Sally's new comp won't boot....

dragonV8

Problem....Cannot get computer to boot, even into the bios now. Managed 2-3 times before, this morning.

New computer, all new parts.

Taken 3 days to put this one together. Cable sleeved wiring from Psu, changed molex connectors from white to red, using proper tooling. Set up water cooling prior to installing mobo.
Removed ram, trying 1 stick at the time.
Removed/replaced wiring from mobo.
Tried booting with NO HD, then 1 HD.
Cannot get HD activity now. Sally did manage to get into bios at one stage to change boot sequence for setting up the OS.
Removed the battery twice and moved jumper to suit.

Starting to tear out what little hair i have left as nothing we can think of appears to make a difference.

No post beeps. When starting the puter, codes are as followes. 83, 89, 90. Stays on 90, fans running, not much else. Water cooling is on seperate mains power. (Eheim 1048).

Tsunami Dream case
Abit AA8 mobo
Intel 3.4 550
GeCube Ati Radeon X300 PCI-E
2 x 512M DDRII 533mhz
Super Flower 500W Psu
1 x 74Gig Raptor HD
2 x 200Gig WD HD
Water cooled
4 port usb pci card
Tv pci card

Any help/suggestions are greatly appreciated.

Jon & Sally




*Update: Yellow is NOT Red.

Since you changed the molex connectors on the supply, you may want to try a different power supply, on the off chance you mixed up the order of one of the connectors.[quote/]

I molex connector had the coloured wires the wrong way....Thanks shwaip.

Though i had pulled all cards out, lifted the mobo off the offsets, no change in the post codes till i found the problem molex connector. Now put it back together and see what happens.

Will post back with results of this find.

Thanks guys.

I made a mistake.....i was W....W....WR.....incorrect!!

shwaip

Try taking out the RAM and putting it back in. Make sure assorted cards and/or other components are completely seated.

Make sure the WD drives have the jumpers set correctly. I was having trouble with mine until I set them properly. If they are single drives on a cable, make sure that NO jumper is connected. If they are master/slave on the same, try them on Cable select, and try them set to master/slave directly as well.

Since you changed the molex connectors on the supply, you may want to try a different power supply, on the off chance you mixed up the order of one of the connectors.

Couple other things to try:

Try with motherboard out of case, only with RAM + CPU + Video card and see if it posts.
Try with/with out watercooling (outside of case) to see if that's the problem

mmonnin

One thing I have learned when building new computers is that make sure the bare components like CPU/RAM/Motherboard/PSU all work BEFORE attaching all devices and even BEFORE putting the motherboard in the case. Test it outside first. That makes troubleshooting a lot easier and if something doesnt work you dont have to mess with all the neat cabling you just did.

Well since this is all new stuff and none of it will work with anything else that you have there is not much you can swap out with another computer. Thats the easiest thing to do.

Test the video card in another computer. Cant test the RAM/CPU/Mobo because of the socket change/RAM change.

Next thing would be to try to take the motherboard out like shwaip mentioned and have a go with the bare min.

dragonV8

shwaip wrote:

Try taking out the RAM and putting it back in. Make sure assorted cards and/or other components are completely seated.

Removed ram, reseated (few times), tried 1 stick at the time. No change.

shwaip wrote:

Make sure the WD drives have the jumpers set correctly. I was having trouble with mine until I set them properly. If they are single drives on a cable, make sure that NO jumper is connected. If they are master/slave on the same, try them on Cable select, and try them set to master/slave directly as well.

Forgot to mention, all 3 drives are sata. The only one that is confusing is the Raptor. It has a jumper on pins 1&2 as default. To do with "Spread Spectrum Clocking". Research failed to enlighten me. WD's site stated what removing the jumper does (on/off....big deal).

shwaip wrote:

Since you changed the molex connectors on the supply, you may want to try a different power supply, on the off chance you mixed up the order of one of the connectors.

Guess i could pull all the plugs out for inspection, though i'm sure they are all the same, with yellow on one side and red on the other. The only ones that may have been crossed would be the black ones in the middle. Definitely red & yellow on the outside.

shwaip wrote:

Couple other things to try:

Try with motherboard out of case, only with RAM + CPU + Video card and see if it posts.
Try with/with out watercooling (outside of case) to see if that's the problem

I'lll be trying the easier options first, lol. With the watercooling there are hoses everywhere. Pump, cpu, nb, radiator and reservoir. Pretty major job that one.

Thanks for the input Shwaip.

dragonV8

Just read your post marc. Should have learned to do that trick myself by now. I'll try removing all cards, etc. Then the psu next. Leave pulling the watercooling to bits till last, me thinks.

Thanks too for the input.

mmonnin

Yeah I had to diagnose a computer the other day and taking the CPU out was one of the last things I wanted to do. Swapping Mem, Video and other cards came first since they were easier.

dragonV8

Still got major problems. Put it together, would not work. Pulled it down to board only (in case), still no post.

Pulled the whole thing to bits, mobo out of case, tried different psu, still nothing. By sheer good fortune actually had it boot up, no k/board or mouse or screen. Hooked them up, tried again and back to the same numbers. 83, 89, 90.

