Hello all,
I am hoping to pick your brains on a particular problem I had yesterday and what my line of action should be now:
I received my order Saturday morning (was very impressed with the speed of delivery!) which included the following:
Motherboard: Asus Rampage II Extreme Intel X58 (Socket 1366) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard
Motherboard Chipset: X58 Socket LGA1366
Intel Core i7 920 D0 Stepping (SLBEJ) 2.66Ghz (Nehalem) (Socket LGA1366)Memory: Patriot Viper 6GB (3x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800 (1600MHz) Low Latency Tri-Channel Memory
PSU: Corsair HX 1000W ATX Modular SLI Compliant Power Supply (CMPSU-1000HXUK)
Graphics: BFG GeForce GTX 295 1792MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express)
Sound Card: SupremeFX X-Fi (onboard)
Operating system: Vista 64 bit SP 1
Case: Antec 1200
CPU Cooler: Asus Triton
I was supposed to also get a pack of Arctic Silver Thermal Compound but this was not in the pack - but as it was £5 and the CPU cooler came with compound, I was not overly concerned.
I was a little worried when the corner of the GFX card box had clearly been hit and there was an indent. When I pulled the card out, the faceplate was bent back at the bottom by about 30 degrees....so I straightened it and hoped for the best.
I built the system and installed Vista without any problems. As of Saturday night Vista was up and running (and stable) but without any of the main drivers (i.e. GFX) installed.
Sunday morning I installed all the drivers and did a diagnostic in Vista which showed everything working ok and ranked all components of the machine at 5.9 in Vista scoring (highest possible).
The GFX card did make a strange high pitched sound whenever it was doing 3d (3d chess) which I found a little odd - but apparently that is normal - something to do with coil noise.
I was browsing the web when all of a sudden it cut out. It would not reboot, so I turned the plug off, pulled the cable out then replaced it. It then booted correctly and I thought nothing of it. Then it happened again, and again, and again.
Eventually it will not even boot into BIOS. The lights on the case would flicker and the fans seemed to be running at a slightly slower speed than they on Saturday (it looked like it is not getting the power it needs).
Sometimes it would not even do this - there will be a little flash of LEDs/fans about to start before powering off. I attached the LED poster thing that came with the motherboard - when you turn on the machine it said welcome but does not progress any further.
I removed the GFX card and the problem still persisted - so I did not think it had anything to do with it (even if it was a bit damaged in transit).
After reading several forums it seemed likely to be either the PSU or Motherboard which were faulty. I did all the standard troubleshooting methods (like removing RAM etc) and got the same problem. At this point I wrote an email to OC about returning the Mobo and/or PSU. I had pretty much given up hope!
I went out for a meal (finding it very hard to concentrate on anything but the PC!!) and when I came back I disconnected and reconnected every lead possible. I moved the power leads from the modular PSU into different sockets (still the black ones - but had only the Mobo and Fans connected to it - not optical drives etc). I then tried again with no gfx card and the LEDs and FANs came on properly.
I then added the GFX card but did not screw it in (did not know if this was pulling it out of alignment. Booted it up and made it into BIOS. Let it sit in BIOS for a while, checked all the temps which were low 30-40s (so I know it is not an overheating issue)...checked the votages - all normal.
I decided to risk all and plug the HD and Bluray player into the PSU and try again. The computer booted properly and straight into Vista. I then loaded Farcry 2 to test the GFX card and RAM etc. The game ran super smoothly at the highest resolution. Plugged headphones in and the sound was perfectly clear - no static etc. Computer remained stable for the remainder of the night.
This morning I booted the machine and it seems fine - but I am really nervous about touching any part of it!! - in particular screwing the GFX card onto the case fitting and putting the sides on.
Do you think this was just a simple case of a loose connection somewhere or do the symptoms suggest a dodgy motherboard? Surely if it can run Farcry 2 for a few hours no problem - then everything must be working ok? What else could have been wrong to cause such odd symptoms (i.e. powering the Mobo but not booting to bios). The Republic of Gamers light on the mobo was on even when the machine would not boot.
I really don't want to have the farce of sending things back (especially the motherboard as mounting the CPU cooler took me ages)! I just hope it boots when I get back in tonight.
Thoughts?
