Need help with a new system build

[DamG]

I'm trying to build a new system containing these:

Epox 8kta+ Motherboard
Athlon 750 Processor
Crucial 256MB PC133 RAM
Generic Case w/ 250W Power Supply
Radeon LE Video Card
IBM Hard Drive
Generic Floppy
Misc. other peripherals.

My problem is I'm having an incredibly hard time just getting this thing to boot to a floppy. First, I had everything installed, and (using a Windows 98 boot floppy) I tried to boot to DOS. It would hang about halfway through the process, and just sit there. I tried removing the hard drive and replacing the AGP card with a PCI one, and I can occasionally boot to a DOS prompt, but if I try running something like Partition Magic, it either freezes up again, or it starts scrolling all sorts of stuff on the screen (the only thing I can remotely read is something about a GPF). I thought it might be the RAM, so I swapped that out, but no solution. I tried a 300W power supply (that I know works well in my main system), but no dice either. I've tried a new floppy drive, new cables, and just about everything I can think of. The processor and MB were pulled from other systems, so I know they work (at least they did). Core temperature stays around 38 to 40 degrees C, so I don't think it's overheating or anything. I took everything back apart (including the processor/heat sink), rebuilt it, and it still doesn't work. Does anyone have any suggestions on what else I can try? My only thinking now is maybe something went haywire with the MB, and it needs to be replaced.

Any comments appreciated. Thanks.

 

[Shack70]

Look into that power supply...It may be a little small.

See how it does minus the Misc. other peripherals

 

[Souka]

Sounds like a MB issue.

You might want to go into the BIOS and try setting it to "setup defaults" or something similar. This mode chooses the most "stable" settings for your MB. If that still doesn't work, you may just have a bad MB.

My $.02

 

[DamG]

Thanks for the responses. Right now, I only have the PCI video card and floppy drive attached. I loaded just the fail-safe defaults in the BIOS (but re-enabled the floppy drive, which the defaults disable). Still doesn't work. I finally found my Windows XP bootable CD, so I removed the floppy (in case that was causing problems) and tried to run setup. It freezes during this as well. So it's got to be either the MB, CPU, or Power Supply. The power supply is the only thing I never tested before, but I tried a working one in there as well, and that didn't seem to solve anything. The CPU was working fine in another PC, as was the motherboard (but in a different PC). I don't know if the combination of the two just isn't working, or if something happened to one of the two. I would think if the CPU was busted, it would be giving me a lot more problems than just freezing here and there (if I stay in the BIOS settings, it keeps working even after a couple of hours). So it looks like it has to be motherboard related. I'm guessing the only way to really test it would be to either invest in some tools, or take it to a shop (and it would probably be cheaper to buy a whole new MB). I'll probably just go buy another one, and see what I come up with, unless anyone else comes up with something. Thanks for your help everyone.

 

[garebo]

I'm a novice compared to most but I have built a few systems and fixed lots of problems.
I have a question. Since you people have covered so many different possibilities, why hasn't someone mentioned the bios?
If you checked all the stuff you should do first and you know the cables, cpu, ram and powersupply are good then yes, it looks like the problems probably in the motherboard somewhere. You have nowhere left to look, right?
What about the battery, is it right up to par?

 

[DamG]

I think the battery is OK. It's keeping the time OK without power, but I'm not sure how else to test something like that. I've tried playing with the BIOS settings to get stuff working, but even backing down to the most base level isn't even working. It almost seems like the IDE ports are bad or something. Maybe there's a broken pin or something in there, since it seems to work fine until it needs to use the IDE or floppy ports. I've got to get this built this week, so I'll probably just buy a new one, and keep playing with this one (the company it was purchased from is now out of business, so if it's busted, it's gone). Thanks for all the help.