Asus A7N8X problem - need help

B

Big G

Guest
All,

My mate is the proud owner of a new Asus A7N8X deluxe, with which he had a Barton 2500+ and 512 Meg of PC2700 Twinmos Ram.

I've fitted PC bits for years, and come across plenty of problems, but nothing like this.

Basically, i fitted the motherboard to the case, fitted the CPU and heatsink and the memory. I like to run a basic PC to make sure it posts ok, so i fitted a spare GF2MX gfx card (all static precautions taken). It booted fine first time. I go into the bios on first boot, change the FSB to 166 MHz, "save settings and exit" then the PC just died on the spot. At first, i thought there was a problem with the settings, so i booted holding "del" - still nothing. Removed battery, erased CMOS settings, still nothing.

To be safe, i told my mate to get everything back to overclockers.co.uk asap. They tested it and said there was faulty RAM, but returned the wrong stuff to my mate. He returned the wrong stuff and he eventually got his A7N8X, barton and RAM that he sent back in the first instance.

Once again, I fitted the bits. Once again, absolutely nothing. The fans spin, the mobo light comes on, there are no beeps, no monitor signal, no loading but there are fans spinning.

To troubleshoot, i tried the following:

1) the Ram in my own PC, it works fine - my own ram in the A7N8X, no joy
2) three different graphics cards, all of which are known to work - still nothing
3) two different PSUs (rated at 350w each, once is AMD and Pentium4 ready) - nothing
4) mounted the motherboard out of the case incase there was a short - nothing
5) made sure all the available jumpers were set ok - they were
6) Tried an Athlon 1.4 GHz to be sure the barton isn't shot - still nothing

After all this, i still get no beeps, no voice saying "no cpu fitted", no booting - just absolutely nothing (althought some of the chipset is obviously warming up). Again, I run a stripped out system - just a mobo, CPU, mem, gfx card.

It looks like the mobo is definitely shot, so i tell my mate to get back to overclockers.co.uk. They say they have tested his kit and are adamant there is nothing wrong with it. They said that a 400w power supply is required for that motherboard, which i know is complete bs (particularly if it's running nothing but mem, cpu and gfx card - different if it was running 4 hd's, 9800 pro, 4 cd drives etc)

However, i've noticed there are posts on other forums with problems on the A7N8X regarding saving bios settings which corrupt the data in the bios, rendering the PC useless and unbootable. This ties in exactly with what happened the very first boot: i saved settings to the bios and the whole thing died.

Can anyone offer any ideas or suggestions, or anything i may have missed?

Gaz
 
K

kameleon

Guest
are you getting the agp warning light lighting up on the mobo?

Alo check that the jumpers are all at default. There is one on the asus for fsb settings .
 
B

Big G

Guest
Triple checked the FSB settings, and im aware of the AGP warning light which isn't lighting up - i've tried 3 different graphics cards, re-seating each one.

This mobo is supposed to be able to post to tell you the gfx card is missing though, I'm not getting as far as that. Additionally, i've tried an older PCI graphics card with no joy.

G
 
C

Chameleon

Guest
I've had similar problems before when I changed the default graphics type setting thingy to AGP in the bios. I usually end up putting in a cheapy pci graphics card and this enables me to get back into the bios and change the dodgy setting. Have you tried a pci gfx card?

/edit - oooops, that'll teach me to read posts properly :p
 
K

Krazeh

Guest
Sounds like the mobo is shagged, I know for a fact it'll run on a 300W psu cos that's what i'm using in my system atm.

If you're gettin absolutely nothing from the system apart from spinning fans and all the other components are working then it sounds like the motherboard has been fried. It seems unlikely that saving some changes to the cmos would've corrupted the bios to the stage that it doesn't boot, usually to do that u'd have to screw up flashing the bios.
 
B

Big G

Guest
I'm just totally baffled, tbh.

It's the fact that overclockers (who are patronising twats) say they have already tested the board and that it's fine. Having said that, i put my car into a garage which had a coolant leak. The garage said they pressure tested the cooling system and couldn't fault it. On driving my car off the forecourt, the coolant pissed out again. They were forced to eat their words and fix it properly.

The board is gonna have to go back by the looks of it, i've tried every combination and tried all the individual parts and the only bit that doesn't work is the motherboard.

Any more ideas, please post.

