Pretend Contest! Who can tell me my compatibility problem!

[Druzal]

I purchased two sets of parts off of New Egg to build myself and a coworker a new computer. I built one up and the system would not post (no beeps nor monitor action) but power, fans, and motherboard led light seemed to tell me I did at least remember to plug the thing in.

I then tried swapping the video card with the identical part I got for the duplicate system. No dice. So I built the second system minus the drives just to see if I could get the thing to do anything different. Again I lacked dice.

I figured after enjoying this website for years that the forums here might be able to help me out. I'm really not sure it's a compatibility error either. Could easily be an installer error. But I think I've eliminated any broken parts considering I can't get either to work. Oh and given how much these have set me back, this pretend contest only has my thanks as reward. Sorry :frown:.


Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 Conroe 2.13GHz LGA 775 Processor Model BX80557E6400 - Retail

ASUS P5B Deluxe/WiFi-AP LGA 775 Intel P965 Express ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail

EVGA 640-P2-N821-AR GeForce 8800GTS 640MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP Video Card - Retail

OCZ S.O.E 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 667 (PC2 5400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model OCZ2SOE6672GK - Retail

FSP Group (Fortron Source) AX450-PN, 12cm FAN, version 2.2, 2 SATA, PCI Express, 450W Power Supply - Retail

COOLER MASTER Centurion 534 RC-534-KKN2-GP Black Aluminum & Mesh bezel / SECC Chassis ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Retail

Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3320620AS (Perpendicular Recording Technology) 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM

LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner with 12X DVD-RAM write and LightScribe Technology Black E-IDE/ATAPI Model LH-20A1H-185 - OEM

Oh and two silly RAM question. It's been awhile since I put one together and the Asus manual is unclear:

1) Will the motherboard boot without RAM?
2) Given Slots A1 (yellow) A1 (Black) and B1 (Yellow) and B2 (Black), where should I put my two sticks of RAM =D?
I tried pretty much every permutation so I don't think this is my problem but it would be nice to confirm.

Anyway thanks in advance anyone!

 

[Bob Anderson]

question 1: No. You will hear a series of beeps if you try to boot without RAM.

2) both modules go with the same color slots.

-Bob

 

[shadowofthesun]

Your PSU may not be enough to support the 8800 GTS- make sure you have sufficient volts on your 12 Amp rail. Also, if you are running RAM in dual channel, make sure they are matched, although I doubt this would cause the issues you aare having.

What I do when I encounter a similar problem is build the system without the case and just go over each component individually- I once spent an hour troubleshooting a build before I realized the RAM was caught on the clip and wasn't in the proper slot. Sometimes the simplest things cause issues- these things happen.

 

[Druzal]

Thanks for your replies. At the very least it was inspiration to to look at all the connections a tenth or so time and I noticed that there was a four pin power conneciton up top. Now the manual didn't say to connect it but I thought, what the heck I like smoked motherboards. And of course it worked.

Thanks again!

 

[RebateMonger]

You don't get very far without connecting that 4-pin 12Volt ATX connector....

 

[Captante]

(1) Its also possible that your RAM isn't receiving enough power to be properly recognized... you may need to snag a cheap 512mb dimm of value RAM that will post at 1.8v VDIMM so you can get into the BIOS & raise the voltage to 2.1v or more. I've had it happen to me a couple of times & now I keep a dimm of Kingston DDR2-533 in my tool kit specifically for this purpose.

(2) Btw the FSP 450 watt PSU might turn out to be a problem in 3D mode, but there should be enough power to initialize it... you could try sticking in an old PCI video card & see if it helps but I doubt it will.

(3) Asus motherboards are usually coded with channel 0 being white dimm slots & channel 1 as blue, so for dual-channel use one color or the other ... I've had slightly better luck sticking with the white ones.

 

[Fraggable]

If I were you I'd return the PSUs while you're still in the return period and get something with a little more juice. 450W is cutting it close with that CPU and GPU.