Totally weird problems - help!!

mjow · 7 Jun 2006 at 11:34

Hi

My system: AMD 64 3200+, MSI K8N Neo 2 Plat mobo, 2 Gigs dual Crucial RAM, Sparkle Geforce 6600GT 128mb video, Enermax 485 watt PSU, Audigy 2ZS sound, 19" Iiyama LCD monitor, Netgear DG834GT router.

Last night while running as normal the monitor image just went blank. At first I figured it was a monitor problem so I set it up on my old AMD 2400 system that the wife uses and the monitor worked fine. So then I figured it was the graphics card. Took it out and put in an old Geforce Ti 4200, that worked fine and so did all the other hardware, put the 6600 GT back in and the system failed to boot properly. AHA! failed graphics card I thought. As the Ti 4200 won't run any games/sims I play I decided to get a new graphics card (a 6800 GS AGP). When it arrived I slotted it in fired up the PC and everything booted up OK the first time but after a short while the monitor went blank again :mad:

I tested the new card in my other machine and it worked fine.
When I turn the power on all the fans seem to be working OK on the PSU, mobo, case and video card, but the system fails to boot up fully or else boots up and then the monitor goes blank.

Now I am not sure what is causing the monitor to go blank and the failure to boot up properly. I suspect the PSU, but don't really want to keep throwing money at replacing individual components when I am not sure what is causing the underlying problem.

Anyone got any idea what is wrong and how I should progress ?

Thanks

mjow · 7 Jun 2006 at 12:34

Temp has always been within acceptable ranges during hot weather last year. The case has two case fans and the Enermax PSU has two fans also with one presumably drawing heat off the CPU and case in general. Cannot check the temps in the BIOS at the moment as the PC is in pieces.

mjow · 7 Jun 2006 at 14:40

Thanks for the input. I don't have a PCI express slot on the board just an AGP 8X slot. I have ruled out the AGP slot not working by trying an old Ti 4200 graphics card in it which was fine. The latter does not require a molex power connection though unlike my original 6600GT.

mjow · 8 Jun 2006 at 17:14

Hi Guys

Thanks for the continued suggestions. I still have problems. To answer your questions: Yes I did have the 6600GT connected to a molex with the Enermax PSU. It was on its own connector as the other molex cable connected the optical drives and floppy.

Since your last replies though I have bought a new power supply. A 600w FSP. Having connected all this up and making sure that the new 6800GS has its own molex I started up and still have the same problem ie. the boot sequence gets as far as the windows XP logo then at the point where it would normally take you to your desktop and load up the icons the monitor screen goes blank and displays the message "No Signal". Also I notice that during bootup the splash screen and windows logo screen graphics are corrupted before the monitor goes blank.

I have run out of ideas now (and spare cash). I can get into Windows via Safe mode and browse and copy files to DVD so I know there is nothing wrong with the hard drive and the optical drives. Also the monitor works on my older 2GHz machine as does the new 6800 GS card.

In the BIOS system temps and voltages are as follows:

System temp - averages 27C/80F to 30C/86F
CPU temp - 39C/102F to 41C/105F
CPU Fan RPM - 3245
NB Fan RPM - 5037-5113
Vcore 1.34v to 1.36v
+3.3v - 3.23
+12v - 11.97 to 11.91
+5v - 4.86v
Battery - 3.19v
+5 USB - 5.02v

System and CPU temp look normal to me for idle in this heat so the CPU seems to be functioning OK.

Have tried re-seating the RAM and changing round the slots that the paired RAM sits in and there is no change to the problem.

I don't get any error beep codes when the sytem starts up just the normal POST beep.

Any more advice or should I just give up and take it to my nearest PC repair bloke in town (not that I want to trust my machine to the satanic deeds of the local repair man ! )

Thanks mbv

mjow · 8 Jun 2006 at 22:48

Bump - any more ideas out there?

mjow · 9 Jun 2006 at 11:22

Yup tried memtest and that came out OK after an overnight run. All components seated properly.

Only thing in terms of drivers that I had installed was the latest nvidia graphics drivers, but they were stable for at least a week before the problem occured so it is not as though they caused an instant conflict.

That corrupt BIOS logo issue sounds as though it could be on the right track. I will do a Google search on the mobo and see what comes up.

After that its a windows re-install I guess.

Thanks for all the advice - very helpful people on here

mjow · 9 Jun 2006 at 16:59

Couldn't find anything quite like the problem on Google so in desperation I took the PC to the local repair guy in town. The result five hours later is that I am £39 worse off and they could not fix the problem, which kind of confirms my less than trusting attitute to our glorious local PC repair guys.

They confirmed my problem with the boot, tried a few earlier drivers which made no difference. Curiously they did stick an ATI card in the slot and that worked fine. So they handed me my PC back and pronounced that it was the brand new graphics card and I should send it back. They seemed to forget that the problem began with my 6600GT, not the new 6800GS.

I did actually manage to get the 6800GS fully through the boot and to the point where the desktop and icons loaded last night. It was OK for 2 mins then the monitor blanked out again. I am still not wholly convinced the new graphics card is at fault here.

I have an old nvidia 5700 Ultra that still works. I think I will try that in the slot next while reverting to the 77.77 drivers which always worked fine for me.

Wish me luck

mjow · 10 Jun 2006 at 08:52

Well, I stuck an old 5700 ultra in and it WORKS :eek:

Whole system boots up fine and all systems are Go.

So it turns out my original graphics 6600GT card was a dud as suspected, no idea why it suddenly failed though. My new 6800GS must also be a complete dud, either dead on arrival, or died as soon as I put it in the machine. Guess I was just unlucky to lose two graphics cards in one week. I will RMA them back and try the new ones when they arrive.

EDIT - A note about the tech repair guys in town - they managed to leave a mess of beta and non beta graphics drivers on my machine that they were testing my dud 6800GS with and also tried ATI drivers (with an ATI card)without fully cleaning the system of nvidia drivers first. The result was that when I tried to put some new nvidia drivers on my machine for the 5700 ultra the setup constantly claimed it could not find existing drivers and the driver install would fail. I had to do a system restore to get the system back to a state where it would accept new nvidia drivers.

Also they disabled my sound card in the device manager and left it that way!

Now for me this wasn't much of a problem as I knew how to fix the mess they had left me with. But you imagine your average punter with little or no troubleshooting knowledge getting their machine back, finding they have no sound and the graphics are stuck on 800x600 resolution. Naturally they will call the repair centre again and the guys will say they will take a look - a nice easy extra £39 for cleaning up their own mess :mad:

Thanks to all who tried to help in this thread