PC Freezes - Thinking Motherboard issue?

[Gorrillasnot]

I built a PC for my newphew some time ago and recently it has started freezing up during POST.
Sometimes it will let me enter the BIOS but then will immediately freeze up. Most of the times it freezes at or before the asus splash screen.
Also a couple times it showed a old school looking ami bios screen instead of the normal uefi.

I've tried unhooking everything besides 1 stick of ram and the cpu using the onboard video but still it would freeze.
I've tried each of the 2 sticks of ram individually in each ram slot..still no luck.

I don't have a spare PSU to try, but I'm thinking its likely the motherboard that has went bad.

Last summer there was a lightning strike that took out the onboard NIC. He installed a PCI NIC and all was well, but I'm thinking the lightning strike weakened the board.

What do you guys think?

Specs: 2600k (not OCd) w/ stock cooler, Asus P8Z68-V LE, G.Skill DDR3 1600 2x8GB, WD Black 500GB, HIS 6870, Cooler Master silent pro 700w, Asus DVDRW, Windows 7 Ultimate x64.

 

[denis280]

Last summer there was a lightning strike that took out the onboard NIC

Probably. but you could open CMD and do a chkdsk to see if the disk is fine.

 

[Gorrillasnot]

Probably. but you could open CMD and do a chkdsk to see if the disk is fine.

Can't run chkdsk..it wont make it past the post screen.

 

[Gorrillasnot]

bump

 

[denis280]

Hard to say.the motherboard or hdd. it's like flipping a coin.

 

[Steltek]

Ordinarily I'd start troubleshooting this type issue with the power supply, then go to memory followed by motherboard. However, because the motherboard was previously damaged, in this instance I'd move it to the beginning of the line and start there by doing an RMA on the board if it is still in warranty. I suspect, though, as it was subject to an electrical surge you may also end up having to RMA memory and/or the power supply as well in the long run to get a totally stable system.

One thing you really need to question is why the motherboard got damaged in the first place. Have you determined how a lightning strike managed to damage the NIC? The surge had to come through something hooked to that NIC port, and that probably shouldn't have happened. Were it my system, I'd be looking at the building wiring to make sure it is up to snuff and also that the building is properly electrically grounded (I can't tell you the number of houses I've seen that don't have ground wires run to outlets, that have the wrong size i.e. too small ground rods, or don't even have ground rods at all, etc).

 

[Gorrillasnot]

Hard to say.the motherboard or hdd. it's like flipping a coin.

It's not the hdd. I have it and the DvD burner unplugged and I removed the graphics card to eliminate those variables.

Ordinarily I'd start troubleshooting this type issue with the power supply, then go to memory followed by motherboard. However, because the motherboard was previously damaged, in this instance I'd move it to the beginning of the line and start there by doing an RMA on the board if it is still in warranty. I suspect, though, as it was subject to an electrical surge you may also end up having to RMA memory and/or the power supply as well in the long run to get a totally stable system.

One thing you really need to question is why the motherboard got damaged in the first place. Have you determined how a lightning strike managed to damage the NIC? The surge had to come through something hooked to that NIC port, and that probably shouldn't have happened. Were it my system, I'd be looking at the building wiring to make sure it is up to snuff and also that the building is properly electrically grounded (I can't tell you the number of houses I've seen that don't have ground wires run to outlets, that have the wrong size i.e. too small ground rods, or don't even have ground rods at all, etc).

The house he was living in had old school 2 slot outlets with no ground. The lightning strike took out the power brick to the router he was using and killed the onboard NIC on his and a roommates motherboard.
Another roomate was using a decent surge suppressor and his PC received no damage.

I think at this point without having a spare PSU or ram to test with I will rma the motherboard. at the very least it will fix the broken onboard NIC.

thanks