Precision 690 CPU Ugrade Problems HELP!

Since you are already using the latest BIOS, it's clear:  your system does not support those CPUs.

No.  As the message states, the system does not support those CPUs.

I have got the same problem, however in a slightly different way.  I had my machine up and running with the two quad xeons but with the A01 bios.  I then updates to the A07 that you stated and ever since, evey time i start up the machine it comes up with 'ahci bios not installed' and then 'incompatible processor detected'.

This therefore shows that there are issues with compatibility with A07 bios and not an overall compatibilty issue, if you get back to bios A01 you should be fine.  The problem is however that I can not find a way of doing this, lol.

I know this probably has not helped too much, but at least you know that the processor should work and hopefully someone will be able to let us know how to fix the situation.

I have at the moment sent my computer to someone to try and get them to try a different processor (a smaller one), so we can downgrade the bios and then put the quads back in.

I will let you know if this works, but in the mean time if you find another solution or anyone has any ideas let me know.

Cheers.

Thank you for the advice. I would appreciate it if you let me know what you find out.

I had success for a while. Here is what I did.....

1. I removed the E5335 Quad Core Xeons (2) and installed the 5130 Dual Core Xeons (2).
2. I updated the chipset software and reflashed bios A07.
3. I then replaced the two 5130s with the two E5335 Quads.

When I rebooted the system I received the same error as before, "'incompatible processor detected'.

I then removed the CMOS battery and waited 30 minutes.. When I put the battery back and restarted the computer the system booted up great with the two E5335 Quads. I could see all 8 cores using Windows Task Manager or the Intel CPU downloaded program.

I did benchmark testing that showed that the two quads where much faster than the old tandum. I even did my Windows 64-bit SP1 install with ease. I was ready to list the two 5130 Xeons on EBay when I remebered that there is one thing I hadn't tried yet, turning the computer off and back on again. I had rebooted many times, yet when I turned the computer off and tried to restart it the old "'incompatible processor detected' error came back.

How can the sytem run perfectly with the two quads and then be shot down by a restart? The system ran great with the 2 quads.

Thoughts??????   Help????????

Greg

Hi again,

I had herd of that way of sorting it out, but unfortunatly I have built this machine so had no other processors to fall back on.  However to get your system back up and running you can do the same but then downgrade the bios to the bios that worked (however, in my case bios A01 only read the processors as dual instead of quad).

The other thing that I have found however, is that even though dell say all Precision 690s should take quad xeons, only the latest ones do.  Therefore, like in my case, I have one of the old revisions of the 690 motherboard so it will not take quads.  In total there are 3 revisions: F9493, DT029, and MY171 of the x5000 chipset but only the MY171 revision accepts quads.

My solution to this is that I have just gone an bought a 690 case and motherboard off ebay with the MY171 revision for £200, so when I get hold of it I will swap all my components over and see how it goes.  I will then in theory still be able to sell my 690 case and motherboard for the same price because at the end of the day it is still a 690.

The other option, if you have bought yours directly from dell, is to contact them and see what they say, becuase they may be willing to swap motherboards or come to some arrangement (probably unlikely but it cant hurt to ask).

I will let you know if this works with my new machine.

Regards.

PS if you find that your revision is MY171 and you are still having the problems, please let me know becuase you will save me the hassle of swapping my components and also I can start digging deeper into the problem and possible solution.

Thank you for the information, y2gar84!

I checked my motherboard and unfortunatly it is a DT029 version. It looks like I will have to be on the lookout for a pair of Xeon 5160s. The price on the 5160s is at a premium. Does anyone know why the 5160s are more expensive than many quads? Plus if anyone knows of a good source for reasonably priced CPUs, I would appreciate the information.

Greg

All 690's support quad core Xeons as of A02. I too had some problems, but the solution is pretty simple.

Put your 5335's in.

Remove your CMOS battery (see the manual if you're unsure how).

Remove your power source.

Connect your power source. Leave the CMOS battery out.

Boot your machine with DOS bootable floppy that contains the BIOS exe you want installed (A02 or above).

