ATi Radeon 9700 AE2 Stepping AGP 8x Bug

[Mr.Tweak]

ATI responds:

ATI is aware of a small number of reports of incompatibility between the RADEON 9700 PRO graphics accelerator and certain AGP 8X motherboards. It is important to emphasize that the number of incidents is very low. Extensive testing has been done, in conjunction with motherboard chipset manufacturers, motherboard manufacturers and with retail available motherboards, to determine if compatibility issues exists. From these tests, it has been concluded that no compatibility issues exist with the current or soon to be released AGP 8X motherboards.

Some end users have reported issues to our Customer Service department that we are investigating. From the data that has been gathered, it appears that issues that have been reported are caused by individual board issues and are not indicative of a general compatibility issue. RADEON 9700 PRO product owners are encouraged to contact our Customer Service Department should they have an operational problem with their product.

In addition, it is important to ensure that appropriate system preparation is done prior to installing the RADEON 9700 PRO. We recommend installing the latest motherboard BIOS in the system as well as the latest available AGP drivers. Many of the 8X issues have been resolved with an updated BIOS from the motherboard manufacturer.

- From www.rage3d.com

[Deathjag]

Originally Posted by Mr.Tweak

Since receiving our Sapphire Radeon 9700 graphics card a couple of days ago during testing we have been experiencing a few strange problems – such as continuous system reboots and programs and games crashing back to Windows desktop when used on all SiS 648, VIA KT400 and P4X400 based motherboards with AGP 8X support operational.

We cannot be 100% sure if this is an isolated problem however can be sure in saying we received confirmation from our contact at Epox Taiwan (who got first hand information direct from ATi) saying the problem is only occurring in AE2 stepping Radeon 9700 chips, and not the newer AE3 chips which are now shipping from the Canadian company, who say fix the problems discussed here. The problem is, the AE2 stepping chips are vast, and thus many made it into the retail market where end-users are no doubt going to suffer. It’s important to note that we had no problems what-so-ever running the AE2 stepping Radeon 9700 on VIA KT333 and Intel 845E/G based motherboards operating in either AGP 2x or 4x modes.

I know tio is working on a review of the p4s8x, and he's had nothing but problems with it. Any processor clocked above 2 ghz needs serious restrictions placed on it in the bios on order to work correctly. (I've already read the full review even though it hasn't been posted). I don't think that it is the AE2 stepping, and more likely the sis 648 chipset, combined with some possible instabilities from the new video card. However I can't explain the issues with the other motherboards..

[saidin]

updates in mobo bios, a bigger power supply, RMA'd cards, etc have all been solutions to the problems with the radeon 9700. Go to www.Rage3d.com 's forums and check out the different problems and solutions to the 8x issue.

[Jamur411]

I FIXED THE PROBLEM!!! I've done everthing you can imagine to fix my BSOD and agp lockups including changing video cards, reinstalling windows, reformating, benchmarks, quick fixes and I've finally found the problem that I believe is plaguing a wealth of computer gamers who have built their own machines or who have had unoptimized systems from manufacturer: RAM TIMING ISSUES!!! After a month of sleepless nights and an incredible amount of research I determined that my SOYO P4x400 mobo was not properly determining the RAM timing in my system bios. After searching pages for optimized ram timing in the bios, i plugged in some new numbers and my computer finally became the beastly machine I wanted it to be. The reason AGP cards cause errors in unoptimized RAM is becuase they right directly to the system memory. If any of the timing options are off by a little, the video card might try to overwrite a section of memory containging windows information, therefore creating a General protection fault of a BSOD. So go find the right optimized ram options and fix your broken computers

SOYO P4X400 Ultra Platinum Edition
Cmedia 8738
1 Ghz Ultra PC3200 DDR 400
3.06 Ghz Intel Pentium 4
Pny Verto Nvidia 5900 XT