Computer problems, need a bigger geek than I

[bsusigep18]

Alright, first off...i posted this on a few computer q/a boards a few days ago, still no response. I give it 3 hours before i have an answer, or at least an attempt from here. I have a giga-byte mobo. GA-7VRX ver. 2.0 mobo, and its been either ok, or total ****. This is my first attempt at putting together a computer, so bare with me. When i first put it together it was running fine...but it wasn't enough. Here's what i started at, for financial reasons i didn't move on to what i just got until now.

AMD XP2000+
Gigabyte - GA-7VRX2.0
256mb DDR PC2100
60g Maxtor 7200rpm
MSI 48x CDRW
Matrox 450 millenium (i've had that for a while)
along with all the other basics

Fastforward to last week. Bought a stick of 512mb DDR PC2700, PNY Verto Ti4200 64mb, another maxtor drive, and a 400w PS. Here's the problem:

This is all after attempting to install my new stick of ram. Everything else works fine. First i took out my old 256 PC2100 ram, before installing, at first boot up with the new ram, my monitor is not recognized. The power LED light on my monitor turns green, then fades to yellow, signifying that its not active. After trying another video card, and another monitor (which i know both work), to no avail, i can turn no where else but towards the motherboard. Any ideas as to what is going on? No changes were made to the motherboard other than adding the ram, which has been removed, set back to original hardware placement, which also has no results. Hopefully that made some sense. Thanks in advance for any help.

[irbodden]

You remembered to 'de-static' ...? This problem occured after you installed the new power supply?

[bsusigep18]

huh? i had the same issue before the PS...

[lopxtc]

Do you hear your BIOS beep? When you power on you should after a second or two get a beep from your case speaker which is just your BIOS telling you that it is good to go.

I had an issue where my system would look like it was powering on, but the monitor didnt come on. Disks spun and looked like they were booting as normal but no video. The only thing I noticed different was that I was getting a BIOS beep any more. Turned out the problem was a bad CPU. Put in an older CPU that I knew worked and bam powered up.

Aaron

[bsusigep18]

Hmm...interesting, thanks lopxtc. i'll check that out and get back to you. thanks.

[bsusigep18]

Well...i tried resetting the fan and cpu (thats what it suggests in the manual) and that didn't do crap, same exact situation. So, are we thinking its the cpu? am i just supposed to go and buy a new cpu? i don't have any other AMD cpus to test it on...any ideas?

[pbzmag]

Make sure that your mobo can accept PC2700 mem sticks. Put back the old mem stick and boot it up. If It works, then the new PC2700 stick is either bad or to fast for the mobo. Another problem can be an old piece of hardware. I too had a problem booting up with a pc that I put together myself. It turned out to be an old joystick that was causing the booting problem. Some old hardware won't work with new mobos. Also check your cpu for any burn marks or smell of burnt rubber. If you have any of those two, you have a paperweight.

pbzmag

[temps]

hmm... before buying a new cpu, you can bring it to a computer store that repairs computers, they will have cpu chips that they can test to see if you fried your cpu.

Other then that, all i can sugest is making sure that everything is connected securly, make sure you didn't knock anything out when you were fooling around in there.

Also answering the question of if your box beeps when you push the power button to start her up would help norrow the problem down a bit.

Good Luck!

[bsusigep18]

Thanks for the advice guys...i think we're narrowing it down to a cpu problem. hopefully i can get it fixed sometime in the near future. And to answer the bios question, no it doesn't beep when i boot up. Guess i'll have to make time to take it in to a computer shop to see what they can do for me. thanks.

[tr0n]

I am also thinking CPU. My friend's ACER (peice of crap 200-something MHz PC100 RAM) had the same problems. We took the processor out and looked at it after trying everything else in the entire world including taking it apart and putting it back together, and 2 of the pins were bent from when he took it out to look at it earlier that day. He must have forced it back in, but anyway we bent them back with a razor and put it back in and everything worked.

[mikey101]

Did you get a new heatsink with the processor? Because what happened to me when i got my AMDXP2000+ was I forgot to take the little sticker on the bottom of the heatsink off before I placed it on the processor and completely fried my processor when i started it up. This caused my monitor not to turn on such as your problem. If you turned your comp on with the sticker on the bottom of the heatsink touching it, it's most likely done because AMD's burn up in less then a second.

PS - Have you tried starting up in safe mode? it could just be a driver issue.

[alkafluence]

My suggestion is to move to the most basic setup and start from there.

The most basic setup:

Remove all cables and external drives.

Remove all "cards".

Start with the CPU, memory and graphics card that you know work.

Make sure that only the CPU, Memory and Motherboard are the things that are going to be running and see what happens.

If it works, proceed from there to replace only 1 component. If that works, then replace the next. Once you know all 3 of these items work, you can start reattaching your other hardware 1 by 1 until you find which is not working correctly.

Basically a "process of elimination."


Hope that helps...

[branman444]

have you for sure got it to a CPU prob. your computer has several diferant sounds from BIOS when ram is out it does one and when CPU is out another video another.you may switch from an AGP video to PCI for testing. look and see if you have any lights on the keyboard flashing when you start up numlock caplock ... if so let us know what. those are tel tel signs that will tell you what is wrong numlock is ram caplock is video (ill check on that to be sure if you let me know)

[Dayspring]

Well, try booting it up. If you get 3 beeps, it usually means there's an issue with the AGP card not seated correctly.

Another thing to think about is that the new graphics card is looking for a 1.5v AGP slot and you have a 3.3v slot. I know my motherboard won't even consider booting with a 3.3v AGP card in.

[digitard]

Man,
You guys <b>ALL</b> forgot the most basic thing ... he installed new components and it didn't work, so you <B>CLEAR THE BIOS</b> to reset its data.

A large chunk of the time its the cause ... (I do tech work for Insight.com).

Simple enough ... unplug the power to your MOTHERBOARD ... then there's a small silver CMOS battery on the board (about 1/2 an inch) ... remove the battery. After you've done that there should be a jumper near there labelled either CLRTC or CCMOS (normally its labelled that). Its going to be one of 3 things to clear it.

1) Its a single 2 pin jumper setup ... grab a jumper and put it on for about 30 seconds, then remove it and put the power/battery/etc back together and power it on with JUST the CPU and speaker attatched (and power).

2) Its a 3 pin Jumper setup. If this is the case there's already a jumper on pins 1/2 ... just follow the same steps and this time just move the jumper over ONE pin so its on pins 2/3 ... wait 30 seconds, then put the jumper back to 1/2 and power on again like previous.

3) Theres <b>NO</b> jumpers, and its just 2 solder points marked on the board. People mistake this for not having a clear option ... but in actuality its the most simple. Grab a flathead screwdriver and touch the 2 solder points together for approx 30 seconds, and then put the battery/power back and power on.

You should hopefully at this point get a consistant and repeating beep over and over on power on. This would be a "no RAM" beep. At that point put your ram back in (still no video) and power on ... it should be you 2 long and 1 short meaning no video .. put your video back in and you should get a display.

Hope that helps!

Sincerely,
Dave K