A second opinion.

[RedBull]

Before I begin I'll start with my computer's vitals.

Iwill KK266Plus motherboard
1.5GHz AMD Athlon XP Palomino (Model 6) Core
1.5GB Kingston Value SDRAM
BFG GeForce 7600 512MB AGP Graphics Card
Sound Blaster Audigy SE OEM
Windows XP Home Edition

If you need more details on my setup just ask.

My ram and graphics are about as far as they're going to be able to go.  So I decided to upgrade to the fastest possible processor in the Palomino core, the AMD Atlhon XP 2100 (1.7GHz).  Upon installing the processor I started to encounter numerous STOP ERROR screens.  Now I have experienced a few hardware issues reguarding the placement of my network card/sound card ect, but had fixed them years ago.  Thinking that perhaps this may be an IRQ related issue I began moving my sound card to different PCI slots to no avail I still encounted more STOP ERROR screens.  I removed the sound card all together, which seem to help the issue for a few hours before yet another stop ERROR message appeared.  Some of the stop error messages are as follows:

STOP: 0x0000007E (0xC0000005, 0x8057C018, 0xF78E2AD4, 0XF78E27D0)

STOP: 0x000000C2 (0x00000040, 0x00000000, 0x80000000, 0x00000000)

STOP: 0x0000008E (0xC0000005, 0xB6BAF736, 0xB5859888, 0x00000000)

STOP: 0x00000050 (OxE6CA8008, 0x00000000, 0x8054B020, 0x00000002)

STOP: 0x0000001A (0x00041284, 0x0F30B001, 0x00006112, 0xC0503000)

Some of these error messages identified the problems such as:

SPBBCDRV.sys - Address B6BAF736 base at B6B90000  (Sound driver I assumed)

BAD_POOL_CALLER
PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA
MEMORY_MANAGEMENT
WIN32K.SYS
IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL

The only conclusion that I can come to is that while the processor is able to boot up correctly, it is damaged or not compatiable with my motherboard.  I do not believe that it is not compatiable though.

Before I get the standard response of "Check your drivers and update them"...I have updated both my sound card driver and video card driver.  Motherboard driver can not be updated due to the fact that Iwill in no longer in business.  I could go through the chip manufacture for an updated driver, but feel that its is a waste of time considering that by updating my sound/video driver as yet to show even the slightest bit of improvement.

So....Is this a hardware issue?  Do you think that it is the processor?  Should I try and configure the IRQ's and rearrange PCI cards?  Thanks for any responses ahead of time

[simshi993052]

Hiya redbull i recieved similar messages today with my pc i did the system matic checks and foungd that it was the memory, if you can change the memory see how far that gets you and report back
all the best good luck
Simshi

[patio]

Does the MBoard support that processor ? ?
They will list which ones it does at the board manuf. site.

Many boards didn't always keep up with CPU advances and even though the slot architecture is the same they didn't neccessarily support the latest chips in a line of increasing performance.

[RedBull]

It is unlikely that it is a RAM problem.  My RAM has worked since I installed in in 2005.  It wasn't until I installed the processor that the STOP ERROR messages started to appear.  None the less I do have a few PC133 128 MB RAM chips laying around and I'll give them a shot.

Reguarding wether or not the motherboard surports this processor....IWILL is no longer in business and there websites have been offline for quite sometime now.  Forunately I have the retail manual that came with my board and it states that accepts speeds from 700MHz to 1.6GHz and higher.

Of course from my own personal experience I have found that the board will accept XP processors with a Palomino (Model 6) Core only.  I've tried faster Throughbred cores, but they have not worked. 

Also, at one time I had this processor in the past running on a different computer with the same motherboard, using a different graphics card and no sound card.

I still have the 1.5GHz AMD Athlon XP (Palomino Core) and will more than likely re-install the processor tonight.

Is it possible for a processor to be damaged, but still boot up?

Descriptions of the two processor that I'm using.

http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/K7/AMD-Athlon%20XP%201800%2B%20-%20AX1800DMT3C.html

http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/K7/AMD-Athlon%20XP%202100%2B%20-%20AX2100DMT3C.html

[patio]

I think it's as i suspected ...that board may not support that chip.

And yes i have had CPU's that would be able to boot but would not run anything properly.

To test the one in question swap it into a board you know supports the specific CPU and take it around the block a few times...

[RedBull]

It is a strong possiblity that the motherboard may not surport this chip, but comparing the two side by side their isn't much difference. Different clock speed (Mulitplyer) but same FSB and voltage ect even same core.  But I think I'm going to go ahead and reinstall my 1.5GHz and run with that. I was installing the 1.7GHz to play BF2 (which I was doing before with the 1.5GHz  ) figuring Id get better performace on the game from the higher clock speed.