Shuttle SS51G XPC Mini PC... help please

Dru858

Junior Member
Apr 29, 2001
17
0
0
I put together a new computer based around the SS51G barebones, here's the parts:

P4 2.4B
256MB Crucial PC2700
Maxtor 6L020J1 20GB 7200RPM ATA133
Plextor PlexCombo 20/10/40-12A CD-RW/DVD-ROM
ATI Radeon 9700 Pro

Everything works fine except for when it's POSTing. It takes about 1min to detect IDE drives; it just sits there saying "Detecting IDE devices..." then after a minute they appear and on to the next screen. But then get this, the HDD LED stays on the whole time the power is on. I checked my jumpers and the hard drive is a master on it's own channel and the CD-RW/DVD is a master on it's own channel. I haven't had a chance to put the system through any stress tests or anything yet because I barely had time to install Windows and the drivers to make sure it worked last night. While it appears to work fine, the fact that it takes so long to POST and then the HDD LED staying on kinda bugs me. Of course my first thought is that the HDD LED cable was backwards but the front panel LED/switches are all on one little connector thing and I would think that it would be set up right because the switches and other LED work fine and, well, Shuttle must mass produce these little bastards so I wouldn't think they'd just mess up mine hehe.

Have any of you with a SS51G ran into this problem? If not, do you have any advice still? I'm going to go home afer work and take the drive cage out and recheck the jumpers against what it says on the actual drive label and not what the web site says because you never know... I've already tried ensuring the IDE cables were in there good, and they sure are, but I'll reconnect them again just to be sure. Oh yeah, I also flashed to the newest BIOS on their web site, too. That didn't solve the problem.
 

Workin'

Diamond Member
Jan 10, 2000
5,309
0
0
The rounded IDE cable that came with my SS51G was defective. It made all the IDE devices do really strange things. I replced that cable and everything works perfectly.

Try 1 IDE device at a time to narrow down what might be causing the problem.
 

Dru858

Junior Member
Apr 29, 2001
17
0
0
Well that sucks. Such a cute little cable... luckily I have a rounded cable left over somewhere else that I know for a fact works. I'll have to give that one a try. Thanks.
 

foofoo

Golden Member
Mar 5, 2001
1,344
0
0
my ss51g has been working flawlessly since i got it.
my hd is the wd120jb, but the suggestion about the cable makes sense. you might also turn off the ide chanels you arent using so it wont try to auto detect on boot up. usually that doesnt take a whole minute though.
good luck.
 

Dru858

Junior Member
Apr 29, 2001
17
0
0
It was the friggin cable. As I was taking out the special one that Shuttle included I noticed that by placing the cable in the clips (as the manual said to) it had smashed the living hell out of them and that probably causes some considerable crosstalk or external EMI to leak in. So I swapped it out (Ha! Swap out something in one of these cases? More like take the whole thing apart and start all over) with a rounded cable and viola it POSTs fine and everything's...fine! Thanks for the suggestion. You know I probably wouldn't have thought to check the cable until after I started breaking things out of frustration.

Now it's time to install some games and see what this lil' bastard can do!
 

Workin'

Diamond Member
Jan 10, 2000
5,309
0
0
Glad to hear it's working well for you now. I think the clips ruin the cable, like you said. I just used a regular flat cable to replace mine, it fit in there just fine - it doesn't block any air flow and it's practically invisible. I just ran it right along and underneath the primary IDE cable, it works like a charm.