DS4 e6300 very strange boot problem

PhilipM · 16 Jan 2007 at 00:49

Hi,

I have a problem with my mobo/cpu which is very interesting indeed!

With no heatsink installed, the system will boot.
Adding the pressure of a heatsink causes the boot to fail. No bios is displayed and the system continually powers on and off. All I am doing is resting the heatsink on the cpu and this causes it to fail!

I checked the seating of the CPU. There was a little thermal grease on a few of the contacts, but that might have been just me taking it out. I cleaned it off, reseated the cpu twice and each time it made no difference.

I'm also sure all the pins are there and making good contact since it will boot with no heatsink. Not sure what to try next!

Anyone seen anything like this before?

Thanks,
Philip

masslac · 16 Jan 2007 at 00:52

I will admit to being a little stumped (so am therefore sorry for posting without a proposed solution).

Am very interested to see what happens with this, though.

FatRakoon · 16 Jan 2007 at 16:12

There could be some kind of shorting or contact on the bottom of the board?

I dont know of course, but check for things like the HS being so tight that it might be bending the Mobo... Only by a tiny ammount, but maybe enough?

The RAM for example might not be seated perfectly if the board is twisting.

You might also like to take care of the actual holes that the HS is plugged into and make sure that they are free of any metalic objects.

It is indeed interesting but I think that what you will hopefully find, is that the answer will be right under your nose, and ocne you find out the cause of the problem, you will be kicking yourself.

Just as another thought, I assume you have already done this, but...

Take the board out of the ase totally, and fit the cooler onto it while its out of the case... Take your time in making sure that any risers are where they should be and that there is no chance of any of them being out of line, who knows, you might even have one that should not be there, and the HS is also making the Board have contact where without the HS it might be enough of a gap to allow the booting.

Anyway, put the mobo back in and make sure that the back-plate is also not warped as this can also cause it to fail to boot.

Erm, so thats basically all I can suggest really.

- Brass risers
- Warping the board
- Warped back plate

PhilipM · 17 Jan 2007 at 13:21

Thanks for the reply.

I have already tried the system out of the case in case of shorting. It makes no difference.

When I've been trying with the heatsink, I've actually just been resting it on the processor.

Interestingly, after leaving the heatsink resting on it overnight, it will now not boot at all, even when I remove the heatsink.

I will try reseating the processor again tonight and having a really good look at the socket. I suspect that it is some sort of minor flaw in the socket that is disconnecting the CPU once any pressure is made to the top of the CPU heatspreader.

FatRakoon · 17 Jan 2007 at 13:59

Of course, its LGA so the pins are on the board not the CPU, so make sure that all the pins do indeed spring properly ( Carefully of course )

It might be that the position of the CPU is not 100% right? - its very unlikely but not impossible I suppose?

Munromax · 17 Jan 2007 at 17:55

Sounds like dirty or bent pin or dirt on bottom of CHip -really can't be much else!

PhilipM · 18 Jan 2007 at 11:32

I really can't see the fault. I have a really good light to inspect the socket and chip and I can see no problem. I can clearly see the fresh contact made on the surface of pads on the chip too. It now just won't boot at all!

RMA time. :rolleyes:

PhilipM · 31 Jan 2007 at 12:26

I've RMA'd the board, cpu and heatsink and OCUK can find no fault. Yet I can't get it to work.

Any ideas what to do next? I'm tempted to buy an identical mobo as I'm 90% sure that's the problem. No cheap, but neither is all this unsuccessful RMA postage!