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The "Not Quite Amiga but still computer related category" => Alternative Operating Systems => Topic started by: Cyberus on November 06, 2006, 07:34:50 PM
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My mate got a load of components and I helped him put them together. I've never built a PC before, but felt sufficiently technically minded to assist....
So anyway I've installed the mobo, the CPU (with heatsink), the ram, connected some fans and tried powering on.
The fans spin. But that's it.
So I borrowed an old PCI gfx card and put that in a slot, and connected a monitor, and also plugged in a mouse and a USB k'board I had lying around. But still, all I get is a power light on the mobo.
So questions are:
I assume an SLI mobo will get as far as the bios without an SLI gfx card?
And will it do so without any drives attached?
Anyone got any pointers, I feel like a bit of a newbie when it comes to tinkering with PCs, I've only ever tinkered with cars and Amigas lol!
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make sure you have the pwr swtch and reset swtch leads connected to the mobo in the correct orintation
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Cyberus wrote:
My mate got a load of components and I helped him put them together. I've never built a PC before, but felt sufficiently technically minded to assist....
So anyway I've installed the mobo, the CPU (with heatsink), the ram, connected some fans and tried powering on.
The fans spin. But that's it.
So I borrowed an old PCI gfx card and put that in a slot, and connected a monitor, and also plugged in a mouse and a USB k'board I had lying around. But still, all I get is a power light on the mobo.
So questions are:
I assume an SLI mobo will get as far as the bios without an SLI gfx card?
And will it do so without any drives attached?
Anyone got any pointers, I feel like a bit of a newbie when it comes to tinkering with PCs, I've only ever tinkered with cars and Amigas lol!
Did you install a floppy drive? A reversed cable - or one on PATA devices for that matter - can cause the symptoms you're describing.
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What type of Components are you using ?
- Mobo
- CPU
- Ram
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Hey Duesi,
Long time no see!
I plugged in some headphones and got "CPU not installed properly" so I've just had the heatsink and fan off and repositioned the CPU, no bent pins, and a nice layer of thermal compound.
Why these heatsinks are such a {bleep} to get on off I don't know!
mobo: Asus A8N-SLI deluxe
cpu, some AMD 64 3700 , I forget which
RAM: Crucial 1GB DDR pc3200
Just gonna put it all back together and try again
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Could be as simple as a jumper for FSB speeds being in the wrong position. If there is one, try the alternate position. Take a good look through the manual and ensure all jumpers are in the right place while you are at it. Oh, and have a :pint:
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@ Cyberus
Are all the components new, straight out the box?
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@x-ray
yeah
just trying to get the retention clip on the heatsink to actually, well, err clip, at the moment!!!
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Ja, that is the worst part: getting the heatsink on. In the end I had to get two flat screwdrivers and hook them into the retention brackets and then force them down. You must be of sound mind and steady hand if you try that though, cos if you slip it might be crying time.
Don't forget to plug the fan in, and check that the SLI bridge is secure before switching on. They tend to come loose in transit and then you get a no-boot. And take care which way you have the bridge oriented. If you have one SLI card, you can opt to use slot one or two, depending on how you orientate the bridge. I had to do this when I changed the heatsink on my northbridge and it interfered with my SLI card. I moved slots, and changed the bridge around and now I am running a single SLI card from slot 2.
In the default as-new configuration, you should try slot 1 first.
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Now I'm starting to wonder if I've got the heatsink on the right way round...I just cannot get the retention clip to 'clip'. All I have is a mobo manual with a very dark picture that shows nothing.
The CPU manual isn't here. And I'm worried that I'll trash the CPU if I'm not careful :-(
P.S. I assume an SLI PC will boot without an SLI gfx card?
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The heatsink will have an off-centred area of thermal paste on it, and when you go to clip it on, you will know if you have it the wrong way around.
Heatsink: yes, I almost gave up myself. It is without doubt the worst thing I have ever had to install on a PC. Took me more than half an hour to get it right, because I was being careful.
SLI: can't remember if mine booted without the card or not. Surely you can put a floppy in the drive and see if it gets accessed? If so, wait for disk activity to finish, eject that disk and put another one in and press any key. If it accesses that disk also then you have your answer: the PC will boot without the SLI card.
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@ Cyberus
Stop a bit mate, I have images that may help...
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Okay, this is the mobo you are working on, right?
(http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g154/Odd_Job/ASUS20A8N-SLI20Deluxe20big.jpg)
Here is my mobo, a different one, but also SLI and socket 939:
(http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g154/Odd_Job/gigabyte_ga_k8n_pro_sli_u.jpg)
As you can see, our mobos have the CPUs in the same orientation, so you can attach that heatsink the same as mine.
How is mine attached? Well the locking lever on the heatsink faces the SLI slots. IIRC I clipped the other side in first, then clipped the side with the lever.
That should help you now old bean.
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Stop a bit mate, I have images that may help...
That sounds dubious :inquisitive:
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@ Odin
hehe
The man is battling to get it on and I am just pointing out all his slot options ;-)
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Touché :lol:.
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@ Homer ASUS Mainboards are Jumperfree since a long time.
@ Cyberus I got it possibly
for Athlon64 3700+ you need at least BIOS Version 1015.005
so take an older CPU first and Update the BIOS.
That may work.
and yes a SLI Motherboard Boots with any Type of GFX-Card
except AGP ofcourse :-)
I'm kind of ASUS expert.
