Motherboards Dying Left and Right?!?!

[DarkPrime]

Ok, this has me stumped and very frustrated. Back in December, I bought a Gigabyte Socket 939 board and Athlon 3800+ X2 off of a friend to put in my wife's computer. After installing things, the board wouldn't boot (fans came on, but no post). I took things apart and after fiddling with how the CPU sat in the board, it booted up. Things had been fine until a few weeks ago. At that time, my wife was going on a trip with co-workers to NYC for the weekend, so she shutdown her machine. When she got back, it wouldn't turn back on. I unplugged the power to it, plugged it back in, but it wouldn't boot (it turned lights and fans on, but no post). I fiddled with the parts, checked them out in my machine to see that they were working, but couldn't make it boot. I then purchased a new board a couple weeks ago, installed it, and on the first try things worked great. Fast forward to today. The power went out for a spit second today, turning off her computer. Now it won't boot again. I have fiddled with all the parts and nothing. Fans turn on, but it won't post. I find it hard to believe that another board could be dead. Maybe something else is wrong? Maybe somethign else is causing these boards to die? Any thoughts or ideas to try?

I have reset everything, pulled all the pci cards, pulled all disk drives, reset cmos, removed the battery, everything I can think of.

The machine was currently:
MSI socket 939 Board (nforce4)
AMD 3800+ X2
2x512 Geil PC3200 ram
1 120 gig WD HD
1 CDRW
1 DVDRW
1 ZIP250
1 Radeon x1300
1 Tv Tuner Card
1 Audigy
1 Wifi Nic
Antec 430 TRU Power Supply

 

[TheBeagle]

Check that PSU. I had one of those Antec PSUs do exactly the same thing to me. Apparently one of the rails in the PSU crapped out but it didn't affect the other components, but it wouldn't provide the proper current to start the computer. Borrow a good quality PSU from someone and hook it up and give it some juice. You may find that's the problem. Another source of that type of a problem is a BIOS setting. If the BIOS on that board is set to shutdown the computer if it senses the CPU getting too hot, and if the CPU cooler is not seated correctly, with good thermal paste, then it may be giving a false reading to the BIOS, which can cause the board to not start. Without actually seeing the unit, that's the best I can offer from what you have described. Hope that's of some assistance. TheBeagle

 

[DarkPrime]

TheBeagle,

Thanks for the suggestion. I just removed the PS from my shuttle and that little thing couldn't make it start. It did get the fans to spin, but the board wouldn't post. Perhaps it's too small? As for bios, I have reset it, but still things are a no go. The cpu is also properly cooled, so that doesn't seem to be an issue. Besides, the problem started when the machine turned off by the user or lack of power, not overheating.

 

[DarkPrime]

any other ideas?

 

[DaddyRabbit]

Originally posted by: DarkPrime
TheBeagle,

Thanks for the suggestion. I just removed the PS from my shuttle and that little thing couldn't make it start. It did get the fans to spin, but the board wouldn't post. Perhaps it's too small? As for bios, I have reset it, but still things are a no go. The cpu is also properly cooled, so that doesn't seem to be an issue. Besides, the problem started when the machine turned off by the user or lack of power, not overheating.

With all the add-ins the Shuttle PSU (which is great for a Shuttle <I have 3>) won't power that rig. Try removing everything but Video, RAM, and HDD and, using the Antec, see if it powers up. These three failures may seem to be related but the power surge may have just been the final nail for the Antec and they aren't related at all...

 

[DarkPrime]

I just don't see how there was a power surge, considering the first dead board seemed to die while the machine was already off.

THe shuttle Power supply did turn on the hard drive and fans, but that's all. I also did have everythign else disconnected just in case.

 

[Duwelon]

About 4 years ago I killed 3 motherboards within a 6 month period of time before I figured out what my problem was. A ground wire had come loose in the house and many outlets weren't properly grounded. Get a tester and check for wiring faults at the outlet where the computer sits.

 

[Skott]

The power going out and then coming back on can pose problems IMO. The power goes out and then it comes rushing back on (surge) can play havoc on a system. But just having the power suddenly go out can be just as troublesome on components as a surge.

One thing I have learned in all the years of having PCs is that all my PCs have a UPS system dedicated to each PC. Not just to give myself time to power down a PC when power goes out but to also help prevent surges and the sudden drop offs of power. IMO surge protectors arent good enough. Need something that supplies steady constant power and control surges and power drops wether the PC was turned on to begin with or not.

First thing you need to do is get a psu thats powerful enough to run your rig that know definetely works and then start from there. Then just go through the process of elimination component by component starting first with the psu.

Good luck and I hope you get it resolved soon.