ASUS A7N8X Deluxe Problems

[JonElfson]

I just bought a ASUS A7N8X Deluxe mobo for my present Also I got a new burner and floppy.

So the plan was I move my stuff in my old comp into a new case and mobo.

Well I put it all together and it doesn't boot at all, it doesn't even show BIOS, it's like the monitor is on and the computer is off but it's on. It makes no beeps or anything but the little Green LED comes on by the PCI slots.

Here is what I moved:
Althon XP 2100+
Generic 256MB PC2100 DDR RAM
MSI GeForce3 Ti200
WD 40GB HD
Liteon 52x24x52 Burner (New)
Floppy Drive (New)

I know all this stuff works because I had a nice stable system on my MSI K7T266 Pro2 mobo.

Any suggestions? Maybe a bad mobo? I don't know... I checked all the connections, maybe a hidden jumper?

Can anyone help me?

 

[JonElfson]

Oh I also got a Lian-Li PC-65 and a Enermax 430W PS :Q

 

[mechBgon]

Generic RAM could be the culprit. First step I'd try is taking the motherboard out of the case and operating it with nothing but the CPU, heatsink/fan unit, one stick of RAM in the solo slot, video card and keyboard. No drives.

It could also be that you have the thermal overload protection kicking in. The likely cause is a heatsink that's not making good contact with the core or has an impediment to the thermal transfer (plastic slip still on the thermal patch, for instance, or a heatsink that's been installed 180° backwards so its step is opposite the solid part of the CPU socket).

 

[BraveSirRobbin]

Since I see you are on-line now I'll give it a shot.

I would try removing as much as you can from the system, just to see if the bios comes up. (Basically leave in just the HS/Fan, memory, & video card and unplug everything else from the motherboard and power supply). Hopefully the motherboard bios screen will show.

Then plug in the hard disk and so on to see what is causing the problem.

EDIT: Sorry, mechbgon replied while I was typing this message!

 

[mechBgon]

Great minds think alike!

 

[JonElfson]

Nope

Still nothing at all

 

[mechBgon]

Got any pals with some Crucial PC2100 or PC2700, or Kingston or Corsair?

 

[JonElfson]

No, I got another stick of that generic crap

But even with nothing but the mobo connected wouldn't it atleast beep at you?

It does nothing, it has the 1 LED Light by the PCI slots to say the Standby Power... the stuff runs like the HD, Burner, Floppy, the lights go but nothing happens.

 

[JonElfson]

Even with the RAM out it doesn't do anything...

and I know the CPU and Video Card work, I've reinstalled the CPU a number of times, it looks fine.

 

[mechBgon]

I had a brand-new board where the contacts in the AGP slot were really stiff. There are two layers of contacts in there... could the card only be halfway in? If you can see the gold contacts at the edge of the card, it's probably not all the way down. *crosses fingers*

 

[JonElfson]

Nope, reinstalled the Video Card 3 times and removed it and trying to boot.

Still nothing, you would hope it would at least beep, eh?

 

[JonElfson]

So more then likely a bad mobo?

 

[mechBgon]

Got any other semi-compatible systems you can use to cross-check the PSU, the video card, the RAM and the CPU?

 

[JonElfson]

As I said before I had the CPU, RAM, and Video Card in my other computer and it all worked perfectly. I don't think it's the PSU because if it didn't work there would be no lights at all.

I even trying disconnecting EVERYTHING except the ATX Power Cable, the LEDs and the case speaker so I could hear it beep but still nothing at all.

I even tried another video card... nothing... no POST... no beeps... no nothing.

 

[mechBgon]

Hmm, plug some headphones or speakers into the audio-out jack at the rear panel and see if the POST Reporter has anything to say.

 

[JonElfson]

The case speaker was plugged in and that's what does the POST beeps, anyways I had my speaker hooked up to it too. Nothing.

I think it's a fried mobo, you?

 

[mechBgon]

So you had your speaker plugged into the stereo jack at the rear panel, and nothing comes out? The POST Reporter sometimes says informative-yet-unwelcome stuff like "System CPU fail! System CPU fail!" (been there, done that!)

And yeah, it sounds like time to call it in, unless by chance the generic RAM is giving it indigestion. Only one way to be sure, and that's to go buy some name-brand stuff such as Corsair, Kingston or Crucial, maybe some genuine Samsung. Avoid OCZ/GEiL like the plague, it's giving some people problems that are clearly being caused by the RAM.

