Asus P5K WS - board or RAM at fault?

Tyler Durden

Tyler Durden

Tyler Durden

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28 Oct 2002
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444
Hi guys,

I rebooted my PC today in the process of uninstalling an application I had believed was behind the numerous errors I was getting from Vista after installing it.
The PC then just died. No familiar and reassuring beep, just the spinning drives and fans.
I removed the GFX card and tried again but no change.
I removed the RAM and tried - and did get the long beep, short beep, short beep for no RAM detection.
I tried a single stick of RAM and the system booted fine.
I set only a few basic settings - most notably the RAM voltage to 2.5V. My RAM is OCZ Flex 9200 and is designed for that voltage.
No problem till I added the other sticks and the deafening silence again. I tried two sticks and even other sticks in the single. Nothing. Now nothing even with one stick - any of the four as far as I can tell.
I know entropy is at the heart of nature, but it seems a gradual failure...odd.

I have tried clearing the CMOS several times, but now no POST even with a single stick.
As I have no reason to assume otherwise, I am thinking the RAM has died - but all four sticks?
On the other hand the board does still beep when no RAM is inserted, so that shows life.

The board is the Asus P5K WS (P35 chipset).

Should I return the board or the RAM? The perils of buying elsewhere - I should have bought the board from here like the other kit....:(

THANKS for any advice/ideas

I am thinking the Vista errors were RAM related? But the board could still be the culprit.
 
Try testing each stick in isolation using Memtest. If the one stick totally kills (shorts) your PC, then it's probably stone dead and needs to be RMA'd. It sounds like the RAM simply couldn't hack it... :(
 
u may need a cheap stick of ram that uses 1.8v to get the bios to post then change the volts back to 2.5 ive heard this problem before

im sure W3bbo from this forum had it
 
Thanks guys.
Just been tinkering again as the worry has me unable to sleep :(
Tried a few different sticks in the same slot and in others....no POST but the board still beeps whenever no RAM is present...

Is it likely that the board has failed (at least in so far as the capacity to run at full speed) but the RAM detect still functions?


I don't have any generic RAM :( I wish I had the ability to test that way.

Odd I got a POST once from a single stick....I then did set the RAM voltage to 2.5V but as I say the addition of the others resulted in no POST. Since then, no joy with even one.
I have run as low as 2.2V with no POST issues or crashes and the board booted fine for weeks with BIOS resets and the subsequent returns to default voltage settings.
I also wonder whether all four sticks are likely to fail together versus the board being the issue. It is just the beeps that indicate life.

I am letting it sit and then I shall try to place different sticks in the primary slot again and see if I get any POST.
I am leaning towards the board but I cannot be sure.....
 
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I've decided to just check up the spec's on your RAM, as I kept thinking that 2.5V really sounded excessively high even for high end RAM even though you stated that it was made for it (I know that too high voltage kills RAM more quickly than e.g. CPU's etc.)

Anyway, the page I found for your ram on OCZ's site is this one, and if this is indeed the appropriate page, it actually states 2.3V for your RAM, with 2.35V EVP (Extended Voltage Protection) that, and I quote "allows performance enthusiasts to use a VDIMM of 2.35V without invalidating their OCZ Lifetime Warranty." So the absolute maximum for your RAM is 2.35V, according to the manufacturer...

So, hence I have the nasty suspicion that you might've possibly killed or damaged your RAM by running 2.5V through it, and to add insult to injury also invalidated your warranty by doing so, tbh...
 
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The guy on the OCZ forum confirmed the 2.35V EVP.
Interesting as the OcUK listing says 2.4V with a 5% plus or minus, covering 2.5V. OcUK also say 2.3-2.5V in the listing.

Also, on the OCZ site itself I found this on the page advertising the Flex 9200:

Fudzilla
"We tested the good old 9200 and we scored some great results. You do need to use 2.5V for this memory, but the warranty supports even such a high voltage. This is probably the best you can do as far as memory goes."

If they do not honour a warranty when I acted in good faith as per the advertising I shall kick up a fuss!
 
Thought I would chip in with my experience with this motherboard, this is the P35 workstation board with the single PCI-X slot....

