Reboot/reset - never boots OS

[flares]

AsRock 775 Dual-VSTA + E6400 Constantly Reboots/resets - never boots OS

I recently did a cheap upgrade to Core 2 Duo (6400) using the AsRock 775 DUAL-VSTA. Everything worked sweet as a nut with absolutely no problems until a few days ago. In the middle of the night while I was asleep the machine (which is left on), just started restarting, and never stopped.

It gets past the memory test, and has located all the drives etc. when it flicks to start booting the OS, it just resets. I can clearly hear the little click noise from the board, the same noise that occurs when I hit the reset button.

I have removed, swapped, and tried less of the memory modules, and it makes no difference whatsoever.

I have swapped out various Hard drives with different OS's, and it makes no difference. It will not boot from a windows CD, or indeed a boot floppy.

I can get into the Bios as normal, but I don't get the menu choice to boot into safe mode.

I have tried cleaning and reseating all components, and tried it without all components it doesnt need. No good.

The case is very cool as is the CPU temp, plus I underclocked the CPU just in case, so its not that.

I can only deduce it must be something wrong with the Motherboard. The fact that it just happened so suddenly makes me wonder if it has failed in some way.

If anyone has any ideas, I would really appreciate them.

thank you

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Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 (allendale)
ASROCK 775DUAL-VSTA
1GB RAM
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro
Windows XP Pro SP2

 

[GWillow]

I would guess that the motherboard is faulty. I would personally send it back and get a replacement.

I was thinking of getting this m/b but this might make be consider a rethink.

 

[flares]

Okay I RMA'd the mortheboard, and received my replacement yesterday. I installed it last night and guess what........

It didn't work! The PC still reboots itself immediately after the memory and drive check. While my motherboard was back with the retailer, I reinstalled my old motherboard and CPU, and everything worked perfectly, albeit slower with the old CPU.

Is it possible it could be the new CORE 2 DUO (E6400) CPU. The BIOS still reports that it is running nice and cool. Would it even get to the BIOS if the CPU was faulty?

Would really appreciate some advice

thanks

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