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Hey guys - I'll keep this as short as possible. We have an i7 machine with a GA-Z97X-UD7 TH mobo and GTX 970 in it. 32 gigs of RAM. Apparently for the past two months it's been taking 20 minutes to boot up (and nobody told me). The power clicks on and before POST or *any* LED mobo codes can even start to come up... it clicks off. Then rinse repeat about 50 times and it finally comes on. Once on it performs perfectly. We've done everything to isolate the problem. Stripped case down to nothing, removed mobo to rule out shorts (put it on cardboard) and removed everything down to just the CPU and mobo itself (no RAM, Graphics card, etc) and it still exhibited the same behavior. We did variations of each to test each component too (including individual sticks of RAM)... same thing. Finally we noticed that we thought it was switching to the backup BIOS, but never was (even though the light seemed like it was). I found the "Switch to Backup BIOS" physical switch and voila! Everything worked! I rebooted a bunch of times to check and yup, seems like everything worked just fine. Now, earlier on one of the first things I did was reset all BIOS settings but that didn't do anything. Well, I think, it's just a corrupt Main BIOS. I download the latest BIOS (about a year newer than the one on there) and update it. It updates the main *and* backup BIOS and...... now..... you can see where this is going..... Nothing works. Both physically switching to backup bios and main bios exhibits the same behavior. Neither works. Just stuck in an endless one cycle power loop. I'm going to try to wait for it to come back on (it's currently doing it's thing) and downgrade the BIOS. But anybody have any experience with something like this?
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Feb 1, 2018 22:05
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| # ? Apr 26, 2024 04:45 |
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BonoMan posted:
Sometimes a failing PSU will powercycle like that for awhile but that's probably not the issue here. I'd try resetting the CMOS via a jumper (if that motherboard has that option).
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Feb 2, 2018 06:59
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Zogo posted:Sometimes a failing PSU will powercycle like that for awhile but that's probably not the issue here. Sorry I forget to add in the OP we switched out the PSU with a brand new one and have reset the CMOS (it's got jumpers as well as a physical button to do it). Neither worked  .
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Feb 2, 2018 14:09
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I'd try taking the motherboard battery out for a little and see if that helps. Otherwise, I don't have any other ideas.
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Feb 3, 2018 23:52
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Zogo posted:I'd try taking the motherboard battery out for a little and see if that helps. Otherwise, I don't have any other ideas. Tried that too. He'll I even tried manually shorting the pins of the BIOS chip with a paper clip. To force a backup restore. Nothing works so we just ordered a replacement on Friday. If I had any soldering skills, I could have just ordered.a.fresh BIOS chip for $15.
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Feb 4, 2018 00:04
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BonoMan posted:If I had any soldering skills, I could have just ordered.a.fresh BIOS chip for $15. Soldering isn't too difficult if you want to give it a go in the future. Not exactly welding or anything like that.
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Feb 4, 2018 00:26
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Zogo posted:Soldering isn't too difficult if you want to give it a go in the future. Not exactly welding or anything like that. And now that we have the actual replacement board ordered.... it's not like I'm going to gently caress anything up. Might give it a go!
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Feb 4, 2018 00:38
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So, goddamn. Get the replacement mobo in and everything does the same thing. We're heartbroken but we fiddle around with it and figure out that sometimes pulling on a cable or pressing something will cause it to boot properly. Seems like an obvious short. But we can't replicate it and ... just... I'm going to go scream into a pillow. Thought it was the front panel cables... but can't replicate it. Thought it was the CPU fan cable. But can't replicate it. It also doesn't explain why it did it with everything taken out. Both power supply and mobo with ONLY CPU and Cooler attached. Nothing touching the case and nothing touching any metal. Could the CPU cooler be shorting it by touching either the CPU plate guard thing or the backplate of the CPU touching something wrong on the back of the mobo? Pulling my hair out here and we're at like 4 days of total lost productivity (I mean obviously if something was extraordinarily dire we'd just pop over to the apple store and buy a new iMac, but still... it sucks). BonoMan fucked around with this message at 01:35 on Feb 8, 2018 |
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Feb 8, 2018 01:33
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Initially did you use the old or new PSU? There's a chance the old PSU is failing and damaged the new motherboard.BonoMan posted:Could the CPU cooler be shorting it by touching either the CPU plate guard thing or the backplate of the CPU touching something wrong on the back of the mobo? If the thermal paste was spread messily it could cause issues. Eventually you may want to check to make sure the CPU pins and motherboard socket are both undamaged. Also, in rare instances the CPU could have some kind of issue even if there's no visible damage.
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Feb 8, 2018 05:36
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Zogo posted:Initially did you use the old or new PSU? There's a chance the old PSU is failing and damaged the new motherboard. Initially, upon installing the new motherboard, I used the old PSU. With nothing to lose I ran some experiments. Took PSU and mobo outside of case and set on cardboard. Removed absolutely everything INCLUDING the CPU fan and heatsink. Same results. Didn't really work unless I sometimes twisted or pinched the mobo power cable (midway between the PSU and mobo connector). Could never get reliably repeatable results. Went and got a second PSU brand new just to see. Same issue. Did everything I could but nothing works. I don't really see any bent pins on the motherboard or any damage on the CPU. I'll replace the thermal paste tomorrow and see if that helps. I'll just clean the chip in general. But given this behavior there before I reapplied the paste (and there wasn't a ton of it on there to begin with) I doubt that's it. At this point about the only thing left it could be is the CPU. I'm exhausted and have never been this stumped before.
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Feb 8, 2018 06:25
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Just for shits and giggles I tried it without even a CPU. Same thing. Although that could be because that's the board typical "no CPU" behavior and that's what it's been doing all along (aka bad CPU).
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Feb 8, 2018 16:30
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| # ? Apr 26, 2024 04:45 |
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Looks like this saga might have come to an end. Just bit the bullet and ordered a new CPU and it appears to have fixed the problem. So in ... in the end... it was the gahtdamned CPU.
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Feb 9, 2018 22:42
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