Leachim Sredna wrote:
Hi Group,

I was running one of these boards for a year or so some months back, but
started getting various strange problems ( I admit I had been overclocking
it a bit, and it was always a tricky board).
The last problem I recall appeared to be the floppy controller failing, but
I couln't pin that down definitely, as I might have got the power connector
the wrong way round (I am always doing that on my floppy drives).
I tried changing the PSU for a brand new Corsair 650 W job but the system
finally failed entirely, I think. So I left it for some months, after
resurrecting some even older systems for basic daily use (a reliable old
Dell and an even older HP - I don't do much more than email and a bit of
surfing these days).

But that dead ASUS system was bothering me. Not to mention a lot of data on
the hard drives that I would like to access or recover. So I got another P5W
DH board secondhand, and a second processor, thinking I could salvage the
Win XP installation and data files on the OS hard drive and the second hard
drive (no Raids - they drove me crazy). Built it all into the case, and....
nothing. Power light comes on on the board, CPU and video card fans both
spin up, but can't get into BIOS and see no video.

I've since tried running both the older (revision 1.03) and the newer
(revision 1.04) board with both the newer (E6850) and the older (E6750)
processors outside the case, with just the one hard drive with OS (I trust)
on Sata 1 port, and an optical drive on Sata 3 with the installation CD in
it ready to boot from there if need be, and a Sapphire Radeon 2600XT on the
first PCI EX16 slot, but get no luck still. The fans spin up, the Ram leds
light up, but I don't get as far as seeing the BIOS and any video.

Any suggestions or advice as to what to try now (apart from trashing the
lot)? Seems a pity not to salvage at least something workable from all this
junk. I cleared the BIOS jumper-wise on the newer board, thinking that I
should start with default setting there.
Of course both boards may be dead now, and both CPUs too. And I suppose the
video card may too be suspect now. Is there any obvious next step without
further purchase of dodgy components, please ?

Leachim Sredna

You start with a "beep test".

The least hardware you can test with in this case is,

motherboard, CPU plus heatsink/fan, power supply, computer case speaker,
front panel power switch

For this test, no RAM or video card are installed.

If the processor is receiving power via the ATX12V 2x2 connector,
and the processor can read BIOS code from the BIOS chip, it will
attempt to probe for video and RAM and find them missing. The
preferred method for communicating with the user when they're missing,
is a "beep pattern" that comes from the computer case speaker.
If you've wired the case speaker to the Panel header, then
you'll be able to hear beeps.

If you hear *no* beeps at all, then the BIOS is not being
executed. In that case, check that the system is receiving
power (test with another power supply). Check that the CPU is
properly seated. Check that the BIOS chip (if it is a PLCC)
is properly seated in the socket. The newer serial EEPROM chips
are generally soldered to the motherboard, so it's harder to
do repair procedures to those. Socketed chips give you more
options.

It's possible you had some defective add-in hardware, and it
burned both motherboards. If you were to obtain a third
motherboard, you'd start with the "beep test" first,
and slowly build up the system and evaluate it's performance.

I tend to do that when building systems. I start with the
bare minimum hardware and test it a piece at a time, as
I add components to it. I've done that a couple times,
outside the computer case. On one occasion, I installed
all hardware and software, while the computer contents
were outside the case. Then, it was a simple matter to
install them with a screwdriver, and the system was ready
to run right away.

Paul