- Matt.
I am hoping to pick your brains on a particular problem I had yesterday and what my line of action should be now:
I received my order Saturday morning (was very impressed with the speed of delivery!) which included the following:
Motherboard: Asus Rampage II Extreme Intel X58 (Socket 1366) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard
Motherboard Chipset: X58 Socket LGA1366
Intel Core i7 920 D0 Stepping (SLBEJ) 2.66Ghz (Nehalem) (Socket LGA1366)Memory: Patriot Viper 6GB (3x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800 (1600MHz) Low Latency Tri-Channel Memory
PSU: Corsair HX 1000W ATX Modular SLI Compliant Power Supply (CMPSU-1000HXUK)
Graphics: BFG GeForce GTX 295 1792MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express)
Sound Card: SupremeFX X-Fi (onboard)
Operating system: Vista 64 bit SP 1
Case: Antec 1200
CPU Cooler: Asus Triton
I was supposed to also get a pack of Arctic Silver Thermal Compound but this was not in the pack - but as it was £5 and the CPU cooler came with compound, I was not overly concerned.
I was a little worried when the corner of the GFX card box had clearly been hit and there was an indent. When I pulled the card out, the faceplate was bent back at the bottom by about 30 degrees....so I straightened it and hoped for the best.
I built the system and installed Vista without any problems. As of Saturday night Vista was up and running (and stable) but without any of the main drivers (i.e. GFX) installed.
Sunday morning I installed all the drivers and did a diagnostic in Vista which showed everything working ok and ranked all components of the machine at 5.9 in Vista scoring (highest possible).
The GFX card did make a strange high pitched sound whenever it was doing 3d (3d chess) which I found a little odd - but apparently that is normal - something to do with coil noise.
I was browsing the web when all of a sudden it cut out. It would not reboot, so I turned the plug off, pulled the cable out then replaced it. It then booted correctly and I thought nothing of it. Then it happened again, and again, and again.
Eventually it will not even boot into BIOS. The lights on the case would flicker and the fans seemed to be running at a slightly slower speed than they on Saturday (it looked like it is not getting the power it needs).
Sometimes it would not even do this - there will be a little flash of LEDs/fans about to start before powering off. I attached the LED poster thing that came with the motherboard - when you turn on the machine it said welcome but does not progress any further.
I removed the GFX card and the problem still persisted - so I did not think it had anything to do with it (even if it was a bit damaged in transit).
After reading several forums it seemed likely to be either the PSU or Motherboard which were faulty. I did all the standard troubleshooting methods (like removing RAM etc) and got the same problem. At this point I wrote an email to OC about returning the Mobo and/or PSU. I had pretty much given up hope!
I went out for a meal (finding it very hard to concentrate on anything but the PC!!) and when I came back I disconnected and reconnected every lead possible. I moved the power leads from the modular PSU into different sockets (still the black ones - but had only the Mobo and Fans connected to it - not optical drives etc). I then tried again with no gfx card and the LEDs and FANs came on properly.
I then added the GFX card but did not screw it in (did not know if this was pulling it out of alignment. Booted it up and made it into BIOS. Let it sit in BIOS for a while, checked all the temps which were low 30-40s (so I know it is not an overheating issue)...checked the votages - all normal.
I decided to risk all and plug the HD and Bluray player into the PSU and try again. The computer booted properly and straight into Vista. I then loaded Farcry 2 to test the GFX card and RAM etc. The game ran super smoothly at the highest resolution. Plugged headphones in and the sound was perfectly clear - no static etc. Computer remained stable for the remainder of the night.
This morning I booted the machine and it seems fine - but I am really nervous about touching any part of it!! - in particular screwing the GFX card onto the case fitting and putting the sides on.
Do you think this was just a simple case of a loose connection somewhere or do the symptoms suggest a dodgy motherboard? Surely if it can run Farcry 2 for a few hours no problem - then everything must be working ok? What else could have been wrong to cause such odd symptoms (i.e. powering the Mobo but not booting to bios). The Republic of Gamers light on the mobo was on even when the machine would not boot.
I really don't want to have the farce of sending things back (especially the motherboard as mounting the CPU cooler took me ages)! I just hope it boots when I get back in tonight.
Thoughts?
- Matt.
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