t1n0m3n

I meant that AS separates in the applicator...I.E. before you try to apply it. It is some type of clear liquid that comes out when you try to squeeze some on the die of the CPU. Kind of like real peanut butter, the oils separates from the solids. If you let the clear liquid stay on the die it causes higher temps. (And some strange bubbling of the AS paste on the die too after a while of usage.) I have not had temps "creep up" on me with AS once I got it applied correctly without the "clear liquid" on the cpu die.

Oh, I reread your post.... This is happening BEFORE your card tries to post correct? I would just disable the onboard IDE ports that you are not using (set the IDE from auto to none)

That happened to me too with AS2. I didn't know what was going on until I realized that AS "separates" The only solution that I could find was to squeeze off some into a paper towel first to get to the "good" stuff. Now my CPU is 102 idle and 109 under a load. (With a Swiftech MC462) Before it was 120 idle and 131 under a load.

Yeah, that seems to happen with WD drives. You can make it be faster if you connect a HD to all channels. Before I had WD drives connected to my TX2, I had 2 Seagate Barracuda 4's and they did not seem to have that problem.