit, asus are usually alright..

asrock, msi, gigabyte are normally fairly crap at ram compatibility

[locborg]

you know, GEIL is german for horny ^^

[[F.E.A.R]Cicada]

you know, GEIL is german for horny ^^

horny ram...i like it

[Cotizi]

i would try to not mix and match ram. i stuck with 4x 512 of them cheapo geil sticks and i havent had a problem.

[maforduk]

My PC was from DELL...Would I have to look on there site for a BIOS Update?
I have Intel P4 2.26Ghz with 512Mb RAM!

[Talus]

I had the BIOS downloaded already, the problem I was having was where to find the utility to flash it

Turns out this ASUS motherboard has a built-in BIOS flashing utility. Simply hold down Alt+F2 during bootup, and VOILA!

Upgraded.

[XoC.bomber]

I did the 1 Gig to 2 gig upgrade, but a little hesitantly because I was convinced 1 Gig was enough. Man, was I wrong. I have 4-512mb sticks now, and the memory leak is gone, the start lag is gone, maps load in 15 seconds, I haven't crashed in a week and no longer get the 60 seconds of music when I exit the game. Plus my Ventrilo doesn't conflict any more, and I don't have to reboot 5 times a day. Every problem I had was fixed with a $100 upgrade.

Is this not the most expensive game you've ever played?