AMD A8-3850 Sleep Zombie

[Aveamantium]

Built a new computer a few months back and wanted to start out by saying that the computer is perfectly stable when on (no BSODs, lockups, etc.). However, SOMETIMES when the computer goes to sleep (usually when it has been asleep overnight) the computer refuses to power back up (no spin up of fans, hard drives, nothing), it just sits there with the power light blinking (indicating sleep state). You can press the reset button, power button, hold the power button nothing. The only way to get it out of this state is to power cycle the PSU then it powers on just like normal. This is where it gets fun, I've replaced the PSU, motherboard, hard drives, cpu and tried two different sets of ram.

The funny thing was I was using two sticks of F3-12800CL9-2GBNQ at first and had no issues. Then I decided to add extra ram that I had sitting around so I stuck in two sticks of F3-12800CL9-2BRL. Since I did this the problems started, so easy fix right, remove the added ram. Nope, now the computer goes into this sleep zombie state no matter what I do with the ram (4 sticks, 2 sticks, 2GBNQ or 2BRL, loose timings, run at 1333 MHz, etc).

I even tried disabling sleep in Windows, only to find it the next morning back in this state.

So the question remains, since I've pretty much replaced the whole computer outside of the case, could this be a ram compatibility issue? Here is my setup:

AMD A8-3850 APU
ASUS F1A75-M Pro
No Video Card (Built into the APU)
and the Ram I mentioned above.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated as I'm about ready to take this thing out for target practice!

Thanks!

[Tradesman]

Do you have the latest BIOS and have you tried disabling the various power savings options i.e. the C6 mode

[Aveamantium]

Oh man have I been messing with the Bios (AHCI vs IDE, Disable/Enable EPU and Surge Protect, Fan settings, yes even fan settings)... I did try disabling C6 but I have yet to combine that with disabling sleep in Windows. Also, I haven't tried disabling C6 since I replaced the CPU (latest RMA). Oh so many variables... Given that, I'll have to give the old C6 disable another try. Couldn't find any other BIOS options to change regarding sleep mode. A couple of APM settings but those were only for wake on this, wake on that... There is also the EPU (left disabled by default but have tried it enabled) and the DIGI+VRM stuff but I have left that as default as I don't understand that.

One thing of note, it seems to go a few days without doing this if I only run 2 sticks of ram at looser timings 1333 MHz or one hard drive instead of 2 but it will still happen, just seems to take a little longer. Unfortunately, this is an HTPC that does all my recordings so I can't just shut it down when I'm done with it.

[Aveamantium]

Oh and yes, I'm running the latest BIOS 1501 (included a firmware update to the CPU????). I've also tried other flavors of the BIOS without success.

[GSKILL TECH]

Check for any memory power down options in BIOS. Try hard resetting the BIOS and try again.

Thank you
GSKILL TECH

[Aveamantium]

Memory power down options?? I guess I'm not exactly sure what to look for there? I just went through the manual again and the only power management I recognized was the C6 setting.

Under the DIGI+VRM there is CPU Load Line Calibration, CPU/NB Load Line Calibration, CPU Current Capability, CPU/NB Current Capability, CPU Power Phase Control, CPU Voltage Frequency, VRM spread spectrum, VRM Fixed Frequency Mode, CPU Power Duty Control, and APU spread spectrum but I've left these at default settings as I don't even know where to start there.

I have set to factory defaults in the BIOS several times and I have also reset the CMOS including pulling the battery but this didn't help either. Would there be any reason to up the DRAM voltage and/or VDDNB voltage given I'm stable when the computer is on? I'm running 1.5 V and 1.15 V respectively.

I really appreciate the help here as I've google searched the heck out of this and nothing seems to fit exactly. Most people's computers "spin up" but don't necessarily come out of sleep where my situation is basically a hardware locked computer with absolutely no activity outside of that blinking power light (again you can't even power off by holding the power button).

Please keep any suggestions coming!

[GSKILL TECH]

Contact ASUS to see if they may know of any S3 issues.

Thank you
GSKILL TECH