Athlon 64 failure?

[spwango]

Hey all,

I have an MSI K8T Neo mobo and an athlon 64 3000+. I built the machine severals weeks ago, and it has been running rock solid without issues. I swapped a monitor this morning (with the power off) and tried to reboot, and the mobo won't post. I'm getting the four red LED code which is "processor damaged or not inserted properly". The system had been idling before I powered down to swap the monitor. It was under load during the day without any issues. Any ideas as to what could be going on here?

 

[Dman877]

Is the new monitor tested to work ok? If its a cheap monitor it could have slipped through QA with a grounding problem or a short somewhere. Other then that I have no idea. If you plug the old monitor in does it still fail to boot?

 

[Swanny]

As Dman877 said, try it with the old monitor hooked up, or with no monitor hooked up.

 

[spwango]

It's dead for both monitors. The "other" monitor is a 17" I use for lan parties. It's been around for a good deal of time and never caused a problem.

 

[InlineFive]

Complete system specifications?

 

[Duvie]

Were you doing any ocing of the cpu???

 

[spwango]

Antec Truepower 380W PSU (been using for two years or so)
512 MB Samsung CAS2 PC2700
512 MB Corsair CAS2 PC2700
Radeon 9800 NP
WD 80GB JB drive
56K Modem
The proc was retail, but I used artic silver, as I messed up the thermal pad.
Case is an Aspire XDreamer II

Think that covers the important parts....

 

[spwango]

NO Ocing or goofiness either. This was a retail proc, and with my PC2700, I was just leaving it at stock. Does this sound like a proc? I would think that AMD would have to take this back if it is a proc failure.

 

[mechBgon]

Just a couple other suggestions: firmly re-seat the video card in the AGP slot, clear the CMOS and try just one memory module at a time. Also try a different surge supressor... I had one causing some wierd problems at work last week, never would've guessed it was anything but a HDD failure

 

[wetcat007]

There shouldn't be any need to turn it off when u switch monitors but if it's a retail CPU u have a 1 year warrenty on it.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

I personally feel most board diagnostic messages mean precisely dick after having had enough of them be wrong or simply useless on many different boards. Consequently I would ignore them and do a methodical troubleshoot. It's possible that while plugging the monitor cable in that you unseated the vid card, or caused something to make contact shorting the board. I'd start by reseating the vid card and power connectors, if more troubleshooting is required I'd move to clearing the CMOS, No luck? use a screwdriver to short the power on pins to eliminate a faulty power switch, then try yanking each stick of memory 1 at a time, no dice? try reseating the CPU, still no go? Pull the board and try booting barebones out of the case, if that doesn't work at least you already have it ready to box if it needs to be RMA'd The PSU could have died since it's been in service a couple years so if you can try a known good unit that would be great. The chances that the CPU failed are slim but anythings possible, however being an A64 that's the hardest thing to test by using another since not many people have one, so that's the last thing I'd try replacing/RMAing.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Originally posted by: wetcat007
There shouldn't be any need to turn it off when u switch monitors but if it's a retail CPU u have a 1 year warrenty on it.

3yr warranty on AMD retail processors and he may have voided it by using the AS. However, he can call and explain the situation and most likely get an RMA anyways if it comes to that, but as I stated, I'd eliminate everything else before looking to the CPU as the problem.

 

[spwango]

I would have glady used their recommend greases (and they are both low quality goop) had they been available anywhere. I haven't even found them online. I've started yanking crap, and no luck yet :/

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Originally posted by: spwango
I would have glady used their recommend greases (and they are both low quality goop) had they been available anywhere. I haven't even found them online. I've started yanking crap, and no luck yet :/

Keep at it, tenacity is the only defense against hardware Gremlins. BTW, you said you messed up the pad, how? I used mine twice and there's still enough left for a third go. I also can assure you it's not low quality, it's Shin Etsu G751 which is one of the best thermal compounds available.

 

[wakedog102]

I have the same mobo/processor. I was screwing around with my RAM settings and pushed them to 2:2:2:5 and the same thing happened. I had to power down, and switch the CMOS jumper to reset, wait for about 10 secs. WITHOUT powering back on, then switch the jumper back to regular. I got full POST then. Give that a shot.

 

[spwango]

So, I haven't cleared CMOS before, and the directions are less than clear in the manual. Do I change the position of the jumper, then power it on, or do I just change it, leave the power off for ten minutes, and turn it back on? thanks.

As an update to what I've tried. I've yanked everything but the videoboard and ram at the moment. Tried a new PSU too.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

unplug the power cord from the PC, set the jumper to the clear position, wait 20-30secs to be certain, then replace the jumper to default position, plug it back in and try booting. Do not power on with the jumper in clear position.

 

[spwango]

OK. done. No effect. I also loosened each motherboard screw and retightened them. Only thing left to try is to remount the CPU, and I don't have anymore thermal compound--This is not good. I don't know what has died, but I hope it's only one component. What are the odds I nuked mobo-video board- and cpu?

Oh yeah, you asked about the pad, too...when I was taking the plastic cover off of it, it was taped on one side and I put a pretty thick scratch in the pad. In hindsight, I wouldn't have removed it and applied artic silver--I forget about the new heat spreaders, a little bit of monkeying, and the pad would be fine. I was refering to the two thermal pastes AMD has out on their website as supported, not the included pad.

thanks all for the help

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Having had MSI boards die on me like flys, That's my prime suspect.

*Happy MSI users, dont bother with a testimonial, I don't care and I've sworn off MSI for life So save the future carpal tunnel responding *

 

[spwango]

Gah. I'm screwed on the proc warranty too...can't find the serial number. One fricken time in my life I buy retail, it dies, and I can't find the serial number...that's about right. I'm really doubtfull it's the CPU...I agree--unless it was a static discharge caused by plugging the monitor in, it just doesn't add up.

 

[Adul]

i would suspect the motherboard.

 

[RussianSensation]

Why dont you unplug the chip from the motherboard and plug it back in? Dont worry you can reuse the old thermal paste. I've done it thousands of times, it might degrade your performance but it still works. Also I wouldnt jump to conclusions about your processor just yet, I've never had problems with cpu chips and I had Asus, and MSI boards give me trouble. The only problem is that it's going to be very difficult for you to check since you don't have another motherboard to test with this cpu.....or vice versa.

 

[MAME]

I have never ever heard of a computer being messed up from a monitor change ESPECIALLY when it was off at the time...are you sure you didn't move something around by accident?

Anyway, I really doubnt it's the CPU

 

[mechBgon]

Originally posted by: spwango
Gah. I'm screwed on the proc warranty too...can't find the serial number. One fricken time in my life I buy retail, it dies, and I can't find the serial number...that's about right. I'm really doubtfull it's the CPU...I agree--unless it was a static discharge caused by plugging the monitor in, it just doesn't add up.

My guess is for a mobo failure too, but for the record, I think (educated guess) you'll find your CPU's serial number on the retail heatsink/fan unit.

 

[WebDude]

This may be a long shot, but try it with just one RAM module, then the other. I have a K8T Neo FIS2R with an Athlon64 3000+, and I've had incredible problems with the RAM and getting the RAM timings right. It seems that most people have to really relax the RAM timings from the SPD defaults to get their boards to run with consistent stability. There's a lot of info on the MSI user forums about RAM settings for this board.