Neshi

After being away for 2 weeks on holiday I come back and when I try to turn on the computer, there is no visual respons on the screen. The light is on, but its colored orange. I've turned the screen off and put it on again, then it's green for a little while (and I get a No Signal sign on the screen) then it turns orange again.

I've checked all the wires, turned the computer on several times. But I'm afraid I can't find the source of the problem.

As far as I know there was no lightning while I was away, no short circuit or something.

I hope one of you might know where I should look for the problem.

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If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

swimtech

Your monitor sounds fine, it is obviously indicating that it is not getting a video signal.

My first step would be to remove the video card and reseat it, then try again. If not good after that, swap in a known good video card...

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It's not so much getting your way that matters or not - what matters is how you go about getting it.

Neshi

so far I've reseated the videocard, but no luck. I just dont get it how it doesn't work. The computer worked fine when I left, I come back 2 weeks later, nobody has touched it and then it doesn't work.
The videocard I use (x1950xt) has 2 slots at the back, I am using one of those convertors for my monitor, but I've been using the slot on the right for all this time, should I try connecting the left slot to the monitor?
And I'll follow up with the thing about swapping in a known good card, will try that and report

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

swimtech

Sure, try the other output connector - it won't hurt (I didn't think of that...). Also, if you can run the cable directly from your monitor to your video card connector without using the adapter - try that as well.

Ah, just noticed you were overclocking this system. Try resetting the CMOS to factory defaults with a jumper on the board (or a switch for such...). That might help.

Basically though, sounds like the video card is not initializing properly - though we still don't know why...

Edit, BTW - I really like your sig line...

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It's not so much getting your way that matters or not - what matters is how you go about getting it.

Neshi

tried the other connector, same story.
I don't really know what you mean with the second sentence, but as far I know the monitor-vga cable isn't using an adapter, so I guess I can skip that.

I withdrew the x1950xt, resetted CMOS with the jumper, put in an old x800xt I know that works, rewired everything... and still the same story.

The light on the monitor stays orange, no response whatsoever. If I turn the monitor off, and then on again it burns green for a little while, then the No Signal sign shows on the screen and it turns yellow. Doesnt matter if the pc is on or not.
I don't know what else to do, I've put in the current videocard again, made sure everything is connected and still nothing.

I'm beginning to think maybe the monitor died while I was away... I was a little stupid leaving it on (left the psu on too btw) when I left.

- thanks, I like yours too

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

BlueMak

might be a mainboard problem. Do you hear windows loading?

__________________

The people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forego ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others(Bertrand Russell)"You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil,You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them." - Lt. Gen. James N. Mattis
This is slavery, not to speak one's thought. [Euripides-The Phoenician Women (c.411-409 B.C.)] http://www.macedonia.info/FALLACIESANDFACTS.htm Sic semper tyrannis.

Neshi

with those beeps and stuff?
I don't hear the beeps... I guess that's a bad thing right..
damn.. I've noticed it when starting the computer all those times, but dismissed it.

that means the board died in some way. Do you might have an idea how that could've happened?

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

swimtech

Bummer, ok...

Inside your computer on the main board just above the Primary IDE connector, and behind the the third PCI slot on your board is a standby power LED - is it lit, or flickering, or anything? If on, it indicates that the PSU is supplying standby 5v power to the mainboard. If off, it means that the computer is unplugged or that the PSU or motherboard are defective.

If the standby LED is on, unplug the computer and remove all the memory, then plug the computer back in and turn the computer on - you should hear one long beep followed by two short beeps, then the pattern repeats, if the mainboard is able to sense that the memory is missing. If you don't hear any beeps with the memory out of the machine, I would say your mainboard is bad, with a possiblity that the PSU might be bad too.

You could, with the cover off, listen for whether or not the hard drives and fans spin up.

Let us know what you find...

__________________
It's not so much getting your way that matters or not - what matters is how you go about getting it.

Neshi

The led burns continiously, so that isn't faulty. I followed your advice and removed the memory. Everything worked fine.. the harddrives and fans spin up, but what you said was right: no beeps.
RMA'ing is all that's left to do isn't it.

