kt7-raid instability - whats the cause (includes my workaround)

[Broo (IB)]

Spec:
ABIT KT7-RAID motherboard (idle 18c)
Athlon 1.1ghz @ 1.1ghz using FOP 32 (idle 21c)
Generic CAS2 256mb 133 ram
ASUS Geforce2 GTS 64mb
SB Live player 1024 (pci 4)
3com network card (pci 3)
ADAPTEC SCSI 19160 Card (pci 2)
Atlas 18gig SCSI hdd (160)
LG CDR-W IDE Primary Master
FDD
Tornado 300w Case.

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Hi all again
-------------------------------
Spec:
ABIT KT7-RAID motherboard (idle 18c)
Athlon 1.1ghz @ 1.1ghz using FOP 32 (idle 21c)
Generic CAS2 256mb 133 ram
ASUS Geforce2 GTS 64mb
SB Live player 1024 (pci 4) (sb16 emu disabled)
3com network card (pci 3)
ADAPTEC SCSI 19160 Card (pci 2)
Atlas 18gig SCSI hdd (160)
LG CDR-W IDE Primary Master
FDD
Tornado 300w Case.
Running Win98se
USB, RAID, Com 1,2 and LPT1 disabled
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Problem:
This is best described with an example.

Turn pc on, boot into win98se.
Most the time clicking anywhere and on anything will cause a BSOD (vxd errors normally).
Reboot (ctrl-alt-del or hard reset) and trying to run almost any application (not inc games) will eventually hang/bsod.

HOWEVER if i boot in and load American Mcgees Alice and continue to play this for 30+minutes, then when i quit out my pc is stable (sometimes things illegal operation but after reboot pc is stable)

So why is it, that after running this game my pc reaches a stage of almost complete stability for the rest of the day/night yet is sooo unstable before running this game.

The same also occured after running FIFA 2001 for 30+minutes, however it doesnt achieve stability running quake3 arena for any amount of time.

Note: Games generally dont lock up or crash, it only appears to be windows/apps.

Ive tried most solutions apart from the following:
removing scsi and testing an ide hd
updating motherboard and/or gfx card bios
removing/changing pci cards
updating gfx card (currently 6.37 det3 drivers)
updating scsi card driver (using cd drivers)
updating soundcard driver (using cd drivers)
Changing ram slot
Changing to different ram

Due to the way its possible to achieve stability after running alice could that mean theres some form of hardware failure somewhere?

Any ideas/suggestions welcome.

p.s Soundcard is same irq as usb, however usb is disabled (5)
scsi card and network card share irq 11
gfx card is 10

anymore info then please ask as im sick of this instability now (ive completed alice and dont wish to be forced into playing a game for ages if i just want to read email etc :)

[FlyinBrick]

Sounds like a heat dissipation problem to me, afte 30 mins of running everything will have heated up and achieved an equilibriem (sp?). Maybe check your cooling so that nothing is getting too much cooling and other things arn't getting enough.
Another thing to try is to clock your PC down to around the 950 mark, that should introduce a bit more stability, and with those specs, there's not gonna be any games that need that extra 600hz is there?

[Boycee]

i swear that i have heard sb live 1024 with a geforce don't go......and even the amd cpu can cause probs.....

Other than that u tried the via 4 in 1 driver...supposing thats a via mobo......

I guess u have tried taking out the sound card as its not one of the things u haven't tried.

Hum....other than that is it 'overcooled'?

[Deathwish2000]

Have u checked the kt7faq?

http://www.apushardware.com/faqs/kt7faq/kt7faq.htm

:)

[Broo (IB)]

my first guess was it being over cooled :)

im going to try ide hdd adding cards at a time...

all via stuff is installed

[hurricane hicken]

Have you tried raising the core voltage a touch? Overclocking trick no1.

The other thing that it might is the SB1024 does have some issues, which I think are driver/IRQ related. Down load the latest drivers and make sure the USB is disabled in BIOS, not just under windows.