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Building PC, Problem from the start

Predator314

Junior Member
I'm trying to put together a nice media center PC. I have all the parts and can't get the thing to even POST. I get power and the fans come to life. LEDs work fine, but nothing on the screen, no beeps to identify the problem.

I tried taking everything out except for the RAM, and Video card and still get the same problem. Any ideas?

Only thing I can think of is the motherboard grounding out on the case or something like that. I'm going to try re-mounting the m'board in the case and see if that works.

Any other ideas?

*** Edit ****, also wanted to add that the DVD drives seem to be power up and doing their thing. Keyboard lights up temporarily when I turn the power supply on, but when I power up the PC, it doesn't do anything (no lights on the keyboard).
 
Try the mb, cpu, hsf, ram, and vid card on the bench when you take it out, don't try re-mounting it right away. Prove out the basic harware first.
 
I'll give that a try when I get home this evening. Since the LEDs are lighting up (Power Indicator, some lights on the M'board as well), can I assume it's not a problem with the motherboard? Also, would these light up if the m'board was grounding out on the case?
 
You can't assuming anything yet. I would check to make sure your power supply is putting out good voltage and if you have a spare, try it. Finally, make sure that you have all the case posts lined up with the motherboard holes. If you have one post that isn't in the right place, and is ground out something on your motherboard, it can give you similar symptoms.
 
Thanks for the tips guys. I'm going to try working on this in a few hours when I got home from work. I really hope it's a grounding issue. Last time I ran into this problem, it was a DOA cpu.
 
I tried just powering up with RAM, CPU, heatsink/fan, and video card and motherboard out of the case on the bench. Still the same results. I'm lost now.

I'm assuming something is DOA. I guess I possibly took RAM out of the picture by just trying with 1 DIMM and I tried each with no luck. So I guess it's down to motherbobard, cpu, or video card being bad. I don't have another video card I can try.

Anyone know how good newegg is as far as returns in this situation? I just don't know what to return.
 
Try to pull all of the ram out of the system and see if it starts beeping at you. If it does, then the motherboard is recognizing there is no ram, if not then the motherboard is obviously the problem. If you don't have a speaker on the motherboard, hook up the speaker from the case. If you don't have a speaker in the case, you can place another case next to your system and use the speaker in that case. Also, you can do the same thing with the video card. Finally, will all of the components installed, you should get a single beep during startup. If you are, then it is probably your video card. I'm sure you can find more information about PC speaker beeps and their troubleshooting usefulness on google.
 
Originally posted by: phios
Try to pull all of the ram out of the system and see if it starts beeping at you. If it does, then the motherboard is recognizing there is no ram, if not then the motherboard is obviously the problem. If you don't have a speaker on the motherboard, hook up the speaker from the case. If you don't have a speaker in the case, you can place another case next to your system and use the speaker in that case. Also, you can do the same thing with the video card. Finally, will all of the components installed, you should get a single beep during startup. If you are, then it is probably your video card. I'm sure you can find more information about PC speaker beeps and their troubleshooting usefulness on google.

Some good advice by phios ...

If the board starts beeping when you try to start it without ram, then you have signs of life in your board. What are the specs of your system? If we knew what parts are in your system, it would help a lot. I'd also double check that you have your p4 12 volt 4 line plugged into your motherboard. It would give you the symptoms you've stated.

Let us know what's in your system.
 
Specs:

ASUS P5LD2 Deluxe Motherboard (LGA 775)
Intel Pentium D 930 Presler 800 Mhz FSB Processor
OCZ Gold Series RAM (2 Gig - 1gb x 2)
PNY Geforce 7600GT 256 MB Video Card
Lian Li PC-7B Plus case
Aspire ATX 520W power supply
 
I'd also double check that you have your p4 12 volt 4 line plugged into your motherboard. It would give you the symptoms you've stated.


OMG, I feel like such an idiot. I haven't plugged this in. If that's the root of the whole problem, I'm going to kick myself in the nuts. These bad boys are new since the last PC I built. Next time I'll RTFM.

I gotta wait another 9 hours before I can try it, so please disregard this post for the time being. Oh and thanks for the help again folks. Don't laugh too hard at me.
 
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