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

swimtech

I think the likelihood is highest that you have a mainboard failure - yes. Since the hard drives spin up, you know the PSU is responding to the power on signal from the mainboard and that 12v is being delivered to the motors from the PSU. The mainboard is not getting past that point though, it appears...

The information on the beep codes for "no memory" came straight from the mainboard manual (Asus P5K Deluxe) I downloaded from the ASUS site. You should be able to tell them about the steps you took to obtain your RMA.

__________________
It's not so much getting your way that matters or not - what matters is how you go about getting it.

Neshi

thank you for helping me with this. I would have never thought of the mainboard to look for the problem.
First thing next week is rma-ing that board and look what they have to say about the issue. Do they ever explain what the exact problem/failure/defect is with stuff you bring for rma?

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

Nachbrenner

Depends on whether they repair or replace it.
e.g. i got exact repair reports in the 90's for my VCR or camcorder,
but nowadays hardware with SMD technology is usually replaced by companies.

swimtech

My pleasure, as always, Neshi - hope it turns out well...

And no, they won't - they may actually not even bother finding out themselves - who knows...

__________________
It's not so much getting your way that matters or not - what matters is how you go about getting it.

BlueMak

You are welcome.

__________________

The people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forego ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others(Bertrand Russell)"You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil,You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them." - Lt. Gen. James N. Mattis
This is slavery, not to speak one's thought. [Euripides-The Phoenician Women (c.411-409 B.C.)] http://www.macedonia.info/FALLACIESANDFACTS.htm Sic semper tyrannis.

Neshi

Giving you guys an update.
I've send the board for a RMA and it got repaired, and they send it back.
Mounted everything in the computer, fired it up and look and behold, it worked. So the problem was definately with the mobo.

It seemed it lost the memory of having videocard drivers, but I did a search for update thing and then it said it was fully updated and during that time the pc installed drivers for some things, what exactly, I don't know.
Anyway, I had to restart the computer. It shut down and everything but when it restarted it was stuck on the black screen again. Like I described in my first post. So my motherboard is broken, again.

It doesn't post, no beeps and stuff..
something in my computer is killing the mobo. Could it be a faulty PSU? or can there be something else that is doing this?

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

Neshi

*shamelessly bumping to the top of the page*

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

swimtech

Oh cuh-rap!

Yes, it could be your PSU, or your..., or your...

Seriously though - I would start by trying to get a known good PSU in there just to be sure. You might have had damage to it while you were gone. Unplug the system from the wall, and I'd also get the system down to a bare minimum. Reset the CMOS with the jumper using the procedure in your manual. Turn on the system with just the CPU, memory, and video card installed, mouse and keyboard - no drives or any other external devices installed at all, and pray you get a bios screen.

If you do get one, attempt a restart - not a shutdown - and see if that comes back up ok. Then try a shutdown and restart. Add components back one at a time.

If no bios screen, it's possible they may not have caught all the problems on the mainboard the first time through if it was indeed repaired - not replaced. You may need to go that route again...

You have any spare parts around, or friends that do?

I hate this for you Neshi, really..

__________________
It's not so much getting your way that matters or not - what matters is how you go about getting it.

Neshi

It's a pity I don't have a good PSU lying around, and my friends aren't so computer savvy to know or to care to have a good quality PSU.

Although I really doubt I will get a bios screen as I suspect the mobo is dead already. I get no beeps, not even when there is no memory in it. I will try the things you said.

I just remembered, I might have an old one from antec somewhere and I'll try to find that one. Otherwise I'll just try it my current PSU.

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

Syndicate2083

I would definitely lean towards a power issue of some sort while you were away. This is a pretty common tale, and you don't need lightning to get a surge and damage your equipment.

