AMD64, ASUS A8V, and SATA - NMI Watcbdog lockup [SOLVED]

[dagol]

Hello everyone.

I'm trying to install Gentoo on the new computer, downloaded the 2004.3 universal cd, and packages cd. It boots to cd fine, it let me define partitions using fdisk...
/dev/sda1 /boot
/dev/sda2 swap
/dev/sda4 ectended
/dev/sda5 /
/dev/sda6 future winxp, unformatted
/dev/sda7 /home (I think, whichever is the equivalent of 'My Documents' in winxp, I want on it's own partition.)

Then (following the install guide)

I formatted the boot partition as ext2.
I formatted and initialized the swap partition.
then
mkreiserfs /dev/sda5 (I assume that you just ingore sda4, as it has no real volume, just the other 3 partitions inside)
continue? y
Initializing journal - 0%. . . .20%. . . .40%. .NMI Watchdog detected LOCKUP on CPU0, registers: CPU 0
Modules link in:_

and that's it. I've tried disabling ACPI, but it still does the same thing, and always at 40%...

Please tell me I'm an idiot, and this is a well known problem, and simple fix!! :O)

~ Dagol

[EDIT] I also tried formatting with ext3 - it locked up at 60% complete. Regardless, I'm a bit of a noob, so I gave up on this problem until someone would be kind enough to post a solution here... Well :O)

Early this afternoon my new 2x512MB sticks of ram came, and I eagerly pulled the single 256MB stick I'd borrowed from the system I'm typing this on, and inserted the two new sticks into the recommended BLUE slots on the ASUS A8V-delux[this is important :O) ]

Turned on the system. Nothing. Blank screen.
Thought the ram was bad. Pulled both sticks, and then replaced one stick in the second blue slot (as recommended for single stick operation in the user guide) system starts.
Figure second stick of ram must be bad, replace good stick with presumed bad stick to test. System starts.

Figure that there's really only one thing that can fix this kind of issue, and go looking for bios updates. I have 1006 (A8V rev2) asus has 1007, and 1008. Do a little research -

1007 is a *little* unstable - but it fixes the ram issue, AND A LITTLE KNOW 'LINUX FAILS TO FORMAT SATA DRIVE' issue !!! :O) *happy dance*

1008? as 1007 but stabler :O)

One other thing if anyone else is reading this:
the A8V has 'EZ bios'
what you do is take your new (or old if reverting) bios file, rename it A8V.ROM and put it in the root directory of a floppy or cd (I went with cd, because I haven't used a floppy in some years)

it updates itself, and then you get to reconfigure your preferences in bios.

When I first rebooted with new ram installed, and looked at the CPU info in the bios, it listed my 3200+ at 1200MHz, which I thought looked odd.

Then I rebooted, and it told me it had detected a new CPU and showed me the 3200+ running 2000MHZ. After that all was well.

And now, the happy dance! *People nearby turn away in horror as fat jiggles frighteningly*

:O)
_________________
~ Dagol