theYinYeti Posted February 19, 2007 Report Share Posted February 19, 2007 (edited) Hello, I'm currently overwhelmed by work; however I found time this week-end to setup my new PC, bought second-hand: AMD64 3200+, ATX tower, 512MB ram, Radeon graphics card; Fresh install of Free Mandriva 2007 DVD. It is a dream-machine, compared to my former PC: a PII350 with a Rage128 graphics card! Unfortunately, I'm to the point where I wonder if I should go back to my rock-stable PII350... - With this new PC, I carelessly entered the 64-bit world. I discovered that all software is not available yet, especially the Flash plugin, which in turn requires the 32-bit version of Firefox. Hence each time I enter the software manager, it wants to automatically upgrade FFox and libFFox, and I have to "clear the selection" first; this is annoying. - Things crash! For example, urpmi crashes often. Most of the time, I can relaunch and it is OK. I even had rpm crash, and had to quite often --initdb and --rebuilddb... Firefox crashes quite a lot also, but others do too: for example Gcompris crashed, or random games. It works, and then it stops... I relaunch the program and it works... or not... in which case I reboot and it works anew. xterm did this to me also: it wouldn't relaunch until I had rebooted. - Some programs can't be used. I wanted to create an image of my hda1 partition with partimage. The 64-bit version says this arch is not supported (wrong version of GCC, even if I recompile from the srpm). The 32-bit version crashes halfway through the image-file creation (roughtly after a third of hda1 is copied). I want to keep this wonderful speed! All is so fast! But it is really very unstable. WHY? Is it because 64-bit is too new? Do you all 64-bit Mandriva users also have such issues? Or is it a hardware problem with the motherboard? I spent 2+ hours checking RAM with Memtest86+ (10 passes): ram is reported OK. I tried checking the BIOS settings: settings are fine BUT something happened that never happened to me before: The BIOS config UI crashed! I mean: I was going to verify the boot order, and then nothing reacted anymore, I had to keep the halt button pressed during 5 seconds to power the PC off; this happened twice! On the other hand, although I didn't use Windows for more than a few downloads (among which the first 4 GB of the mandriva DVD) with FFow win32, all seems fine in Windows. So?... Yves. Edited March 12, 2007 by theYinYeti Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iphitus Posted February 19, 2007 Report Share Posted February 19, 2007 (edited) Just run 32bit on it, it will run fine. 64bit will *not* run any faster than 32bit will, although 64bit will happily use more ram. Currently, unless you need the extra address space, 64bit has little to no benefit. I've got a 64bit capable processor that's never seen a single line of 64bit instructions in its life. Anyway, as for the crashing: - You've checked ram, give it another check, ram is a wierd bugger, best to leave it overnight. - Temperature, boot up to bios screen and see if it has temperature monitors. Let it idle at bios, and watch them - Run a 32-bit distro. All the software will work flawlessly on a 64bit proc. Trust me, you won't be missing out on anything by running 32-bit. There's no speed difference. James Edited February 19, 2007 by iphitus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daniewicz Posted February 19, 2007 Report Share Posted February 19, 2007 The BIOS config UI crashed! I mean: I was going to verify the boot order, and then nothing reacted anymore, I had to keep the halt button pressed during 5 seconds to power the PC off; this happened twice! I would clear the CMOS on the motherboard. There should be a jumper on the motherboard to do this, see your manual. You could also remove the motherboard battery for an extended time (1 hour?) to accomplish the same thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theYinYeti Posted February 19, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 19, 2007 ram is a wierd bugger, best to leave it overnight.Wow! That much? I'll think about it...Temperature, boot up to bios screen and see if it has temperature monitors. Let it idle at bios, and watch themIt probably has. What normal temps should I see for this AMD64-3200+?Run a 32-bit distro [...] There's no speed difference.I thought so. However I did not choose: is there a way the Free "dual-arch" DVD can be forced into 32-bit install mode?That being said, before installing with the DVD, I formerly installed with the 4 2007 CDs (32 bits) I had previously used at work without any problems. On this computer, I had problems (same as above)! That's when I decided I might have better luck with a SHA1-checked DVD. One difference though, that made me suspect the medias at that time: The CDs' installer freezed while installing packages, and I had to use the text-mode install to see the end of it; the latter also showed non-blocking urpmi-related errors though. I thought the media had gone bad, and then tried the DVD. I would clear the CMOS on the motherboard. There should be a jumper on the motherboard to do this, see your manual. You could also remove the motherboard battery for an extended time (1 hour?) to accomplish the same thing. I already selected "load factory defaults" in the BIOS UI. Is that the same? I thank you both for those first ideas. I have one question though: are these things to do "out-of-principle" so that we have a clean base to think on? Or are these ideas directly related with the problems at hand, ie: in your experience, failure to do so may directly create a problem as noted above? I'm not sure my question is clear here... anyway, forget about this last question if you don't understand, it's not really important... Yves. