Extremely stuck and confused. Could use help.

J

jubei

Limp Gawd
Joined
Aug 4, 2004
Messages
466
Ok, I just got an Antec case with a 350w psu, a chaintec vnf3-250, and an amd 3200+ socket 754. I salvaged an old (had a p4, so not too old) hp machine for the HD, CD RW, DVD Rom, and floppy drive. I've hooked everything up correctly and when I power it on, only the fans run. The only light that comes on is the HD decetion light which stays on instead of showing the action of the HD. The monitor isn't recognizing that it's hooked up to anything and goes to sleep. I've hooked up the case fan to every power connector and it fires up every time, so I'm at a loss as to what's going on.

Any help would be extremely appreciated. Thanks in advance guys.
 
Make sure there isn't a false grounding between your mobo and case. check to see if the screws go over the spacers and actually touch the motherboard material.
 
Yup, everything is fine in the department. This is just bizzar. I thought maybe the mobo was bad, but it's the peripherals not functioning (unless the cpu isn't either). Then I thought it may be the psu since it may only be putting enough juice out to fire up the fans. Any other ideas?
 
What kind of RAM are you using? More than 1 stick? Take one out and try it with just one stick.
 
Would that really matter? Nothing but the fans are getting power, but I'll try it anyway :) Both the sticks work (with the other mobo anyway) If anything I can put my spare corsair in and see if it works. Thanks for the advice.
 
are there any beeps when you turn it on? if not then it is psu, processor, or mobo related. Check the capacitors on your mobo for swelling and/or leaking.

bad memory will give off an annoying beeping noise.
 
Nope, it didn't do anything :( I just looked closely around the dimm slots and there seems to be a little scratch (more of a scuff) on one of the chips on the mobo. Could that be the problem? I wouldn't think it could be, but then again, this problem doesn't seem to follow logic :(
 
run the computer out of the case on top of an anti-static bag with just the mobo, cpu , vid card and memory. that way if it boots or not we have narrowed it down greatly.

It MUST be out of the case, though. the same thing happened to me and it was because of a grounding between my mobo and case.
 
K, thanks a ton man. I'll try that in a bit. I must play WoW on the computer that works right now though :)
 
Another thing is it could be a random video card incompatibility issue. I've had that before and it wouldn't do anything other than spin the fans up.
 
I tried it w/o the video card in it already :(. I'm really banking on it being a grounding problem. I took a quick look and noticed that the center crewhole only had a raiser with a nub keeping the mobo in place rather than a screw.
 
Taking things out of the case and applying power is THE thing to do. If you get a post screen, then replace the bundle into the case. Attach one at a time, FDD, each optical,any add in cards, HD(s), and finally fans. post after each addition to narrow down any problem areas. It time consuming,but if you have a problem youll narrow it down and isolate it rather than being frustrated.
 
I've had the "only the fan spinning" issue once. It was just a bad PSU. Maybe try swapping that if you can and see if that works . . .

Try running your hardware out of the case. With the bare minimum, CPU/RAM/Video card. . .
 
I had the exact same problem with an Asus P4P800 deluxe, ended up being a bad mobo, pretty frustrating narrowing it down but running it out of the case is the way to go. Good luck...
 
Ok, I ran it outside of the case on an anti-static bag and the psu wouldn't even give any power. The fan on the psu didn't even come on. I then hooked it up to my wife psu and it did the same thing, but the wife's psu runs fine when hooked up to her mobo. So, at this point, would it be safe to say the mobo is a bust and rma it?
 
If the system doesn't work on a KNOWN working PSU, then I gather it could definitely be your motherboard.
 
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