puzzling problem, please help

[WingWizard]

I have a new build (specs below) and I have an interesting problem. When I booted up for the first time, I didn't get the post beep (or any beep) and nothing happened, so I switched around the RAM and so forth and finally got it working. I turned it off, but the next morning when I powered back on I got "CMOS checksum error" and the bios went back to factory defaults. I thought it was odd, but eventually I got things running again. I looked up the error, and I noticed that it's probably a bad CMOS battery, but sometimes it occurs every once in awhile with new mobos. Well, I turned it off again a few nights ago, left it off, and when I powered it back on everything was fine, so I thought, great, everything's working.

Well, last night, I powered it off and powered it back on again this morning, and I started getting all sorts of crazy long beeps. I took out one of my sticks of memory, and everything booted again okay, but now I'm confused. Is it a bad memory stick or bad cmos battery? Or something else completely? These boot up errors ONLY occur after the computer's been powered down overnight I've noticed, as restarting or powering off and powering on within an hour or two doesn't give me any problems. I'm really confused

I powered it down before I went to work, so I'll turn it back on when I get home this afternoon

Abit IC7-G
Pentium 4 2.4c @ 3.4
Antec True 480w
2 x 512 Geil Golden Dragon PC3500
WD 120 GB HD

[Bill in SD, CA]

I'm going with memory. Might try running with only one stick for a while and see if the problem stops. If it does I'd swap the other stick. Could be a problem with the MB itself.

Batteries are cheap though......

Bill

[OuTpaTienT]

You could run a thorough test on the memory to see if it's giving any errors.

Go here and download the memory tester. Let it run over night.

http://www.memtest86.com/

[WingWizard]

I guess I'll do that...

but when I had it up and running w/my 2 sticks, I ran prime overnight with no errors at all

[CatScam]

I had that same thing happen with a friends computer, drove me crazy!
I replaced the Mobo battery & Ram. Everything worked fine until the
third power off. I finally just gave up & tolled him to get a new Mobo
before I smashed it to pieces. But the new Mobo did the trick, hope you
have better luck.

[WingWizard]

you think flashing the bios will help?

[ragtop]

Originally posted by WingWizard
Pentium 4 2.4c @ 3.4

Thats a pretty steep overclock

Do you have the same problems if you run it at stock speed?? You may just be pushing the envelope a bit too far.

[WingWizard]

it's not that steep; many people are getting between 3.2-3.6

[WingWizard]

update : well, I got home, and it booted up fine after being off for 7+ hrs....but only with 1 stick of RAM. Put in the other stick for a total of 1 gig, but I couldn't even get a post beep. Took out the good stick, just to make sure, and still wouldn't post. Put back the good stick and took out the suspected one, and bingo, powered up no problem....