No POST is driving me crazeee! Help!

[jupiter1]

Hi, forum - Newbie here!

I wonder whether there's anyone out here in Internetland who can help me with this problem which is quite simply driving me crazy:

Up until a couple of months ago I was perfectly happily using this combo for running music apps in my studio under WinXP Professional:

Asus NF7-S Motherboard (not overclocked)
AMD Athlon XP2800 333hz fsb CPU
2 x 512mb PC3200 DDR SDRAM
GeForce MX440 64mb AGP 8X Video Card
2 x 200Gb SATR Seagate Hard discs
1 x CD-Writer
1 x DVD-writer
Emu 1820 digital audio system
300w power supply

One day I was working on e-mails on the Admin PC in the studio (they're not networked, and the Music PC is completely isolated from the Internet), and turned round about an hour later to see the monitor had gone black on the Music PC.

I'd been working on the Music PC earlier, and had just left it idling on the desktop, with no apps open. XP is stripped down to the max on this PC to maximise resources for the Music apps, and has worked very, very well for ages.

I re-booted the PC, thinking it had just crashed, and was immediately concerned that suddenly there was no POST check.

A dozen off-ons later I realised something was up, so I disconnected all the hard-drives, the CD & DVD drives and the Emu Audio System, and still nothing. The power LED's on the NF7-S mobo still came on, and the CPU fan still worked, but there were no helpful beeps...

So... I reset the BIOS. Still nothing. I swapped over the monitor and
graphics card from the Admin PC. Nothing. I took out the RAM and
re-seated the two modules singly, swapped them over then put them both back in. Still no POST check.

Speaking to a friend in the building who knows plenty of stuff, he agreed with me that it seemed that the problem was probably either the CPU or the MOBO going down (unless both sticks of RAM or the power-supply had gone, of course...), and the logical likelihood was that it was the CPU, so I went out and bought a new AMD Athlon XP3000 Socket A 333hz fsb chip and put it on the NF7-S motherboard... and no POST!

What was up with this? Logically, the only other things it possibly could be would be either the Motherboard, the RAM or the Power Supply. Being a bit impulsive to speed things up and get through this sudden pain-barrier faster, I bought a brand new Gigabyte 7N400 Pro 2 Dual Bios board, installed it all, put the new CPU in, the sticks of RAM and the graphics card, and guess what? NO POST CHECK.

Trying hard to ignore the sudden itching in my brain, I double- checked everything the micro-switch System Jumper settings on the Mobo, swapped over the graphics card and monitor again, and still no POST.

There are no beeps from the Gigabyte Mobo, except a single one when I power down by holding the power switch in for seven seconds, but the RAM led lights up, and the CPU Fan sparks up, and switches on and off regularly like you'd expect from a CPU under no load.

Then I put the old CPU in to see what would happen. No POST.

By now I was starting to feel a little crazy. Was it the power supply all the time? I've had a couple of badly behaved supplies before, and I know they're pretty sophistimicated little pieces of engineering, so maybe, just maybe...

So I bought a spiffy new 450w dual fan ATX power supply, put it in. No POST.

I bought a new matching 512Mb stick of DDR Ram and installed it on its own. Nothing.

Finally I sent the new CPU away to be tested by the shop I bought it from, and after a pathetic four weeks (that's another story, Maplin fans), they finally reported they'd found the CPU to be working.

So... I've actually replaced the entire computer with new components, and I've still got no POST check. Just what the hell is happening here???

Can anyone understand what this is doing to my head?!? What am I doing wrong here? I'm sure I've done everything by the book in isolating all the elements and replacing them. I've studied at depth all available literature on the new GA-7N4-- Pro 2 Mobo in case there's some little jumper I've missed, and am happy that setting the CLK_RATIO dip switches to OFF (Auto/Default), and the CLK_SW to ON (Auto) is correct.

I hooked up the power cables to the SATR drives (but not the data cables), and they fire up fine.

If anyone can make any helpful suggestions, I'd be very grateful. I've got to admit I'm completely beaten on this one, and don't know what to do next. I've built my last three computers, and this is the first problem I've ever had. Have I got two dead motherboards - one old and one brand new dead out of the box?

Help!

PETE

p.s. - No, I don't know anyone else with a working Socket-A setup I can try swapping components with to isolate the duds...

 

[jnev_89]

have you checked the hard drives?

 

[phosho510]

sounds like a psu problem, but not sure since you bought a new psu already.

 

[jupiter1]

jnev_89 - The very first thing I did was disconnect the hard drives, and won't be reconnecting them until I have a working CPU, Mobo, RAM & Graphics card... and a POST. The drives were less than three months old, and were fine.

Cheers!

 

[jupiter1]

phosho510 - Apparently the new CPU works fine. I've tried the new CPU on the old board, the new CPU on the old board, the new CPU on the new board, and it's the same every time. No POST!

Thanx!

 

[phosho510]

i didnt say cpu, i said psu-power supply

 

[jnev_89]

phosho510 - Apparently the new CPU works fine. I've tried the new CPU on the old board, the new CPU on the old board, the new CPU on the new board, and it's the same every time. No POST!

Thanx!

if you tried the new cpu on all the boards, and none of them worked, then it has to be a cpu problem.

 

[idiotec]

Let me see if I understand:

PSU - New
Mobo - New
CPU - New
RAM - Old
GPU - Old

That should be all you need to POST right? (someone correct me if I'm Wrong)

I would think it would be down between the GPU and RAM. Try putting in ONE stick of known good RAM and one known good video card into the all new CPU, mobo and PSU and see what happens.

 

[gaara]

Also try flashing the BIOS and CMOS.

I am almost willing to bet the problem is your RAM however, bad memory can seriously screw up your computer boot sequence.

The only other possibility I can think of is a heat problem. Question: Does the machine power on and stay on, or power on briefly and quickly shut down again? And you are recieving absolutely no error beeps?

Basically, I would remove everything except for the CPU and motherboard, and try powering those up. See if you can pinpoint the problem as specifically as possible.

This is a toughy though.

 

[Nubius]

For the NF7-S you could saved some cash and simply gotten a 45w 2600+ XP-M and set it to 200x10 and bam you got 400FSB at stock clock speed.

But anywho..

Take the motherboard out

Put it ontop of the mobo box with the anti static bag beneath the mobo and ontop of the mobo box.

Plug in power , CPU of course, one stick of RAM, vid card, and keyboard

See if it posts. If it doesn't do anything, then remove the video card. If it beeps or gives something different than what you had been receiving, the card is at fault.

If nothing changes, replace the vid card, and remove the stick of RAM. If something diff happens, it's the RAM.... if still nothing, no beeps or anything it's the CPU or mobo but since you said they had tested the CPU then it's more than likely the mobo in which you should try the same steps with the gigabyte mobo.