PC troubleshooting!

acidrain

acidrain

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Hi guys,

I've got a serious issue with my gaming gaming. When i power the machine on, the monitor doesnt detect anything from the gfx card ( ie boot screen doesnt show ), so i fiddled around, pulling things out to try eliminate the issue even used the onboard graphics and still nothing.

Now since I couldn't see anything i tried to navigate by listening to the beeps, first beep was the boot process, second beep was a detection of an error on my one hdd after which pressing F1 should resume the boot process ( the hdd with the error is not my boot disk ). This didn't work.

Played around inside again swapping things around and now when i boot, i get the initial beep and then 3 short beeps.

Any ideas? I'm thinking the mobo is fried as when i power off the machine fans still spin and the power light on the chassis is still on :/

Thanks
 
Confirm that you removed that graphics card and plugged in the monitor into the onboard? If you did, then it might be the motherboard.

Also try re-seating the RAM and unplug and plug everything in the box. Finally, remove the CMOS battery, move the CMOS jumper to RESET and then back to normal. Then put back the CMOS battery and restart the machine.
 
Hi acidrain:

  1. First please could you specify your mother make and model
  2. now get your motherboard manual out and page through to the POST error codes / beeps section
  3. Determine what the beep code you are hearing refers to in the manual
  4. Follow the corrective / diagnostic advice from the manual, if this fails, see link below to help you out further

Here is a link to help you out further without me having to type it all out:

http://tips4pc.com/articles/computer troubleshooting/computer_has_a_black_screen_and.htm
 
CriticalConsumer said:
Hi acidrain:

  1. First please could you specify your mother make and model
  2. now get your motherboard manual out and page through to the POST error codes / beeps section
  3. Determine what the beep code you are hearing refers to in the manual
  4. Follow the corrective / diagnostic advice from the manual, if this fails, see link below to help you out further

Here is a link to help you out further without me having to type it all out:

http://tips4pc.com/articles/computer troubleshooting/computer_has_a_black_screen_and.htm
Click to expand...

1. Mobo is Asus M4A785D-M Pro
2. Checked the manual, nothing about beeps

Have left one ram stick in, took out gpu and still the same beep error when using onboard. Tried everything under the sun right now, really think the mobo is bust now.

I think my bios is AWARD and googling says 1beep followed by 3 beeps shows no video card or bad video ram. Changing to onboard does the same but not sure if my onboard is enabled or not.
 
acidrain said:
I think my bios is AWARD and googling says 1beep followed by 3 beeps shows no video card or bad video ram. Changing to onboard does the same but not sure if my onboard is enabled or not.
Click to expand...

Reseting the bios will set onboard vga enabled as per default configuration. it also uses your RAM so try testing with another DIMM, otherwise your mobo is fried.
 
Ye its all good, just gonna send the pc back. My seller ( PostmanPot ) who imo goes out he's way and beyond has once again been happy to return the parts for testing. True customer relations!
 
acidrain said:
Ye its all good, just gonna send the pc back. My seller ( PostmanPot ) who imo goes out he's way and beyond has once again been happy to return the parts for testing. True customer relations!
Click to expand...

Thanks for the good word, acid. A breath of fresh air in light of the other thread.

As per our discussion earlier, please do contact me later today to arrange drop off of your PC, or perhaps just the mobo as she seems to be the culprit. The mobo/your PC will be returned on Monday for RMA.
 
Maybe take the board out and bread board test it.

If it displays, it could be a grounding issue inside the case.
 
Ok so a quick update:

Sent the board in for testing along with the cpu ( only cos i had no holder to put it in ) and both came back with no issues.

So now I put everything back in, turn on the pc and now it doesn't even post, no beeps nothing.

Now im leaning to ghost involvement im that confused :confused:

Any other ideas?

As a summary this is what I have done.
Pre sending in for testing:
1. Took out gfx card and used onboard, got the same 3 beep warning
2. Disconnected all hdd's except my boot drive, same result
3. Removed all ram chips and reseated one in, same result
4. Removed CMOS battery, waited, reseated and turned on, same result.

Post Supplier Testing:
1. No post at all, everything is running though
2. Put in a new psu 350W with only 1 stick ram, 1 hdd and the mobo... pc refuses to even turn on
 
Last edited:
Beginning to think it's your PSU. Eish, if the spare one I dropped off earlier doesn't work (it's new :o) then I'll drop another one off this evening which I know for sure works.
 
Kuga said:
Maybe take the board out and bread board test it.

If it displays, it could be a grounding issue inside the case.
Click to expand...

Ill try this and let you know

Update: Everything out the case... turned on but pc won't post
 
Last edited:
OK so pc is working once again by some miracle. Can't point the blame except to a bios that crashed as thats the only difference with the machine now.

Also i assumed it didn't post as i didn't hear THE beep, but with the new bios it doesn't beep.

Thanks PostmanPot for all the help, your psu will be available anytime
 
acidrain said:
OK so pc is working once again by some miracle. Can't point the blame except to a bios that crashed as thats the only difference with the machine now.

Also i assumed it didn't post as i didn't hear THE beep, but with the new bios it doesn't beep.

Thanks PostmanPot for all the help, your psu will be available anytime
Click to expand...

Pleasure. Just keep me posted (multiple pun :D), as often intermittent problems are a sign of parts slowly pegging...

Perhaps you can enable the beep in the BIOS?

Will arrange collection of PSU soon, thanks.
 
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