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daniewicz Posted February 20, 2007 Report Share Posted February 20, 2007 I already selected "load factory defaults" in the BIOS UI. Is that the same? No, it is not the same. A bios that is misbehaving could cause the problems you are experiencing. I always make it a point to clear my CMOS in times of hardware trouble. It is a quick and easy thing to do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theYinYeti Posted February 20, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 20, 2007 Thank you daniewicz. I need to understand, and now I do :) I'll clear the CMOS then. Yves Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daniewicz Posted February 20, 2007 Report Share Posted February 20, 2007 good luck and keep us up to date B) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pmpatrick Posted February 20, 2007 Report Share Posted February 20, 2007 (edited) I echo everything that's been said about going 32 bit. However, a bios crash/lockup can only be a hardware problem. Is this a commercially manufactured box or a home built? Overclocking can cause these types of problem but clearing the cmos should correct that. If that doesn't help, I'd do the following. Check the memory again as previously advised. Check all your connections to the motherboard and make sure the memory is seated properly. A weak or malfuctioning psu can also cause these types of problems, but if this is a home built unit, I would suspect a motherboard intermitently shorting to the case. Edited February 20, 2007 by pmpatrick Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ianw1974 Posted February 20, 2007 Report Share Posted February 20, 2007 I had ram problems on one of my systems. And in the end, I chose the Load Optimised option, and then it worked fine after that. The bad BIOS config was causing memtest to show faulty memory, when in fact the memory was fine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theYinYeti Posted February 22, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 22, 2007 Hi, I removed the battery during about 90 minutes. Then I put it back, and switched the PC on. The BIOS complained about bad settings (normal), so I entered the config interface, set the right date and time (formerly 1990), set IDE buses to auto, and rebooted. Boot went fine. Login OK. But... Neither Xephem nor Celestia (both newly installed using Smart) wanted to start: both dumped a core file. I launched partimage in the background (in a terminal window), and then started to play xmoto. After about 3 minutes, the computer freezed, not even responding to AltSysRQ shortcuts. I don't know if it is because of xmoto (which I played last Sunday without problems) or partimage... Would you say this is normal? I don't think so, but I'm new to AMD, new to Radeon, new to 64-bits... so I may be mistaken. Is any of you actually reliably using Mandriva 2007 on a PC with an AMD64 3200+ AM2 processor, and something close to a Radeon9200? Yves. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daniewicz Posted February 22, 2007 Report Share Posted February 22, 2007 Since you had to enter the current date, it appears you successfully cleared the CMOS. I would next take the advice of pmpatrick and check all connections to the motherboard. Unplug that hard drive IDE cable from the motherboard and reinsert it to insure a good connection. Do the same with your power supply and all other connections. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theYinYeti Posted February 22, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 22, 2007 As it is, it happens I already did this: first thing I did when I got the PC, I removed the cover, checked all connections, ensured the plugs where OK, and I changed all the IDE peripherals anyway: I changed the HD with my own, and put another HD (for backup) as slave. I even checked the leds plugs :lol: The person who sold me the PC said he'll try and find another PC similar to this one (which would be nice given the good offer that was), and if he doesn't find such a config, then he'll take the PC back (and I my money back). Sometimes, there's luck within bad news :) Yves. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iphitus Posted February 23, 2007 Report Share Posted February 23, 2007 Again, give 32bit a shot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Chabot Posted February 24, 2007 Report Share Posted February 24, 2007 Again, give 32bit a shot. I'm in a similar boat... but one point... Mandriva 2007 FREE DVD auto selects the 64 bit version. It isn't intuitive how to install a 32-bit OS on 64-bit hardware... but there is a note telling you how: From http://www.mandriva.com/en/download/free If you want to use a 32 bit installation on a 64 bit machine, you can select it by pressing F3 then F6 at the boot prompt. The question is whether it is worth a reinstall for me at this point... probably... when I have the time to do it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theYinYeti Posted February 25, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 25, 2007 (edited) Well, I installed Mandriva again, this time from the CDs (i586) re-downloaded, sha1-checked, and reburnt. Install went fine. And now almost all is working OK. I still have a couple of applications that dump a core. Two such are Xephem and skijump. It is however predictable, not random. On the other hand, most that previously didn't run now run fine: celestia, stellarium, all other games, and last but not least partimage. Now would you say the system is fine? I would need a fast answer, because I must decide tomorrow morning if I give the PC back, or if I keep it (at most 9 hours from now). Thanks for any advice. Yves. [edit:]I almost forgot: I also had rpmdrake crash two times in a row while selecting updates, but it didn't crash again after that. And OpenOffice repeatedly crashed, until I installed OpenOffice-gnome, and now it seems to run fine.[/edit] Edited February 25, 2007 by theYinYeti Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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