A Complex situation

[KFKGITdept]

Hello fellow It people, i bring to you a confusing situation we have at our company.

I work for a radio station in phoenix, we bought 4 computers from a company that refurbishes pcs. They are ALL IDENTICAL well they have a couple differences

The ONAIR, PRODUCTION ROOM, and STREAMING pcs are IDENTICAL the ONLY difference is that the ONAIR has a larger hard drive and THAT IS THE ONLY difference.

all of the pcs in question have the following specs

DELL OPTIPLEX 745 MINI TOWER
Processor x86 Family 6 Model 15 Stepping 2 GenuineIntel ~2126 Mhz
the machines all say Intel Core 2 Duo on them
4 GB RAM
160 GB HDD (SATA)
CD ROM
WIndows XP sp3 (Exact version is 5.1.2600 Service Pack 3 Build 2600)

All machines have the following BIOS version (BIOS Version/Date Dell Inc. 2.6.6, 6/26/2011)

we use XP on these machines because the sound hardware we run is professional sound cards that are run by PCI cards installed that run cables to breakout boxes to external devices, we use hardware by Echo Audio, Aardvark Sound, and M-Audio Sound.

Whenever we try to install the ECHO or ARDVARK into ANY of thesem achines the driver installs and as soon as it is accessed (a sound is played from it) we see the following thing happen to the machine, this happens on EVERY machine (makes sense since they are all identical)

the STRANGE thing is we have ANOTHER pc that we did not purchase from that company, it is an older dell as well, and when we install the echo, or aardvark on this machine it functions perfectly, for reference and comparison i have provided the specs from that machine as well, THERE IS SOMETHING that makes it work on this machine and not the other 3, the question i hope to answer is what that is , i welcome any conversation as our station is OFF AIR until we solve this mystery

the machine that all this hardware works on has the following specs

Dell Dimension B110
1 gb ram
WIndows XP sp3 (Exact version is 5.1.2600 Service Pack 3 Build 2600)
Intel Celeron D Processor
BIOS Version/Date Dell Computer Corporation A01, 1/3/2006
80gb hdd IDE
CD ROM


so t hats all for now, maybe its a bios thing i dont know and if thats it that would be awesome if we can somewhow put an older bios on i dont know, I DO know that these cards are not defective and work fine, so anyone at all out there that can see the issue please kindly comment here

We at the station thank you for your rapid response!

 

[spamjim]

Google leads to a few primary options to check but I don't see any of those discussed in your troubleshooting yet.

What happens if you take the RAM out of the working computer and replace it in one of the bad computers?

 

[DSummZZZ]

Have you tried swapping the card(s) from the machine that does work into the machine that doesn't? And putting the cards from the non-working machine into the one that does?
Are there any DIP switch settings different?
Is the sounde device on the working machine disabled but yet enabled on the non-working machines?
Could be there is a port conflict.
And like spajim alluded to, it's possible the card memory conflicts with the 4gig of RAM somehow. Maybe removing some of the memory would be a good troubleshooting step.



-Dave Summers-

Even more Fox stuff at:

http://www.dave-summers.net/foxprolinks.htm

 

[MikeHalloran]

Most of the Dells to which I have been exposed use '8-bit'/non-parity/non-ECC memory, not '9-bit'/parity/ECC memory, so you would _never_ see a memory parity error like that from the Dell BIOS. ... of those machines. Yours may be different, of course.

Check that your hardware vendor installed the correct kind of memory for your motherboards, i.e. ECC/non-ECC.

 

[cdogg]

The above suggestions are all good things to check, but I would first start with MikeHalloran's suggestion on making sure the memory is 100% compatible with the motherboard. Since these are all loaded by the same vendor, it's likely they all have the same type of memory. Here are the next steps I would take (in order):


Determine if the problem is related to memory address limitations
In a 32-bit operating system, 4 GB is the maximum memory supported. Because you're running at the max, there's very little wiggle room for new memory address allocations when adding/installing hardware. This is evident by the fact that Windows XP reports that less than 4 GB is actually available (usually it reports around 3.25 or 3.5 GB is actually usable which depends on the hardware installed). This lack of available memory addresses can cause the kind of problems you're having.

Solution: Test this by temporarily reducing the memory configuration from 4 GB to 2 GB (you probably have two 2 GB sticks, and just need to pull one for the test).


Determine if you have incompatible memory
The Dell Optiplex 745 specs state that best performance is achieved when memory is installed in identical pairs. If you have mixed modules in your system, that could be the problem. If all the modules are the same, then maybe they are not truly 100% compatible. Also, the manual clearly states that 2 GB PC2-6400 (800MHz) modules are not supported in the system (1 GB modules are, but not 2 GB). If the vendor installed that, then you should notify them.

Solution: Replace memory on just one of the towers for starters to see if that makes a difference. The Optiplex 745 supports PC2-4200 (533MHz), PC2-5300 (667MHz), and 1GB modules of PC2-6400 (800MHz). I recommend buying a PC2-5300 4 GB kit (2x2GB) which will give you two identical modules at a reliable speed. Crucial and [link ww.newegg.com]Newegg[/url] are good places to shop.


Then I would go down the road of swapping cards and checking for port conflicts.

Good luck!



-Carl
"The glass is neither half-full nor half-empty: it's twice as big as it needs to be."

[tab][navy]For this site's posting policies, click [/navy]here.

 

[KFKGITdept]

ok so far i have taken all the info and am starting to troubleshoot, i pulled the following sets of RAM from ONE of the optilexes, ill check them all of course but i wanted to start troubleshooting on just one

Ill run a memtest but i wanted everyone to see whats in them

i found 2X of each of these RAM modules in the optiplex,

Ill report back after trying to start the pc with just two of either the kingston or the Nanya ram sticks,

 

[KFKGITdept]

ok both pairs check out as 800 mhz ram, the kingston installed as a pair cause an NMI error the moment the desktop boots, the Nanya pair lets you have about 1 minute before the NMI screen locks the pc,

So i guess its not an upper limit thing ;(

will continue to troubleshoot!

 

[KFKGITdept]

FYI everyone you should take a look at this thread on dells forum, people over there are saying these cards WILL NEVER work on these computers

though they dont want to support this very well, and dells support chat was as big as a dead end as always when it comes to a computer company standing behind anything they make!

Link

 

[kjv1611]

Yeah, I just now read this, and was about to think it may be an incompatibility from the motherboard to the PCI card, which would explain all the same computers having same issue. So you may be fighting a losing battle. Hopefully you find a way, though.

"But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Corinthians 15:57