A search through Abit's forum does not help. Any post made regarding the same problem ends up going nowhere.

Still trying by pulling the battery out and moving the jumper to suit. :bawling:

Straight_Man

Depending on how many times you have cleared the CMOS, you MIGHT have a dead CMOS cell. Try a new CMOS cell. IF the CMOS battery\cell is almost dead, it cannot clear the CMOS anymore, also. I'm also assuming you are using metal stud and screw standoffs in case, under motherboard, and have them only where it is appropriate. Where there are contact points of plain metal around a hole in motherboard, there should a screw and stud be, EXCEPT real close to NB or CPU (real close is like within 10-13mm or about 1\2 inch, the four holes around CPU are for HS mounts, and if you have four holes around NB with one at each corner, screws and studs should not be used to mount through any of those holes, they are HS mount points-- exception is a single hole with no pattern of other evenly spaced holes at "corners" of CPU or NB, which is that close to CPU or NB. )

BTW, if you manage to run 12 V (YELLOW) where 5V (RED, moslty, with possibility of different color on motherboard power connector only) should be, things will get fried. FRIED things can have voltage routes that will drain power from other things, or not have voltage flow routes where they should (volts time amps is approximately watts, so this can also be called wattage flow). This can blow power supply and control components on a motherboard, damage a PSU such that it only feeds 12 V right and not low voltages like 5V or 3.3 V, and blow a PSU's power mgmt components that allows shutdown and wakeup also.

Normally, spread specrum clocking lets sub-busses run async to FSB settings, IE NOT fixed ratio to FSB base settings. IF fans do not run, you have either a polarity inversion or voltage line of wrong kind attached to one or more pins, adn possibly have blown the motherboard's power control circuitry. Look at caps on motherboard for physical damage, make dang sure the north bridge fan is working right.

The only other thing I can say is this:

IF you have another computer that is compatible with the parts in this one, try the video card in it, then the RAM, one single thing swap-out at a time. this can help validate components some, simply because if it works in one it should work in other also, if both are compatible with the thing that only works one place.

Reversing RED and Yellow in connector, to wrong outside place on connector, will fry things big time, especially HDs, CD-ROM or DVD drives, and floppy drives. Only way to then get rest to boot is to remove thing that is fried in some cases. you will, if thing like storage device is badly fried, get boot hangs at device seek time, or no-posts, or simple fan-only or NOTHING-ON results when PSU is turned on depending on HOW the storage device got fried. I've seen folks try everything, disconnect ALL storage devices, get a BIOS screen, then plug things back in one by one, and isolate which device, and done this myself.

dragonV8

Thanks for that reply John. Basically i have tried everything we can to date with the exception of a different mobo or cpu. Tried different video card and ram from working computer. Removed all but the psu to see if it will give a post of sorts.

Next to try will be to take the cpu out of the problem computer and see if it works ok in the good one. When that has been confirmed, remove the working mobo and cpu and put it into the faulty one. Basically an elimination process, till the culprit is found.

Very frustrating as i'm sure you are aware of.

Jon

mmonnin

Did you buy it at a local shop? Maybe you can take it back to see if they can test it for ya with another CPU or motherboard.

dragonV8

Bought it out of state, Marc. Could not get one here in West Aust. All sold out (or sent to RMA, lol).

Well, tried a few more things. Different cpu, still no go. Removed the water cooling, put it on air, still no go. We even tested every component on a working computer. All worked ok, just not with the new mobo.


Found the only fix left...........RMA time. :shakehead

Thrax

Aww, that's a shame. DOA components are a real bitch. Sorry about that, Jon.

dragonV8

Not wrong Thrax. Got a few HD's i should send away, however this is the first time a major one went on us. After seeing Gnome's case some time ago, had a look in the shop and liked what i saw.

Sally is happy as with the case. Bought our first Raptor to see what the difference might be, got our first components to set up a reasonable water cooling on it......then that **** mobo, lol.

Till now we only bought pre-made baby water coolers. This is way better and more of a challenge. Eheim 1048, Silverprop cyclone evolution SE, Silverprop nexus block, Black ice 120mm radiator, Panaflo 120mm fan, Mini coolshroud and a Watercool Reservoir II tank. Very quiet, just not had a chance to run it under full steam.

mmonnin

How can you test every component in another computer? You have DDR2 and a socket T CPU and your sig only shows socket478 P4s.

Thrax

[Insert Thrax's mandatory gripe about the 925X chipset, Socket T and the Prescott]

dragonV8

Insert noted Thrax.

Marc, we bought an Abit AA8 DuraMax with all required stuff a little while ago, eg. P4 3.2, DDRII 533 ram. This is the one we used to check the components for the latest one which was to be Sally's new work (and folding ofcourse) computer, a P4 3.4 .

Have been a bit busy and updating the sig slipped my mind. Sally's sig is even further behind. Must get to do that one too. Also with various problems of one sorts or another, the folding has not benefitted. Once we get the rma'd board back and up and running, things hopefully will settle down.