This is a long one but iv'e just bought a new rig which is going to be for my brother once its finished but im having severe issues 
and i cant see the cause so i need some help from the ocuk collective brain, i dont consider myself a PC noob but i cant figure this one out at the moment. I'll be as precise as possible with what iv'e done so far.
the rig consists of the following:
opteron 144
freezer 64 H/S
DFI RDX200
1gig g.skill 4400
radeon x1900 xt
maxtor dmax10 320gig hdd
tagan 580 watt mod. sli
LG dvd-rw
antec lanboy case
the psu, hdd, opteron, memory, dvd-rw, are all second hand parts out of one of my old systems, and are tested working before i put them in this system. the H/S, graphics card and case are all brand new from overclockers as iv'e never had a problem with anything iv'e bought before.
Yesterday before i started opening boxes, i wiped the hdd in a different machine. Then i put it all together in the new case, which went without any hitches (although the length of the x1900 meant it was a tight squeeze in the case as its relatively small but it wasnt my choice) and booted straight into the BIOS no problems, i set my memory to tighter timings and adjusted the BIOS boot order to 1) CD 2) hdd, i also adjusted the temp ranges for the cpu fan so that it shuts down at 65degrees, and the fan so that it comes on full (100%) at 35 degrees, (so between 25degrees and 35 degrees it is only on about 50%).
I left it in BIOS health for a while to monitor the temps, they barely touched above 30degrees for the CPU so i was happy with that. I then selected to leave BIOS, save changes and reboot.
This is where i hit the first problem, it left BIOS, the screen went blank and then nothing. The antec case doesnt have a reset switch annoyingly so i opened the case and used the reset switch built into the DFI board itself. The board rebooted fine and then went into the windows CD and started the windows loading process. After copying the files, it allowed me to select a drive to install to, as the drive is partioned into 2, one 35gigs (which i intend for windows and 275gigs for everything else) and the second, i selected to install windows to the 35gig partition, and it starts for about a second then imediately blue screens saying IRQL_LESS_THAN_EQUAL. I know the signs so i got the feeling this install wasnt going to be straight forward anymore.
I went back into BIOS, set all the settings to default, then changed the ONLY the BIOS boot order back to 1) CD 2) HDD.
I tried to exit and reboot and it refused to reboot again without me hitting the reset switch on the mobo. Once i did that it went back into the windows install and tried to resume it but it blue screened again straight away with a different error this time, i think it was a SPOOL error but i may be wrong.
At this time i removed it all from the case in case it was shorting or something else, and reseated everything. Out of the case i tried again but it blue screened again whilst trying to do the windows install. So i started trying to eliminate parts.
I started with the memory as it was easiest, which worked fine and sat happily passing memtest86 at 310mhz, i knew that was fine anyway to be honest but best to check.
I then put the dvd drive and hdd in a different machine and selected a new windows install, it ran all the way through fine and windows booted straight away so i wiped the hdd again and eliminated those parts.
I then put in an xp4000+ to check the opteron wasnt messed up as i didnt really want to put the opteron into another computer if i could help it, now with the xp4000+ in it, the mobo refused to boot at all, according to the BIOS diagnosis LEDS it stuck on system startup. I put the xp4000+ back into its own system and it booted up fine again so this confused me even more.
Thats as far as i got last night, the graphics card is yet to be tested but i dont think it is that anyway, i will put the opteron in a diff system tonight to check that, apart from that though the only item left is the motherboard.
So my question is what am i missing? am i dealing with some sort of imcompatability issues or is it possible the brand new mobo is dead?
and i cant see the cause so i need some help from the ocuk collective brain, i dont consider myself a PC noob but i cant figure this one out at the moment. I'll be as precise as possible with what iv'e done so far.the rig consists of the following:
opteron 144
freezer 64 H/S
DFI RDX200
1gig g.skill 4400
radeon x1900 xt
maxtor dmax10 320gig hdd
tagan 580 watt mod. sli
LG dvd-rw
antec lanboy case
the psu, hdd, opteron, memory, dvd-rw, are all second hand parts out of one of my old systems, and are tested working before i put them in this system. the H/S, graphics card and case are all brand new from overclockers as iv'e never had a problem with anything iv'e bought before.
Yesterday before i started opening boxes, i wiped the hdd in a different machine. Then i put it all together in the new case, which went without any hitches (although the length of the x1900 meant it was a tight squeeze in the case as its relatively small but it wasnt my choice) and booted straight into the BIOS no problems, i set my memory to tighter timings and adjusted the BIOS boot order to 1) CD 2) hdd, i also adjusted the temp ranges for the cpu fan so that it shuts down at 65degrees, and the fan so that it comes on full (100%) at 35 degrees, (so between 25degrees and 35 degrees it is only on about 50%).
I left it in BIOS health for a while to monitor the temps, they barely touched above 30degrees for the CPU so i was happy with that. I then selected to leave BIOS, save changes and reboot.
This is where i hit the first problem, it left BIOS, the screen went blank and then nothing. The antec case doesnt have a reset switch annoyingly so i opened the case and used the reset switch built into the DFI board itself. The board rebooted fine and then went into the windows CD and started the windows loading process. After copying the files, it allowed me to select a drive to install to, as the drive is partioned into 2, one 35gigs (which i intend for windows and 275gigs for everything else) and the second, i selected to install windows to the 35gig partition, and it starts for about a second then imediately blue screens saying IRQL_LESS_THAN_EQUAL. I know the signs so i got the feeling this install wasnt going to be straight forward anymore.
I went back into BIOS, set all the settings to default, then changed the ONLY the BIOS boot order back to 1) CD 2) HDD.
I tried to exit and reboot and it refused to reboot again without me hitting the reset switch on the mobo. Once i did that it went back into the windows install and tried to resume it but it blue screened again straight away with a different error this time, i think it was a SPOOL error but i may be wrong.
At this time i removed it all from the case in case it was shorting or something else, and reseated everything. Out of the case i tried again but it blue screened again whilst trying to do the windows install. So i started trying to eliminate parts.
I started with the memory as it was easiest, which worked fine and sat happily passing memtest86 at 310mhz, i knew that was fine anyway to be honest but best to check.
I then put the dvd drive and hdd in a different machine and selected a new windows install, it ran all the way through fine and windows booted straight away so i wiped the hdd again and eliminated those parts.
I then put in an xp4000+ to check the opteron wasnt messed up as i didnt really want to put the opteron into another computer if i could help it, now with the xp4000+ in it, the mobo refused to boot at all, according to the BIOS diagnosis LEDS it stuck on system startup. I put the xp4000+ back into its own system and it booted up fine again so this confused me even more.
Thats as far as i got last night, the graphics card is yet to be tested but i dont think it is that anyway, i will put the opteron in a diff system tonight to check that, apart from that though the only item left is the motherboard.
So my question is what am i missing? am i dealing with some sort of imcompatability issues or is it possible the brand new mobo is dead?