What was recommended are really solid TS steps, but I would consider that PSU suspect until you can do some more testing with it. Perhaps power it up with a volt meter and see what she throws out, or if you have the cash, replace it on principle. It's really unlikely that the motherboard would simply fry itself for no reason, and more likely that something caused it, my guess if your monitor is still working, is either the PSU, or that you have unprotected data lines (i.e. from a router/cable modem, etc) that could pass a surge to the motherboard. If you do have the latter, but the modem/router etc still work, that could be the issue, or not, stuff can still half function most of the time after a surge, and your motherboard is generally going to be more sensitive than the data lines that carried the surge in the first place.

Just some things to think about.

-Syn

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-Crash the silence for the sake of memory.

Intrinsic Realities, Veteran-USN.

Neshi

I agree with you about the power issue. It was the first thing I thought about.
I don't know if you read through the intire thread but for the sake of it I will repeat myself.

I fired up the computer, it didn't POST. I suspected a dead motherboard so I RMA'd it. I got it back, put it in the computer, fired it up.
Then it get's interesting.
I set the drives on RAID.
I got into windows (so it booted, bios worked, windows worked)
After the install of a driver I had to restart. I restarted and it happened again:
No POST. I'm pretty sure my mobo is dead now.

I'm thinking, as my mobo is dead (the trick with removing memory and letting it fire up - should result in beeps, but these aren't there in my case) so testing it now isn't very usefull.

But Syndicate, what you're saying, is that there could have been a surge from the router to the computer? that would explain the dying of the first time.
The only thing that dazzles me is that the second time, the computer worked fine for 5 minutes and then the same thing happened.
During those 5 minutes I resetted the pc a couple of times; I forgot to put the hdd's on a raid configuration in the bios, was too late with pressing del/ctrl+I.

So a 2nd surge from the router could have killed the mobo again? I think that is unlikely.
A faulty PSU would explain it, although that PSU would have only killed the mobo, and not the CPU, Memory, VGA, soundcard, hdd's... because all those things worked when I had just installed the new mobo.

I guess my only option would be: RMA the mobo again, and when I get it back do the TS that Swimtech put in his post.

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

Syndicate2083

Well I have had a PSU go on me before and fry my mobo, and not my memory/vc/HDDs etc. It is certainly possible, just a brief explanation of how that might happen...

The PSU could take, say a surge, and your rectifier (which converts the AC to DC) passes on a portion of the surge to only one of your lines, in this case the mainboard itself, but not the other components.

Also, as for the router, that is just an example, but also very posssible at any time, if it has no type or surge protection. What most people don't realize is that a surge can come in over your power line, but ALSO over your data line. Cable modems are a great example, its all just voltage over a copper wire, the copper wire takes a surge, bypasses your surge strip, goes through your modem, the modem surges over the RJ45, passes it to the router, over ethernet lines, the ethernet lines then to your PC, fried mobo.

I did read the whole post, and agree that this mobo sounds like its toast again, but I would point the finger at your PSU being the root cause here, and not necesarrily just a bad board. You may want to look into some surge devices to protect your setup in the future, and secure any inbound data lines as a thought.

-Syn

__________________
-Crash the silence for the sake of memory.

Intrinsic Realities, Veteran-USN.

Neshi

yea, I guess it's time to send my mobo AND the psu for RMA, both were maybe just a year old.. =/
How can I establish that my PSU is at fault, a voltmeter?

What would you advice as surge protection, are those powerboxes with protection enough or do I have to get me something fancy?
And how do I protect data lines?

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

Syndicate2083

You could try and take a voltmeter, set it to DC, and read whats coming off of your power lines, that would work. It can be difficult to really point to a PSU if it has a flakey or partially damaged component though, so you might want to just switch to another known good PSU in the meantime, and do further testing with that one.

Well allot of 'home use' UPS and Surge protectors have some built in data line protectors, if not my company has devices called protectnets which are little surge units for individual line protection, like a coax line for example.

I of course would recommend my companies surge/ups devices. APC all the way.

Now out of the fluff, what are the power specs your dealing with for a computer? I would assume your using a PFC PSU? Do you want battery backup for shutdowns, or is just surge protection good enough for ya?

