Mouse, Monitor and Keyboard won't turn on

[rakuhntur]

Hi friends,

I need some help.

Recently bought and built a new PC. Here's the specs:

Windows Ultimate x64
E8500
Asus P5Q Pro
Corsair DDR2-800 4GB (2x2GB)
Earthwatts 500W
Palit HD 4850

I've had it a week and it's been working just fine really. I tried changing some settings in BIOS (the multiplier was stuck at 6 instead of 9.5), etc. and I've run many Prime95 tests and it's going well. Even played some Warhammer Online and it's great! However...

I did the start > shut down last night in Windows and then this morning tried to turn it on and the only thing that happens is that the fans and lights all kick on inside the PC but nothing else - no monitor, no mouse, no keyboard. I'm new to building PCs and I'm not hearing any "beep" to indicate passing the POST. I tried restarting, unplugging power, etc. and still nothing. I then tried to clear the RTC RAM on the board and removed the battery and alas, no luck.

I don't even know where to begin. I only have one monitor so I can't see if anything is actually happening in the background. Any help/advice you can give me I would greatly appreciate it.

 

[Big Lar]

Try it with 1 stick of ram in the slot closest to the cpu, if no go, try the other stick in the same slot. To me it sounds like either a ram issue or a PSU issue.

Larry

ps. Wouldn't hurt to reseat the video card as well.

 

[Denithor]

Did you hook up a speaker to the pin jumpers on the motherboard? If not, you're simply not going to hear any beep codes it sends out.

Do you have access to a different video card to test out?

When you "removed the battery" did you have the system unplugged? If not, try that again -- if it's plugged in the battery is irrelevant as the board gets power from the wall even when not running.

 

[rakuhntur]

Thanks for the replies. I'm gonna try to swap the memory sticks/test one single stick. Question though.... how do I reset the graphics card?

And yes, I removed the battery with the power off and unplugged from the wall. Lastly, I guess I haven't plugged in a speaker to the jumper on the board. I've just read that people can hear a beep for POST and assumed that I should too...hah!

I'll go try the memory tonight and post tomorrow on the results. Any other ideas are appreciated.

 

[Big Lar]

Originally posted by: rakuhntur
Thanks for the replies. I'm gonna try to swap the memory sticks/test one single stick. Question though.... how do I reset the graphics card?

And yes, I removed the battery with the power off and unplugged from the wall. Lastly, I guess I haven't plugged in a speaker to the jumper on the board. I've just read that people can hear a beep for POST and assumed that I should too...hah!

I'll go try the memory tonight and post tomorrow on the results. Any other ideas are appreciated.

"Reseat" the vid card, not "Reset" Just pop it out and of course put it back in.

Larry

 

[rakuhntur]

OK, so I just tried the memory swap. First time I just took out the second stick that was furthest from the CPU. Nothing happened. Then, I swapped the sticks and tried booting up with just the single stick and TADA! IT WORKED!

So now what?? Does that mean the other stick is bad? Or should I put it in the other slot and see what happens?

If it's bad, I guess I just need to send this back to Newegg but I should send them both back correct? I've read that memory is best in same pairs...

 

[Denithor]

Try just switching the positions of the sticks. I've seen cases where that worked fine. Also, download memtest86, burn it to cd and run overnight. If it's clear you're good to go. If it finds errors you're sending both sticks back to newegg (they won't take back just one if you bought them as a kit together).

 

[sunnn]

try putting the bad stick back, or put in different slot. sometimes it just need reseating, as pointed out. saves you the hassle if it still works.

 

[rakuhntur]

I've tried swapping the sticks and booting off of one or two, etc. and anytime I put in the bad stick it just makes the computer hang up. I think I've found the problem! I'm gonna send both sticks to Newegg (I bought as a kit) and get some new memory. Thanks for your help guys I'm glad it's just the memory and not a MB or PSU issue.

 

[Big Lar]

Great! Yup bad memory can do all kinds of odd things.

Larry

 

[rakuhntur]

Ok so get this... so I found out that it was one of the sticks of memory that was hanging up my system. I put the good stick on both slots and booted up from both positions no problem.

So today, being impatient like I am, I went to Frys and bought the exacty same Corsair Kit of Memory. Come home and pop in both sticks and no luck. Dern! Eventually it turns out that one of the sticks works and the other does not. WTF!? It's just like the "old" pair.

So I don't know what is going on... Is this normal to have faulty memory like this? I'm 2 for 2 on this and it sucks. I'm beginning to wonder if it's just my MB. So I was curious, I took the "good" sticks from both the "old" and "new" pair and tada! I now have 4GB of memory and the system boots just fine.... so maybe it's not a MB issue? Just super bad luck on memory?

What do you guys think because I'm lost now. I'm going to have to return both pairs to Newegg and Frys and start over again I guess unless you guys think it's something else that's messing up.

Again, thank you for your help!

 

[Denithor]

If they're the exact same kits...just put the two bad sticks in the package & return to whoever has the most tolerant policy (ie if Fry's doesn't charge a recharging fee take the pack back there and just let the newegg RMA expire).

But I would definitely run memtest86 at least overnight to make sure the "good" sticks really are.

 

[rakuhntur]

OK so I'm running a Memtest86+ right now on the two "good" sticks from the two separate pairs. So far so good. If this goes through the day w/o any problems I guess I should return the bad sticks even though they are from different pairs? My gut instinct says "if it aint broke then don't fix it" so if these two good sticks work then I'd like to keep them.

Is there anything wrong with this approach? Because these sticks are from different pairings, will this have any negative impact on my machine for some odd reason? There are the EXACT same types of memory but just from different pairs.

And lastly, is this a common thing for one memory module to be good and the other go bad? I'm worried that it may be something else that is causing this.... or perhaps it really is just a crazy coincidence. What ya think?

Thanks again!

 

[Big Lar]

Originally posted by: rakuhntur
OK so I'm running a Memtest86+ right now on the two "good" sticks from the two separate pairs. So far so good. If this goes through the day w/o any problems I guess I should return the bad sticks even though they are from different pairs? My gut instinct says "if it aint broke then don't fix it" so if these two good sticks work then I'd like to keep them.

Is there anything wrong with this approach? Because these sticks are from different pairings, will this have any negative impact on my machine for some odd reason? There are the EXACT same types of memory but just from different pairs.

And lastly, is this a common thing for one memory module to be good and the other go bad? I'm worried that it may be something else that is causing this.... or perhaps it really is just a crazy coincidence. What ya think?

Thanks again!

Like Denithor said, just keep the 2 good sticks and return the bad 1's to wherever. Odd to get 2 sets with 1 bad in each, but if it passes memtest than I would say thats what happened.

Larry