troubleshooting - your guess is as good as mine

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burnin8r

[H]ard|Gawd
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Nov 19, 2006
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I installed a new EVGA micro atx SLi mobo on friday night. While sliding out the motherboard tray of my Aspire Qpack I accidently pulled the SATA connector out of my hard drive, and got a blue screen momentarily. I powered down and upon reconnecting the HD, my next restart indicated problems with the video card (one long chirp followed by 2 short beeps. I could hear my windows system start noise but there was no display on my moniter. I was able to remedy this my turning off the surge protector after powering down, then restarting. This problem only occurred that night, and seems to have corrected itself...

any guesses ?
 
i was hoping someone had experienced something similar. i have a second video card coming tomorrow so i will try to narrow it down to either the x16 slot on my new board, the video card itself, or some random environmental issue that seems to have passed.
 
I m starting to think its the new board itself. my computer makes a clicking sound from the hard drive area upon booting and then i get the bad video card chirp (one long beep followed by 2 short beeps). I am able to power down, turn off my surge protector and then restart with no display problems...

no one has experienced anything like this ?

I m going to re-install my old mobo and see if the issue still exists.
 
This is the first time you have indicated you still have a problem, you wont get help if you cant explain the problem.
ie the last statement in the first post !
"This problem only occurred that night, and seems to have corrected itself..."

So when does the not booting properly start to happen?
When you reset the UPS and it boots fine then, does the hard drive make the same noises?
 
no, the click sound only occurs on a reset or if i try to restart without turning the surge protector on and then off. if i failed to clearly define what i m experiencing, allow me to recount what happened from beginning to end:

i install a new motherboard friday night. while i was sliding out the motherboard tray, the SATA connection came unplugged and i got an angry blue screen. when i reconnected the hard drive and restarted, i had no display on my moniter and the system made the one long beep / two short beep error code which according to my manual indicates bad video card or video memory. my moniter has an LED that lights up in green when the moniter is on and orange when it is off but receiving power. when the display fails, i am seeing the orange light. i hold the on/off switch until my system shuts down.

i turned off the surge protector and opened up the case. my card was seated properly and i had made no modification other than reconnecting the SATA cable. i restart my machine and it boots up with no problems (single chirp, green light on moniter). i am starting to rethink what i had said before about the issue fixing itself, i may have actually left the computer running overnight through saturday / sunday / monday, possibly powering down including flipping the surge protector off while cleaning up some wiring.

i received my second video card last night, and tested it in mono, then SLi. at first there were no issues with the display, presumably because i had turned off the surge protector while adding the second card (and cleaning up my internal wiring). this morning i experienced the same single click from the HD and no display, i powered down, turned the surge protector on and off, then powered on. the display did appear, but then went black within a minute or two. i switched the moniter to the second video card, and the display came back. I had shut down and flipped the surge protector which is now becoming part of my routine, and left for work. my girlfriend said the moniter went black, i didnt tell her to switch the cables...

so, i appreciate anyone who takes the time to read this and i thank you in advance for any advise you can offer before i do a full tear down to see if this phenomenon still occurs with my old mobo. i want to exhaust every possibility before RMA'ing the new board.
 
Have you re-seated the videocard? Checked the proper power connections? Also can your board run the videocard in the other x16 slot (you said you have an sli mobo). I know some can.
 
the evga micro atx sli board has one pcie x16 and two pcie x8 slots for SLi. my old card has been used in the center slot (x16) and that is when the SATA connector was accidently pulled out. i have tried my new card in both the center x16 and in SLi mode using the two x8 slots.

I will try a few variations when i get home, including reseating each card in mono.

thanks again...
 
What happens if you dont have the surge protector plugged in?
ie the PC is plugged directly into the mains.
 
Let me make sure I understand....

You swappped (or started swapping) motherboards with the power turned on????? :eek:

If you indeed swapped mobos (and didn't fry anything in the process) maybe your harddrive isn't talking properly to the new mobo/chipset. Maybe you need to change video drivers to allow old parts to play nice with the new parts.

I still don't have a clear idea of what all went on in creating this 'problem'.
 
i ll try plugging the computer directly into the wall socket...

and no i didnt switch mobos with the computer on.
 
Sorry, this is what got me confused:

"i install a new motherboard friday night. while i was sliding out the motherboard tray, the SATA connection came unplugged and i got an angry blue screen."

If you changed to a different motherboard, you may have to re-install your OS. Also,make sure the connections to the hard drive and the motherboard are good and solid at both ends ...both power and data. You could have bent a pin in the power or data connector that isn't making good contact.

I had an IDE drive that connected loosely to the power molex. It would randomly act badly and give the general impression that it was going bad.

Also check any power connections to the video cards.

By the way, what kind of board/chipset are we trying to work with here?? Can you give us some specs.
 
thnx to all who responded.

I have been reading about how to install a new mobo *without* re-installing your OS, and I know that I didnt do what the how - to suggests. so, that being said, I ll start backing things up and hopefully over the weekend windows will be re-installed, and this issue will no longer exist.

wish me luck...
 
Good Luck!
Sometimes you can change mobos and not have to redo the OS. I went from a Biostar Tforce6100 to an Epox Tforce 6100 without reworking anything BUT things ran slowly and the system seemed to be working hard just to do routine tasks. I too have read that a mobo swap can be done without re-installing but I've also read that the best bet is to bite the bullet and start fresh.

Have Fun!! :cool:
 
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