A7V: MoBo defect on arrival or wrecked by myself ?

[drangsalino]

During assembly of my mostly new system, TWO different MoBo's of the same type had exactly the same weird fault. I wonder whether I wrecked two MoBo during installation, resulting twice in the same weird defect, or whether they arrived defect.

Here's my system as configured in the tests described below:

A7V133, Promise RAID, AC97 (new). RAID not being used yet.
T'bird 1333/266 (new)
256MB Infineon RAM PC133 (new)
ATI 3D Rage Pro (used, to be replaced with Kyro II)
CD-RW HP9300+ (used)
Mitsumi LS-120 (used)
IBM HD 8GB 5400rpm (used)
Gateway EV900 (used)
300W power supply (new)
Win98SE (not freshly installed, except mentioned otherwise)

After completing assembly of my new rig, neither the CPU fan nor the fan for the VT8363A MoBo-chip worked (don't know whether the fan for the VT8363A may be temparature-controlled so I concentrated on the CPU fan). Got me a new CPU fan, which still didn't work when mounted on the CPU.

Attaching the first fan, now removed from the CPU, to a 12V source showed it working. Measuring the voltage on the MoBo for the CPU fan showed approximately 4.5V. The current was more than 0.5A, but I can't tell how much because the device used for measuring can't display more than that.

Defect CPU ? Let's get the system running and have a try ! I remounted the first fan and again hooked it up to 12V source, this time a HD outlet. The system run reasonably well, even without formatting the HD and reinstalling the OS.

Power supply ? Attaching two IBM Deskstar 307015 (7200rpm) made no difference at all. Running PcProbe while playing Heart of Winter (expansion of Icewind Dale) installed on one of the IBM307015 showed voltages well within their allowed range of +/- 5 percent. The CPU was 40-45 degrees Celsius, the MoBo within 30-35 degrees.

So i decided the MoBo was defect and returned it for a replacement. When the replacement arrived nothing had changed: Neither of the two fans were running. Even formatting and installing Win98 on a 307015 didn't change anything.

I called the technician who had inspected my first MoBo. The only guess he could make was a messed up power supply or some weired mistake by me. So I returned the MoBo once again, which is the current situation as of 06/26/01. Could a defect power supply cause these symptoms, or wouldn't rather the whole MoBo be burned out or the CPU be destroyed ?

I have mounted some cards, disks, CD-ROM etc. before without any problems occurring, but this is the first complete rig I assembled. I'm not an engineer, but I know how to use a screwdriver and other common tools. I clung to "slow and steady" while putting the parts together, which isn't toooo difficult to begin with, so usually I'd be pretty confident I'm not the reason for the problem described above. But two times the same fault ? The vendor said he double checked the second board before sending it to me, so the board being faulty is very unlikely, too.

I believe it's very difficult to make a guess, but should it be me, I just don't want to make exactly the same mistake THREE (!!!) times in a row. :|:disgust:

P.S:
I'm sure I checked and re-checked whether the fans were pluggged in when I expected them to turn but they didn't.

 

[WinWiz]

It sure sound weird, but I cant see how its possible to destroy 2 Mobo this way. I think the MoBo are both defect, because the fan for the VT8363A should start when you power on your system!!!

 

[trungma]

I quickly went through your post so I might have missed this but make sure your case standoffs for your motherboard are in the right position. If they are not then you could be shorting or grounding out your motherboard. That might be the reason why both motherboards had the same problem.

 

[tcc2f6]

I quickly went through your post so I might have missed this but make sure your case standoffs for your motherboard are in the right position. If they are not then you could be shorting or grounding out your motherboard. That might be the reason why both motherboards had the same problem.

Just curious, I have had similar problems (two defunct mobo's with same problems).. I have taken the mobo out and put it in again making sure the standoffs are all in the correct place.. anything else I could do to make sure I am not grounding it? also, grounding doesn't damage it does it? I don't think so but thought I'd double check.

Thanks

 

[kylebisme]

improper groundng can very much damage it, but its highly unlikey to just make the fans stop spinning.

 

[nokeo]

Was your CPU boxed version

 

[HYD]

Try taking your motherboard out and putting it just on a piece of anti-static packaging. Try hooking up the video card, the cpu/hsf, and the ram. Try that method and see if it starts up. This way you?ll know for sure if it?s defunct or not. It shouldn?t short on anything. If you need help getting your power supply turned on, just short it with a flat head screw driver. It?s as easy as 1, 2, and 3.

 

[Bleep]

I would not recommend puting the board on a antistatic bag as the outside of the bag is somewhat conductive. just set it on the foam that the board was on in the box. Are you sure that the CPU is good? I am not fimiliar with the board you have but some boards will not boot without the CPU fan connected into the CPU fan header. Dont plug in anything onto the board (other than switch wires and fan of course) Leave out the memory-Hard drive-cdrom. just boot with video card and see if you get bios beeps, If you boot and get BIOS beeps shut it back down and put in ONE stick of known good memory. Boot again with monitor plugged in and on. If it boots shut it down and plug in a hard drive. and you are on your way. Hope this helps. It may be a sour power supply but doubtfull, if it works with the configuration I decribed and you start adding components if it then fails you will know where the problem is.
Bleep

 

[MrWhiteUK]

My first 2 (and now a 3rd dead) Asus RMA7V's were fu#ked outta the box, they're a POS in my opinion.

 

[drangsalino]

Thanks for your help.

Trungma/tcc2f6:
The system as whole runs fine, both with the old parts and with the new.
If grounding was bad, shouldn't it cause problems in both configs ? Or isn't that necesserily so ? If not: how do I make sure ? I'm not-much-in-hardware, so please be patient.
Where would they be placed ? Can you provide a link for a picture ?

nokeo:
Not sure, probably not: it was just the CPU, on a little foam, in a small bag.
What would that mean ? If that's important: the ( firmware ? instruction set?) CPU-software had to be replaced because of a glitch in this particular series. The technician replaced it, returned it, no mention of any problem whatsoever. Sound strange ?

HYD/Bleep:
I'll try this first thing. The MoBo has arrived today.

Since the MoBo were defect already, I tried get the system running anyway in both cases:
Putting the system together as noted above with all new components including the defect MoBo, connecting the CPU fan to a HD power outlet to get it turning. Turn on the rig and it works just as it should ! PnP for the new components starts, config is ok, windows gets up and running. No apparent additional problems, I can even activate the RAID option and use the logical drives as expected.

I also tried booting the rig with the fan plugged into the MoBo (BIOS set to not check CPU fan speed), to see whether it's temperature controlled: even when the grill was too hot to touch (maybe 70-80 degrees Celsius), the fan didn't turn. Power off, not shutdown, of course.

If it was for insufficient power: could the system be possibly running well, but just not the CPU and VT8363A fans ? I didn't notice any instabilities,
And why would the contacts for the CPU fans show some 4.5Volts only, instead of 12Volts ?

I even tried leaving out some of the key parts to see whether the beeps are OK. Of course, the MoBo reacted exactly according to the manual, so I'm still clueless.

MoBo #3 has arrived just today. I'll try HYD/Bleeps advice with the foam, and will be waiting for trungma/tcc2f6 answer before assembly.