• Please review our updated Terms and Rules here

Assembling a vintage AMD system

H

hunterjwizzard

Veteran Member
Joined
Mar 21, 2020
Messages
890
The other day I decided to assemble another computer out of spare parts because it makes the goblins in my head shut up for a few hours.

Now 've had this MSI KT4AV in my inventory for a few years, and I found an Athlon XP 3200+ to put in it. Well after some faffing about the system posted fine at 1100mhz. I can't get through windows setup or even load a rescue disk, so I figure the CPU clock speed being wrong is a problem. I've been tinkering with the settings in the BIOS to no avail. I got it to read as an Athlon XP 1900+ by turning the FSB up to 133 mhz, but when changing it to 200 the system does not post. I've gotten it to post after BIOS re-sets, but can't get it to read as a 3200+.

Unfortunately this is from an era I do not recall well. I used some AMDs way back when(my first ghz system was an Athlon). I did have a pencil-modded dual MP system, but I mostly used PIII and xeons back in the day(fun fact: I never owned a Pentium IV while they were current). So I'm largely stabbing around in the dark here hoping not to start a fire.
 
Some of the Athlons have locked divisors.
On my Athlon XP board, I replaced the CPU with an Athlon XP-M 2000 (needed to make a couple of small mods to the motherboard). Ran fine at 2.2GHz.
 
hunterjwizzard said:
... I found an Athlon XP 3200+ to put in it.
Click to expand...
Have you verified that this board supports a 3200+ processor? Checking the manual, it mentions "supports 1100 mhz up to 2800+". If not supported, that probably explains starting up at a default 1100 mhz.
 
2800+ was the fastest available at the time the board was sold, is there any reason to think it shouldn't support faster CPUs released later around the same architecture?

I suppose I've probably got a 2800+ I can try. Have a weirdly high number of AMD CPUs for an intel guy.
 
For the 3000, 3000+ and 3200+ I recall there was die revisions that made it incompatible with some Socket A boards. If you were lucky the vendor would release a BIOS update to address it.

Edited: the KT4AV download page seems to imply there was a support update for the 3200+ on the very last BIOS update, about 20 years ago.
 
Guess I gotta work on flashing that BIOS!

So I tried to swap the 3200+ out for a 2800+, but mine has bent pins. So I put in what I thought was a 2500+ and got the same behavior... and found the 2500+ and original 3200+ sitting on my desk. I'm staring at a pile of AMD CPUs trying to work out wtf I put in there. Worse still I gotta take the whole MB out to get the chip.
 
So I got the BIOS flashed to the very latest, its still not auto-detecting my CPU. Of course I'm not sure exactly what CPU I even have in there, but you know. Same behavior persists, if I set the FSB any higher than 133 the machine won't post.
 
hunterjwizzard said:
So I got the BIOS flashed to the very latest, its still not auto-detecting my CPU.
Click to expand...
Because it can't.

First, what 3200+ do you actually have? There was one with an FSB of 166/333 MHz and one with an FSB of 200/400 MHz.

Given that the board you have maxed out at the 2800+, which uses an FSB of 133/266, it is quite clear that you can not get a 3200+ to work at full speed. The BIOS update will not make speeds >133 MHz magically work. It probably has updated microcode for that CPU, but that's it.

So either use a 2800+ or the 3200+ at the lower speed. It will most likely still be fast enough.
 
It might also be a good idea if you are trying to push it out of the gate with an overclock to avoid any overclocking attempts and verify on the preferred settings that it's working as well.
 
The reason your CPU is running at the wrong frequency is because many Socket 462 motherboards don't automatically detect the FSB speed. You need to go into the BIOS and set the FSB speed to 200 MHz, which is double pumped to 400 MHz.

I've had several KT4AV motherboards, they work fine with Athlon XP 3200+ CPUs. Most MSI boards in the 462 era had the same quirk, the FSB would default to 100/133 MHz as a fail safe, and you had to manually set it to the correct value.

If you want to use a 333 MHz FSB CPU, set the bus speed to 166 MHz. 266 FSB is 133 MHz. I don't remember if the oldest 200 MHz FSB is supported that was used on early Durons, but that'd be 100 MHz.
 
So it turns out I somehow took out one 3200+ and put in a different one. Also the 2800+ appears to be fine. No idea what's wrong with me. Maybe I shouldn't build AMDs while tired.