 

[JonElfson]

Well the RAM worked before, I'm returning the mobo for another A7N8X tomorrow... I was thinking of getting new RAM anyways the Corsair CMX512-3500C2PT kinda caught my eye at newegg.com. I was wondering about the DualDDR or whatever on the nForce2 Boards... does that mean if I get 2 sticks of RAM I'll have 1024 MB of RAM plus the nForce2 thing or is it just a faster 512 MB? I only got $400 CAN left

 

[mechBgon]

You do end up with double the quantity of available RAM if you go with two matching sticks, yeah, plus they work in 128-bit mode and double your available memory bandwidth. Under some circumstances, the DualDDR thing can be a significant boost, but in most "normal" use like first-person shooters, office work, etc, it apparently is only a small gain: look at this chart Reason being, the CPU itself doesn't need the extra bandwidth. But the DASP may be able to successfully guess what the CPU will ask for next, and use the extra bandwidth to have it ready and waiting, resulting in the blue numbers in that chart where the big gains appear.

If you had the variant of nForce2 where it had the on-board video core, and you were actually using it, then the dual-DDR setup will tromp on the single-DDR in 3D games and apps, due to the extra memory bandwidth, but still it's nowhere close to a semi-decent add-in AGP card, so why bother. At this point, you're 95%-99% of the way to dual-DDR's performance with just one stick, for the majority of things. If you do the professional OpenGL stuff then maybe the second stick will work its magic, and even if it doesn't, the doubled amount of RAM would probably come in useful at times.

What I'm wondering is whether your generic RAM, although it works in the other board, is not getting along with the A7N8X-Deluxe. Even some of Corsair's PC3200C2 had a problem, which was fixed with the v1.1 module revisions (according to Corsair). Then again, the lack of any beeps or feedback from the board, even with no RAM at all... hmmm. I suppose after you take everything off, you could try powering up the board with no ANYTHING installed, no CPU, no video, no RAM, no drives. Nothing to lose, right?

BTW, do you get charged major taxes by buying from Newegg? I spotted a CA online retailer that Yield is getting an EPoX board from: http://www.vibecomputers.com/

 

[JonElfson]

Yeah, I already posted that I did it without anything in it at least hopeing for one little beep, but I got nothing

The stores in a driveable area are Canada Computers and KCP but the memory they sell is Generic or that OBZ or whatever stuff

But that Corsair RAM will be around for a while right? Because in a year or so I wanna get another stick of the same RAM for of course more MB and that DualDDR thing too since I might as well anyways.

This is mainly a gaming system, I need good RAM ( will have soon ), a nice 333 MHz Chip for the nForce2, and a GeForceFX. A lean mean UT2K3 machine.

 

[mechBgon]

Yeah, I feel good about Corsair. They did a surprising thing for the buyers of their PC3500 modules... they'd sold them with a guarantee that they'd hit a certain set of timings... and then they retroactively guaranteed that the sticks would hit even tighter timings, even to the people who'd already bought the sticks with the less-stringent guarantee. I have one A7N8X-Deluxe on order for a computer build at work, and decided on the Corsair PC3200C2 256Mb modules for it. Kingston also got a consideration for their PC3200 but it was rated CL2.5. If Crucial made PC3200 I'd consider them too, but they don't, and I wanted PC3200 so I'd be ready for an upgrade to a 400MHz-based CPU in a year or two.

 

[JonElfson]

Will the nForce2s be able to support the 400 MHz Bartons? Probably not, eh?

But of course 2 Sticks of Corsair for future motherboards can't hurt none the less

Sync is the best performance wise, right? I don't know, I haven't even seen the BIOS yet

 

[mechBgon]

There are people opining in both directions about the 400MHz Bartons. I'm thinking optomistically and expecting that they'll work in nF2 boards with a BIOS update. Time will tell... the 400MHz Barton isn't an officially-confirmed product, even, so maybe they'll skip from Barton 333 to Hammer.

 

[JonElfson]

Well thanks for the help, I hope you have better luck with your mobo then I did

I'll bring it back to the store tomorrow and see what happens, I'll be sure to update you

I'll be ordering that RAM soon... MMM... real RAM

 

[JonElfson]

Also about the Audio on the board. Does the Deluxe have SoundStorm? Because if it does I don't see any labels or anything anywhere

What's this one the NVIDIA site though...

For the nForce2 Drivers one of the notes is...
- Audio drivers will not install on the following nForce2 products: ASUS A7N8X and Chaintech 7NJS. Please use the drivers that come with these products to enable audio functionality.

What's different about the ASUS A7N8X? Does this go for the Deluxe model too? I thought ASUS used the default nForce2 Audio stuff...