having major issues with new PC - Any help appreciated

[nib95]

Basically, I bought and set up my new PC, all was fine and dandy for a while.
Till I noticed something perculiar, the Big Typhoon on my cpu (Opteron 170) (Mobo Asus A8N32-SLI) was very lopsided and actually wonky. It was angled to one side severely, and hadnt been like this before. At first i thought I just hadnt alligned the mounting screws properly, but that wasnt it.

CPU temps were around 42 degrees at idle as shown by the bios, I thought this was a little high for such a cooler. So stupidly I manually straightened the cooller out, perhaps using a bit too much force?

2 start-ups later. It wouldnt boot up, and came up with some sort of error message.

I believe it said -

FAT Kernel Go!

Or something like that. And it went to some set up page I think and gave me 5 options to boot up from CD or so and so.
So I just reset the computer and left it on the page it gets stuck on...

The motherboard logo page...

where it gives me these options.

Image

It literally stays on this page for a good 5 mins every time I start her up, but then does eventually re-boot. And load everything up as usual. Weirdly upon re-boot Windows kept finding new hardware it didnt before, and there's even one unknown device in my device manager I dont know what I need a driver for.

Everything runs a little sluggish now imo, but I cant be 100% sure.
CPU temp shows at around 47 degrees at idle now.

So anybody have any ideas as to whats the problem?

Have I killed my CPU, or damaged it?
Do I need to re-boot the system? As in clear everything and re-install?


I'm really lost guys, and any help would be really appreciated.

 

[nib95]

2 other things.

I installed a new HDD via a SATA cable, now it is recognising 2 master HDD's but mentions something about a RAID configuration even though I have disabled raid.
I just want a 2nd HDD to pop up in my computers for regular use, but for some reason the second hard drive hasnt.
Any ideas?


And lastly, just wanted to check this is the right order of prority for the BIOS start-up. (seems odd as i dont have a floppy drive).

Image

 

[nib95]

Bump?

 

[jpotter]

Hmmm- it sounds like you have quite a few concurrent issues going on here- I agree your idle temps seem awfully high for the cooler you have- have you tried removing the cooler entirely, cleaning off the thermal grease and re-installing it? That may help a bit with the temps. In terms of the HDD- in order for your comp to recognize the 2nd drive, you need to create a partition on it in Windows if you haven't already done it with software that came with your drive. To do this, simply go to Control Panel --> Admin Tools --> Computer Management, and then navigate to Disk Management which is under the "Storage" heading. You can then create partitions on the drive that isn't currently recognized in My Computer and after formatting, it should work fine.

In terms of the weird boot time issue, the only advice I can give is to try a clean install of Windows- if it doesn't go away, then it's probably some sort of hardware problem- to test your proc you could try Prime 95'ing it for a few hours to see if it gives errors. I think it may be a MB issue- perhaps when you "used too much force" you bent/warped the board a bit. These are just shots in the dark, but best of luck!

 

[nib95]

Originally posted by: jpotter
Hmmm- it sounds like you have quite a few concurrent issues going on here- I agree your idle temps seem awfully high for the cooler you have- have you tried removing the cooler entirely, cleaning off the thermal grease and re-installing it? That may help a bit with the temps. In terms of the HDD- in order for your comp to recognize the 2nd drive, you need to create a partition on it in Windows if you haven't already done it with software that came with your drive. To do this, simply go to Control Panel --> Admin Tools --> Computer Management, and then navigate to Disk Management which is under the "Storage" heading. You can then create partitions on the drive that isn't currently recognized in My Computer and after formatting, it should work fine.

In terms of the weird boot time issue, the only advice I can give is to try a clean install of Windows- if it doesn't go away, then it's probably some sort of hardware problem- to test your proc you could try Prime 95'ing it for a few hours to see if it gives errors. I think it may be a MB issue- perhaps when you "used too much force" you bent/warped the board a bit. These are just shots in the dark, but best of luck!

really good advice mate, appreciate it.

i think you may be right about it being a motherboard issue as I have had a similar boot up problem like this before, and indeed it was the motherboard.

I'll try all the things you mentioned, as well as the HDD thing.
Just running Prime95 now

 

[TheNewGuy8]

jpotter had some great advice - do what he says.

In addition - I would try resetting the CMOS battery. To do this you pop out the nickel-sized battery on the motherboard (usually there is some kind of easy release mechanism) and leave it out for a good 10 minutes or so. Also unplug the computer from the wall and turn off the switch on the power supply. Leave all that out for 10 minutes and then pop the battery back in and start 'er up. The mobo will give you a message saying "BIOS TIME/DATE WRONG" or something like that, it will say "PRESS F1 TO ENTER SETUP". Do so and you'll enter the bios where you can change the date and time back to normal.

Sometimes that can help any software problems. If that doesn't help it is probably a physical motherboard problem (maybe you knocked something loose when you moved the HS).

 

[ofiraltarasy]

unplug all USB devices and they try to boot up this happend to me before

 

[nib95]

Originally posted by: ofiraltarasy
unplug all USB devices and they try to boot up this happend to me before

Wow, this actually worked, just unplugged all USB devices and it booted up just fine.
But, everythings still a little slow and sluggish, and all temps are unusually high.

I'm going to return this mobo and get that DFI SLI-DR that i wanted originally.
I'm getting unusually high temps on my X1900 XTX too, may have to swap that aswell.

Not happy, may even go with a 7900 GTX, anyone know the release date?

 

[CraKaJaX]

Did you try what jpotter said? I would remove the HS all the way, clean off the thermal paste and then just put a drop of it on the processor. Then re-attach the HS and let the HS spread it itself. When I bought my XP-120 and switched HSF's, I put too much paste on the first time. I re-did it with a drop of paste on the processor and saw a 4-5 degree drop. Best of luck though

 

[nib95]

Just been on the phone to my mate, who's quite a techy and repairs PC's for a living.
He says that it's an issue he's seen numerous times on mobo's running with Dual Core processors.
Slow boot up time and cumbersome speed of running apps.

his recommendation was to update the bios which he thinks will solve the issue, only problem is, you need to save the file on a floppy disk, a floppy drive is something I dont have
Anyway to get around this?

 

[nib95]

Just an update, thank god it's not the CPU, because I've been running prime95 for over 2 hours now and not a single problem.
I'm so glad, because this is a Opteron 170 on the best stepping you can get, which they dont sell anymore.

I here the new ones dont OC half aswell.

 

[nib95]

Bump!

 

[ta8689]

Please tell me you didnt straighten the cooler with it still attached to the mobo. If you did=stupid, stupid, stupid!

 

[nib95]

Originally posted by: ta8689
Please tell me you didnt straighten the cooler with it still attached to the mobo. If you did=stupid, stupid, stupid!

I know I know I'm dumb as a door knob.

But I was at my Uni flat and didnt have a screw driver handy, nor did any of my flat mates!
I guess patience isnt a virtue I pocess

Any way, I'm returning the Mobo and buying a new Big Typhoon, god knows how it got wonky in the first place. But If I sent back a wonky CPU cooler, I doubt theyd believe it was a manufacturers fault, and I doubt Id even get a mobo replacement after that.

Anyway, in regards to a mobo decision.

What do you guys think.

Asus A8R32 Deluxe (RD580) £146.82

DFI lanparty UT SLI-DR £152.69

DFI Lanparty UT SLI-DR Xpert £111.57

 

[nib95]

Bump?