G
 
B

Big G

Guest
Try these links for problems similar to mine:

http://www.pclincs.co.uk/Forums/showthread/t-3130.html

http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/topic/9969/?o=20

I'm having the same problem with the A7N8X and Athlon XP 2500+ I recently purchased off of Newegg.com. I've tried everything I can think of, i've stripped it bare down to just cpu/mem/vid. I still get the same problem... green light on mobo, fans turn on, but vid doesn't kick on and no post, no beeps, no voice, absolutely nothing. I read that it could be a memory issue so I replaced the mem I had with a 512 stick of crucial pc2700, still the same problem. I don't have anyone else around that I can test it with and the only thing I can come to is that it's either the board or the cpu.
 
K

Krazeh

Guest
I really have no other idea, i'd send it back and insist on a replacement. Tis a great board when it works, I love mine.
 
A

Any

Guest
Ive just this very minute finnished building a PC for a friend with that board and a Barton 2500+ and it works fine.
Sorry, cant help with the problem. But maybe have a look at www.amdmb.com if you havent allready. They may have something.
 
B

Big G

Guest
Originally posted by kameleon
Have you tried a non barton cpu in it?

see:

6) Tried an Athlon 1.4 GHz to be sure the barton isn't shot - still nothing

G
 
J

jakswan

Guest
Just on the off chance you have tried setting cmos jumper to clear all settings?
 
B

Big G

Guest
holy jesus, jakswan?

Is that sas.jakswan that played quakeworld on wireplay many many, years ago and camped the red armour on DM6 ?!



And yes, tried clearing the cmos

G
 
S

SoWat

Guest
Clutching at straws, but it might be worth checking you're not grounding out the board.

I did this once when a mb support post didn't line up with a hole and was contacting some MB connections.
 
J

jakswan

Guest
Err camped the RA that doesn't sound like me, cough :)

Yeah its the one.
 
X

xane

Guest
I wouldn't be too harsh on the suggestion of low PSU wattage.

Some motherboards are sensitive to the +5V line on the CPU, this can often drop to as low as +4.7V on l300W PSUs and cause problems on the motherboard, I have experienced this myself on two motherboards, both Epox, using 300W PSU, when I changed to 400W the problem dissappeared.

The +5V is irrespective of the numbers of peripherals, I believe it is directly related to the CPU wattage, although I was still getting the problem using a flimsy little 850Mhz Duron.

Saying all that, the 350W PSU should at least be able to boot it up.

If the shop says use a 400W PSU, then go out and buy a cheapo one, then when it doesn't work you can tell them to stick it. TBH its always nice to have a spare PSU, especially seeing as I have a shelf full of the damn things that have all died on me.
 
B

Big G

Guest
Good point Xane, but i've tried my 350W Enermax, which i'm presuming is a solid enough PSU to run that mobo and cpu. My other mate has the Asus A7N8X and a 300W PSU, and it works fine.

Additionally, i've tried an Athlon 1.4 incase there was some CPU/PSU relationship between the Barton and the "bog standard" 350W in the case to do with voltage lines dropping.

Jak: ooo, I used to be in sas for a shortwhile; i was sas.gareth! Loved giving Shelob a run for his money on DM2. Old school eh ;)

G
 
B

Big G

Guest
Originally posted by SoWat
Clutching at straws, but it might be worth checking you're not grounding out the board.

I did this once when a mb support post didn't line up with a hole and was contacting some MB connections.

see:

4) mounted the motherboard out of the case incase there was a short - nothing

;)
 
X

xane

Guest
Originally posted by Big G
but i've tried my 350W Enermax,

Just to point out that _all_ my dead PSUs of late have been Enermax, three I think.
 
B

Big G

Guest
ahhh

My bad. :twak:

Still, I have tried three 350w PSUs with another mate's PC running the same mobo and a stack of devices on a 300w PSU.

It's worth checking out a 400w PSU now, though.
 
I

Insane

Guest
sod the testing, sounds like the bios has committed seppuku on you. (had an identical problem with a compaq system here @ work) it very seldomly happens but a board will "wipe" its bios entirely if theres a problem with it.. or a setting may corrupt it

package it up, contact the retailer you bought it from and get an RMA for it.. isnt anything much else you can do apart from replace the BIOS chip with a new one (which could possibly fry itself if theres a board problem)

might be worth plugging the CPU into another machine (unless you've tried that already and ignore it)

if overclockers isnt forthcoming with returns, id be tempted to drop hints about involving trading standards... they might perk up a bit then!
 

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