It should complain about low battery (lack of), f2 to continue on to.

Flash your BIOS, let yout machine reboot.

From your OS, shut the machine down.

Leave the power source connected.

Pop your cmos battery back in.

Boot up and enjoy your 5335's.

Strange . But it's how I got my quad cores past the "Alert! Incompatible Processor Detected" on my 690. Everything runs smooth now... minus one caviat. If I happen to disconnect the power source, I have to pop out the cmos, boot without it, shut down via OS, then put it back. Takes 5 minutes of minor irritation, but it does the job.

Obz,

I am aware of this method of getting the processors to work, but in all honesty if you can not just turn on the machine by pressing the On button surely that tells you that there is soemthing wrong.  I did try this method and got it working but I did find however that the motherboard would read the processors as dual cores and quads (if you ctrl+alt+delete it will only show you 4 cores rather than the eight if two quads) and even in Bios it says two dual rather than two quads.

Not happy with this I bought myself the MY171 motherboard and case, swapped all components accross and it works perfectly, press the On button and the two Quads read perfectly. Even sold my old case and motherboard (because it still works with duals) for not much less money than what I paid for my new one.

Depending on the board you have. The one board, I cant recall the model numbers, needs the A08 BIOS and it will function as that is the setup of the one machine that I have. The other board you actually need to flash back to BIOS A01 and the processor will work I had this done on my other P690. Also make sure you take out the battery for a few minutes when you upgrade your processors.

shawnconnelly1 is absolutely right, it depends on your board. I had the same problem, you dont need to do anything just reflash the bios A1. If you got the other board, you need bios A08.

The difficulty is that the bios A1 you can only flash from Dos. there are some utility programs they can create virtually floppy from your pendrive, after that its easy just install and reboot and everything will be allright.

Now i have a quad-core E5345

So, I've been following this post, and a few others on another site...

My problem is that I can't get my second quad xeon 5355 to be recognized...

Mobo: F9394

[EDIT]

Solution:

A pin was low on socket_1, needed to be bent up. Even though the plastic protective cover was still on the mobo when i took possession, it was somehow damaged.

So, I dropped in 2 Xeon 5355 (quad core @ 2.66), booted up with BIOS Rev 01, no problems.

Some insight here...I tried testing dual quads on my171 but must have 2 bad mobos:

I've ordered two MY171 motherboards, and BOTH of them act this way when I plug in the power cord for the first time:

1-3 flash green, then power light goes solid amber and 2-3-4 flash green indefinitely, fans are on high

This was the case with either a Xeon 5150 or 5355 installed in socket_0

the case has a 1kw ps, and i do have but are NOT installed: memory risers and sli video card riser

So, I have the F9394 in, works great, I...

disconnect the power cable

hold down the power button for 30+ seconds

open the case

remove the cmos battery

disconnect all connections to mobo

remove cpu and memory and vid card

remove F9394 mobo

...then install the my171 in exact reverse order. The cmos battery in the my171 has been sitting out for 30min.

Soon as i do the last step, connect the power cable, it tries to boot and immediately flashes 1-3 once and then 2-3-4 forever, with the power button amber and fans on high.

I must have had bad luck buying used mobos off ebay?

:(

Another update......

Just installed a DT029 mobo, with BIOS Rev A02 and it works fine with the above two quad-core processors. But again I will reiterate I had -2- pins this time bad on the CPU socket 1. After busting out the magnifying glass and a needle, I was able to bend the pins back into their proper position. So, if your second quad core isn't working, make sure to check the socket pins!

I had a scare once when booting it said incompatible processors, so I opened the case and popped the CMOS battery out. The system boots just fine and runs fine without the CMOS battery. So, if you go the route as prev posted, there is no need to put it back in. You do have to babysit the booting process and go in and set the system date and time. But once you've done this, assuming you are running winblows, just Sleep your system instead of Shutdown and you won't have to deal with setting bios system time again.

...but then I realized it wasn't a system issue....I had left my thumb drive plugged into the front USB port and that's what was causing the incompatible processor message! I removed the flash drive and popped the battery back in, no problems since.