I am posting this in the motherboard section because as far as I can tell, it has either something to do with the motherboard or CPU, but more likely the motherboard.

For those of you who don't wish to read through my entire post but want just a summary of the problem here goes (but before replying, please read the whole thing):

Was running SP1, games worked fine but the build was old and sluggish, formatted, installed SP2, started getting random reboots everywhere (in games and just in Windows). Formatted again, installed SP2, reboots went away. Had other issues with Vista so went back to SP2. Tried many things, but determined it was a video issue when I replaced my Radeon 9800 with an older GeForce. The random Windows reboots went away, but it still crashed during games, but I figured it was just really old. Bought a newer GeForce 6600 GT, game crashes still occurred, have determined it's something about DirectX.

So, it's got something to do with SP2, this motherboard (or CPU), and DirectX.


Okay. Now for the meat of the issue.

I need some serious help. I posted over at the Asus forums and Anandtech but got zero help. I've been tearing my hair out over the past couple of months trying to get this thing working properly, and all to no avail. Before you reply with a default answer to "random reboots", please read through everything I say, since I've already read several topics about random reboot issues and none of the problems people talk about are the exact same as mine.

First off, here's my current specs:

Mobo: Asus A8V Deluxe (Socket 939)
CPU: Athlon 64 3500+
RAM: 1GB DDR2 Kingston (2x 512mb)
HDD: 250gb IDE Maxtor + 200gb IDE Maxtor
Video Card: Nvidia 6600 GT 128mb
PSU: ThermalTake 450W
OS: Windows XP Service Pack 2

So a couple of months ago I decided to reformat. I had been running SP1 because I had heard many horror stories from friends about some programs not working correctly in SP2, so I simply avoided it. Unfortunately, I needed to be using some programs that would only run on SP2 and above (After Effects 7, Maya 8.5). Plus, my build had just been getting really glitchy and slow. So I reformatted to SP2, and almost immediately, I started having random reboot issues. Now, this is very important to keep in mind. Back when I Was running SP1, I NEVER had these reboot issues. Not when I was running games, nothing. Also it's important to keep in mind that back then, I was running a Radeon 9800 video card. The reboots were very random, and would happen just at any moment when I was doing anything. Wasn't consistent with any program or running a game or whatever.

After spending 2 days trying to fix it, I decide to try using Vista. The random reboot issues went away. So that right there told me that the issue had to have something to do with SP2. Unfortunately though, I wasn't entirely happy running Vista simply due to incompatibility issues and sluggishness in certain applications that I could simply chalk up to the infancy of the OS. So I decided I would try SP2 again and just spend more time trying to fix the problem. Well, nothing worked. Here's what I tried:

- Ran MemTest several times. Nothing wrong was found.
- Checked the Event Log after each crash. No errors or warnings.
-Tried turning off each on-board device one after another (heard that the on-board sound on the A8V Deluxe was faulty. Didn't help)
- Updated the BIOS
- Updated ALL the Drivers (including the VIA 4-in-1)
- Tried using PS2 keyboard and mouse
- Have fully patched/updated through Windows Update.
- Full system virus scan

Finally the solution that worked the best was replacing the video card. My roommate loaned me his old GeForce GTS (7 year old card). The random reboots went away..... unless I was running a game. And ONLY if I was running a game. I could use 3D graphics applications just fine. Other than that, I could use my OS without the random reboots that the 9800 Pro was giving me.

So I decided I would get a newer Nvidia card, so I bought a used 6600 GT. Installed it, works fine. Same with the old GeForce, no random reboots when I'm just using Windows. But when I'm inside a game... you guessed it. And there's no consistency to when it happens or what game. I tried CS:Source, Half-Life 2, Albatross18, and Neverwinter Nights 2. Sometimes I can play for like 10 minutes with no problem, others it crashes as soon as it gets into the actual game. I've also tried the various resolutions, quality levels, and running it windowed, and nothing helps. I'm running the most up-to-date drivers from Nvidia, and once again double checked that I'm running the latest VIA 4-in-1 drivers (4.49, as found on the Asus site. I saw another that that had 5.10, but I'm not sure about using it yet since it wasn't provided by Asus). Also, I really don't think it's an issue with the power supply, because if that was faulty, you'd think that I would be getting the same problems in SP1 and Vista...

Now! After doing several more tests, it seems that the problem lies somewhere with DirectX. I was running a few tests checking video based things, and one of them was 3D related using OpenGL. The tests went off without a hitch, everything looked great. But the moment I switched it over to DirectX, it crashed. Now, I don't know if it was merely a coincidence, since as I've stated, sometimes in games it will work fine for several minutes, and ultimately just crash, but I definitely find it pretty striking that the crash happened the moment I switched to DirectX. Unfortunately I don't have any games that can run exclusively in OpenGL, but I use After Effects quite a bit which uses OpenGL for it's 3D effects and it works perfectly fine.

So yeah........ Help? :\ ....

Atom it sounds like you run into a problem anytime you try to run software on your system including games, windows OS, etc. Crashes occuring while the system is under the stress of running applications is often caused by faulty RAM. I know you ran Mem test and the Kingston 2 x 512 showed good. You post was long, but I didn't see where you tried any other DIMMS other than the two you have listed. It might be a good idea to try some other RAM in your system and see if you get better results. HTH. Peace.

did you format the machine before or after you installed the new vid card, I may have missed it but I dont think you did.

it may be worth running drive cleaner pro or something because to me it sounds like you have a driver conflict of some description.

The crashes are no longer occurring while in Windows. It seems to only happen when I am running any kind of DirectX application. And no I have not tried switching out the RAM (I don't have any other at my disposal), but I kind of find that hard to see as being the problem, considering that as I had stated, I never once had this problem in either SP1 or Vista.

I have not formatted since I installed the new video card. I had already decided that that would be my next course of action if I couldn't find any other solutions through forums (since quite frankly it's a really huge pain). But I will indeed try Driver Cleaner and let you know how it turned out.

I tried Driver Cleaner to get rid of any ATI evidence. Didn't help.

Also something to mention, it doesn't ALWAYS just reboot. Sometimes it will just lock up entirely and force me to do a hard reboot.

I realize that it certainly SOUNDS like a video card issue, but just keep in mind that I was having this problem with 2 other video cards.


EDIT: Okay. Further evidence this is DirectX related. I tried 2 different games that use OpenGL exclusively, and I played them for several minutes without a single crash/reboot problem.

And to answer the obvious, yes I have tried reinstalling/updating my DirectX install.

Been there ,done that...It was hard drive once,video another,corrupt bios,and several other elements.Let us know when you get to the bottom of it though it sounds like a conflict of drivers(educated guess),keep us posted and gl .p.s.Many hours invested in this problem,your almost there,I can smell victory 8O, scary isn't it.

I'll be very suprised if it isn't video driver related.

My bad should have stressed any and all display drivers, Try this unistall your video drivers then run drive cleaner then reinsatll you your video drivers.

I went from a 6600 to a 7600GT and had the same random game crashes and crap drove me nuts

I am going to try just doing a fresh windows build on a clean partition and see if that helps.

Yes ,I agree....Sometimes a seperate partition does the trick.I've had some embedded problems before,that might solve it.gl p.s.Let us know what the culpret was.

yeah I was going to suggest you do that next that will work.

Did you get windows installed yet?