I built hundreds of PC's with that Brand of Mobo's
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@ Cyberus
Did you win or not?
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You should see a grove in most cases on one side of the bottom part of the heatsink. This should go towards the white edge sticking up a bit on the cpu socket the edge where the socket name/model is probably written.
Here is a example pic where the grove is at the bottom part of the underside: (http://www.mikhailtech.com/pictures/taisolcgk742092/taisol-006-01.jpg)
Also remember that the fan must be connected to the right power output, as most mobos are as default set to not turn on if it detects no cpu fan.
good luck.
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How many Post beeps did you get ?
No beeps usually is pretty serious.
ie: fuxx0red cpu
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Sometimes if someone has set the timing to agressively in the BIOS it does that too.
Try removing the battery and crossing the jumpers to set the bios back to default.
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No beeps usually is pretty serious.
It should beep even without a cpu.
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YES it should.
Thats the point. If it doesn't when the cpu is in place...
Guess what !!
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Cripes don't talk to me about memory settings combined with Asus motherboards ! When I built this beasty with an XP3000 AMD chip and 1Gb RAM, I was tempted to play with the BIOS after I had it working nicely, and found: Memory settings - Normal or Aggressive. Well, you have to try aggressive yes ? While I watched, it booted and the HDD light came on and that was all. No problem I thought, reboot. I have 2 large PATA HD with two partitions on each. English WinXP on the primary partition of the first, and Korean XP on the primary partition of the second. The installations of XP were backed up {"Ghosted"} onto the other drives secondary partition. Practically perfect yes ? No. The motherboard destroyed both hard drives as it crashed. No rebooting from either drive. I downloaded the manufacturers "Drive Fitness Tools" (DFT) and found that both drives were beyond repair. Not bad for a couple of 1 month old drives ! Well, what can you do (other than send both drives back on warranty) ? I sent an email to Asus and told them what had happened, and asked them to rename the BIOS setting of "Aggressive" to "Self Destruct" ! Surprisingly they answered and said that "they would look into the issue" :lol:
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check the CPU power lead is connected... i think all A64 mobos have a seperate 4 wire lead connected to the CPU power... without this i think you just get spinning fans....
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Then it either works or mobo is dead? ;)
I would think that it would in most situations beep "no cpu" if a dead cpu is mounted in the socket.
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Homer wrote:
...asked them to rename the BIOS setting of "Aggressive" to "Self Destruct"...
Hehe! :lol:
But people being people would still probably try it out, just for the hell of it!
It's a bit like having a web site with a "Do not press this" button on it - almost guaranteed to get people clicking it!
- Ali
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Ehh I hope I'm wrong here but...
on the newer AMD chips, you don't "push down" like you did with the old socket A stuff, you "apply pressure by unscrewing" - not gonna take photos, but basically you screw at the top of one retainer and it goes down; fit the heatsink on top of the cpu; unscrew which steadily applies pressure. Its set so that, when you can't unscrew any more, the right amount of force is applied between the heatsink and IHS (integrated heatsink - melded to the cpu).
Edit - I should say, the locking mech depends entirely on the heatsink, but even so the two screwdrivers story is scary - care to phost (eek that came out of nowhere, post photos...phostos?)
As to what the actual problem is, do the following:
take out everything except the cpu, one stick of ram, and a pci graphics card. I have no idea about SLI boards, but of course do as required to turn off/disable the PCI-E SLI stuff that it says in the manual.
See if it will POST with cpu, one stick of ram, the fans, and thats all attached.
As mentioned make sure you have attached a 20-pin ATX connector and the newer-but-not-that-new 4 pin extra header; if your PSU doesn't have one you can either get an ATX to ATX+4pin splitter, or to be honest if its high powered stuff, you'd be better off getting a new and decent psu.
Again just checking, but a "nice" layer of thermal interface material (TIM) is very very thin...unless you're using a lump pad thing.
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Thats a very good point Linchpin. I forgot about the extra power rail needed for CPU.
My Msi SLi (http://www.nenevalleyvideos.co.uk/TheSkip/Pc2.jpg) or rather .. the wifes.
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Tut tut... good job someone around here know's what he is doing ...
:lol:
Only joking... by the way..
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Hum,
do not underestimate the speed boost when adding extra processors...
Read more (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6128066.stm)
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Hum, does you bios support your CPU revision and speed ?
If not, he won't boot... and if the cooling wasn't lock in the right way, your CPU maybe dead like mine athlon 1400 (the cooling was on the CPU with thermal paste but it was not enought) !
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Thanks for everyone's replies.
I have been really short of time recently, so I have only recently had the chance to have another go. Everything appears to be working well now, despite the fact that the heatsink doesn't seem to clip how I thought it was meant to, i.e. securely
Plugging some headphones in revealed that its says something like 'VGA error' which I took as a good sign (there is no gfx card installed, so I guess it passed all other tests up to this point).
The guy is meant to be ordering a gfc card when he gets paid tomorrow. Anyone got any recommendations?
P.S. Now I want to build myself a PC, now I've seen how relatively easy it is...if only I had the money :-(
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If he's looking for something middle of the road that will play most of the nice games, this 7600 256MB GT (http://www.buyxg.com/store/item.asp?key=vc-154-101) would probably work nicely for him.
Dammy