I bought one of these to pair with an Areca ARC1110 PCI-X SATA RAID card, from the word go, the ARC1110 refused to work properly in the PCI-X slot, the CPU kept running @15-20% when I was doing nothing, although it did work better in the PCI slot, but then I lost a lot of performance beacuse of the reduced data transfer ability of PCI.

Also have problems with IDE controller, optical drives would not work properly, but had no problems with ram, was running 4 x 1GBs ballistix oced.

Got a bit fed up of not been able to get the ARC1110 working properly, as that was the main reason I bought it (the Asus forum for this board were full of complaints about the failings of the PCI-X slot), so after a week I RMAed it, used my Asus P5WDG2 WS pro for a while, then bought a Gigabyte GA X38 DQ6, which I am very pleased with.

Hope you get your ram problem sorted. :)
 
Thanks for the suggestion. I like Gigabyte boards and have used them with success in the past.
I had been a fan of Asus boards in general but I have had a few issues lately. Perhaps they are not what they were or perhaps my experience is a simple aberration.

I find the discrepancy in voltage support in both the OcUK listings and OCZ's own selected endorsements from the OCZ official specs a little odd. They should not display selected endorsements as advertising on their own site if they do not accept them. I doubt OcUK will make an issue of it should the board replacement fail to resolve the issue and require an RMA but it is a dangerous policy. I suspect OcUK's is a mere oversight in some way, but OCZ are treading close to false advertising should they not honour warranty guarantees in this context.


I have noticed something I had missed before. As well as the green LED light for power, the board also has an illuminated red LED above the PCI-E GFX slot. I cannot be sure this is normal as I do not recall it being on before. The manual lists no mention of this LED so I do not know whether it is fault indicator. Anyone have this board and is able to confirm?

THANKS

I also tend to think the motherboard is the more likely culprit, given the relatively low probability of four sticks failing simultaneously.
 
Tyler Durden said:
I also tend to think the motherboard is the more likely culprit, given the relatively low probability of four sticks failing simultaneously.
Click to expand...

I would actually tend to agree with this. (And while 2.5V is very high, it is on the other hand only 0.15V above 2.35V (which the RAM is rated for), so you wouldn't expect the RAM to just die in a puff of smoke as a result of 2.5V....)
 
Thanks m8,

Seems the most likely resolution. Perhaps the board has failed in so far as capacity to deliver the voltage or the tracers have degraded the signal strength as a result of the higher voltage (although Asus did design the board for those voltages..) or any number of other Northbridge issues but I do think the board the more likely cause.

I have ordered another Asus as I need the PCI-X for my SCSI - the P5E WS with the x38 chipset and the Jmicron controller.
I had problems with the Marvel controller on the P5K WS especially drivers causing data loss and the PCI-X implementation was not great.
I hope the P5E WS will be better.

Of course if the new board fails, then I shall have to RMA the RAM. Getting the tubing off will be not be fun...
 
Regarding the Asus P5E WS Pro, have a look Here - it will give you some indication of the problems that have arisen with it.

I did think of going for this board myself, after RMAing the P5K WS, but I noticed the PCI-X implementation was the NEC chip as well (as the P5K WS), and this put me right off it.

The PCI-X implementaion on the Asus P5WDG2 WS Pro was with the Intel chip, and it worked like a charm, never had any problems with it. :)
 
I had the Asus P5WDG2 WS Pro before it died. The P5K WS was a replacement.
Shame about the PCI-X - I had no install troubles with the P5K WS but I heard the speeds were not quite up to scratch. Any chance the issue will be fixed by a BIOS update?

Is the P5E WS a poor board? :(
Most have issues for some - I hope it is similar to the P5K WS and install fine for me. My only issue was with drivers for the Marvel controller in Vista x64. Not installing the Marvel drivers solved that problem.
 
Guys,

Just finished testing with the new board - Asus P5E WS Pro.

POSTs only some of the time - with one stick at a time. Only POSTs with two of the four sticks and not when more than one stick is added.

It would seem the RAM is indeed faulty. OCZ confirmed I can RMA and will be doing so it would seem.

What a nightmare of a birthday present for Wednesday! :(

Any suggestions or is my diagnosis sound?

THANKS
 
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