Let me know, or PM and I can explain all you want about this stuff and what kinda options you have, either way is fine with me I get no commission or anything by the way, this is all off the books, so Im not looking to make any cash off ya, if anyone is thinking that

-Syn

__________________
-Crash the silence for the sake of memory.

Intrinsic Realities, Veteran-USN.

Neshi

I meant like one of these as surge protection. Just to protect the computer from stuff like what happened to me. I don't need the protection for lightning or anything.. I understand that the surge protectors like in the picture won't protect me for lightning or anything.

I still don't understand what you mean about the data lines, and how to protect that. Is that some kind of special ethernet-cable or something?

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

procupine14

essentially thats what he is talking about. its like a tiny in line thing similar to a power surge surpressor but for your ethernet lines (two female ends and a surge surpression device between them)

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HTPC/file server: Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit - AMD Phenom x4 9850 - 4GB OCZ DDR2 800 (2x2GB) - 1TB WD Black - 4 x 1TB Hitachi DeskStar in RAID 5 - ATi TV Wonder Digital Cable Tuner - HIS Raedon 4850 512MB - ASRock N68C-S UCC mobo - OCZ ModExtreme Pro 500W PSU

GF's Gaming PC: Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit - AMD Phenom 9850 - 4GB OCZ DDR2 1066 - 500GB Western Digital GP - HIS Raedon 5770 1GB - ASUS M3A78-EM - Zalman 650W PSU

Media Streamer: Win 7 Pro 64-bit - AMD Athlon x2 3200+ - 4GB SuperTalent DDR2 800 - 250GB SeaGate Barracuda - MSI K9N6PGM2-V2 - ASUS Raedon 5450 SILENT - FSP group 250W PSU

Syndicate2083

ok this guy for example has normal outlet surge protection, ethernet protection, coax, and phone line

https://www.apcc.com/resource/includ...se_sku=P11VNT3

It will indeed protect you from a lightning strike too, it basically will shunt most of the surges you get, and if it is to much for the unit then it will sacrifice its internal components without damaging your gear.


A strict data line protection example would be the following:

https://www.apcc.com/resource/includ...fm?base_sku=PV

Hope that clarifies it a bit for ya

-Syn

__________________
-Crash the silence for the sake of memory.

Intrinsic Realities, Veteran-USN.

Syndicate2083

You can go to apcc.com and switch countries to your own and see what you have locally available, were global so you can find us anywhere, or look at a unit and post it here and I can explain what it does/doesn't do for ya

-Syn

__________________
-Crash the silence for the sake of memory.

Intrinsic Realities, Veteran-USN.

swimtech

I'm sorry if I wasn't clear in my last post, but I thought I had suggested the first thing that you should do is get a known good PSU in there then check the replacement board again, just to be sure. It probably has gotten damaged, but...

I'm thinking too that the highest likelihood, considering the replacement mainboard worked then failed again, is that the PSU is damaged as well, causing (at least...) the second mainboard failure. Less likely, but still possible, is that they didn't repair the mainboard completely - they may have missed something that was weakened. There really isn't a good way to test a marginal PSU without a scope or other rather expensive or more elaborate equipment in order to test DC output quality over a period of time. A known good PSU solves that testing issue.

__________________
It's not so much getting your way that matters or not - what matters is how you go about getting it.

Neshi

I just pulled my mainboard and the PSU out of the computer, and while I was looking at the PSU, for I don't know... maybe something molten or something blackened, I was turning the thing around, and I heard like something was loose insede the PSU.
I got it out and it turns out to be a little screw.
I think this might be the cause of it all... the screw could have made some kind of bad connection in the PSU what caused it to fail which fried my mobo, something like that.
Now I just have to wait till the 4th so I can RMA both of the items.

what do you guys think about it?

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

Mousey

If you found a screw inside the PSU then that definately sounds like the cause of the problem, well.. at least you found the cause, now to wait for the RMAs

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