Anywho.

These are the AMD CPUs I have on hand without bent pins:

Up5LbLA.jpg


uHl3nl9.jpg


VZlnwPT.jpg


S49kdBv.jpg


M3B0E5Q.jpg


A 2500, a 2800, a 3000, and two 3200+s.

Gonna go ahead and put the green 3200+ back in for now and tinker with it some, but if there's another CPU in that collection that's a better choice, let me know.


Also, if anyone has any suggestions for common household items that make good impromptu CPU pin protectors, I'd love a better storage solution than "loose in an anti-static bag".
 
NeXT said:
I tape the CPU's back-to-back if I need to.
Click to expand...
Smart!

So it looks like the AXDA3200KV4E (note the missing D) is from an eMachines(probably pulled by me from during and ewaste event), so the AXDA3200DKV4E is probably my best choice as that seems to be the "normal" version of the CPU.
 
So after having to take the motherboard out twice because I kept dropping screws, I got the thing re-installed with the AXDA3200DKV4E 3200+ CPU on the 5.4 BIOS. As usual it posted as an 1100mhz CPU. I changed the FSB over to 200 and rebooted, the system posted the CPU as a 2500+. Progress! So I turned it off and started adding drives so it'd have something to boot to and... no post.

I'm now back where I started. It'll post on 1100mhz. I decided to stop worrying about the CPU for a bit and see if I could at least get the HDD formatted. Its able to see one of two CDrom drives and the hard drive. I did get it to boot earlier to a C:\ prompt using a bootable CF card, that's how I flashed the BIOS, but so far all attempts to boot to any kind of CD have turned out the same:

z0o8ulh.jpg


This is off a copy of MemTest. But I got the same behavior with ERD Commander and 2 different copies of Windows XP(all burned CDs if that matters). Specifically the partial black/mostly blue screen. This most recent image was taken booting from the second CD drive, though I tried 3 disks in the first one with the same result.

Never seen anything like this before.
 
So just for fun, and because I'd be lying if I said I had anything better to do right now, I decided to swap in the 2500+ CPU. It won't post or even power on. Very strange, I do hope I haven't just killed this board somehow.
 
hunterjwizzard said:
So after having to take the motherboard out twice because I kept dropping screws, I got the thing re-installed with the AXDA3200DKV4E 3200+ CPU on the 5.4 BIOS. As usual it posted as an 1100mhz CPU. I changed the FSB over to 200 and rebooted, the system posted the CPU as a 2500+. Progress!

So just for fun, and because I'd be lying if I said I had anything better to do right now, I decided to swap in the 2500+ CPU. It won't post or even power on. Very strange, I do hope I haven't just killed this board somehow.
Click to expand...

The Athlon XP 2500+ is a 266/333 MHz FSB CPU (depending on the revision), not 400. It's not booting because you're overclocking the crap out of it. Your specific version (AXDA2500KV4D) is a 333 MHz FSB CPU, so you need to be setting the FSB clock to 166 MHz.

If your Athlon XP 3200+ is reporting as an Athlon XP 2500+ with the 400 MHz FSB, you either have the wrong BIOS installed, or your CPU is a fake remarked unit. There was lots of fraud during the Socket 462 era with vendors remarking CPUs.

If you want the specs on your various chips, you can use the chart here:

Chuck(G) said:
What I said about running the FSB faster than designed. Your CPU may like it, but there's no guarantee about peripherals.
Click to expand...

The KT4AV is DESIGNED for 400 MHz FSB speeds. It supports the Athlon XP 3200+ with the latest BIOS. This board supports 133, 166 and 200 MHz FSB speeds. Since the Athlon FSB is double pumped, the effective FSB is 266, 333 and 400 MHz.
 
Actually it turns out the 2500+ was not posting because I had the power button plugged in to the wrong port. I did not realize this until I finished taking the machine apart again for the 27th time to put the 3200+ back in. So that was fun.

Anyway. With the 3200+ installed, I set the FSB to 166 and... got the machine to recognize it as a 2500+. It is at least now consistently posting as that. Still can't get through boot on anything, but I don't have to re-set the BIOS every time I turn it off.

Debating whether or not I should put the 2500+ back in and try again with the case buttons hooked up correctly. Except now its evening and the wife is home and suddenly I might actually have better things to do that tinker with an obsolete AMD system.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top