newly built computer won't boot

[Forgotten]

I just finished my first build of a computer, but I can't get it to boot right. Everything has power and I'm pretty sure (hoping) that everything is right. When I turn it on, it runs for a few seconds and then beeps once (supposed to be normal). After a few more seconds, it has one small beep, and then it starts to make a series of short beeps that alternate in pitch. I don't let this go on very long, as I'm afraid it might be dangerous to let it run for a while. My first thought was the RAM might be installed wrong, so I consulted the manual and fixed what I did wrong. This did not fix the problem. I'm not sure what to do, and I was hoping someone might know what the problem is or what I could do to fix it. My computer is built from the following:

Case: Chenming AX-01 Aluminum
Power supply: Turbolink 420W psu (bundled)
Motherboard: EPoX EP-8RDA+ nForce2
Processor: AMD AthlonXP 2400+
Heatsink: Cooler Master HAC-V81 X-Dream (+Arctic Silver III)
Video card: Albatron Ti4800SE
Sound card: Turtle Beach Santa Cruz
Hard drive: Western Digital 80g (special edition, 8mb cache)
RAM: Crucial pc2700 512mb
CD-rom: Lite-on 52x
CD-RW: Lite-on 52x24x52
Floppy drive: Panasonic 3.5" drive

- other parts: Cooler Master round IDE/floppy cables, Vantec Ultimate Hard Drive Cooler, (5) Cool Max Quad LED case fans, light blue psu mod, aluminum RAM heatspreaders, Enermax 3.5'' System Monitor Control Panel, system exhaust PCI fan

Anyone who could help at all or give any suggestions, please post a reply here. It is greatly appreciated and I'm hoping I can get it working without having to pay even more money to a professional. Thanks a lot.

 

[amdskip]

Reseat the video card, ram for first things. If that does not work, only boot with the bare necessities hooked up/installed. You don't need hard drives, cdrom/burner/dvd, sound, network, etc. Just try to get into the bios.

 

[MARMADUKE]

I'll give you a swift boot!
Sound card: Turtle Beach Santa Cruz
Hard drive: Western Digital 80g (special edition, 8mb cache)
RAM: Crucial pc2700 512mb

The HD should have no jumper on the pins and or set for single drive!
The generic micron ram is a big NO NO (replace)
The sound card? turn off onboard audio in cmos/bios setup

 

[amdskip]

Originally posted by: MARMADUKE

The generic micron ram is a big NO NO (replace)

Don't listen to him, he does not know what he is talking about. Crucial memory works great and many others here will also agree. It is by no means generic.

 

[Batman5177]

every motherboard manufacturer has beep codes, look them up and see what's wrong.

i've had some strange builds myself where everything looks ok, but no boot.

what i did to fix it was to take it apart, then test it with only the basic stuff, such as the motherboard, cpu, ram, keyboard, and video card.

see if that boots up, never give up!

did u remember to use the gold things that keep the motherboard off the backplate of the case?

also, try flashing the cmos, and/or testing the ram in another computer.

good luck!

 

[MARMADUKE]

AMDSKIP..
The guy needs help? why are you bashing me? and confusing him?

Evan Lieb
Senior Hardware Editor

Posts: 715
Joined: Jun 2002
04/01/2003 6:15 PM (NEW!)



This certainly isn't an nForce2 chipset issue. It could be an SPD timing issue or, more likely, Crucial received a bad batch of chips that they then slapped onto a bunch of their PCBs.

In this case, end users are experiencing very poor results with nForce2 boards (for whatever reason) with Crucial's 512MB PC2700 modules, the modules with those bad batch of chips.

Until Crucial gives us a reason to believe otherwise, you probably are going to want to hold off purchasing Crucial 512MB PC2700 memory for another few weeks.

 

[amdskip]

It shouldn't make a difference because he is not overclocking at all. Crucial is not crap and if he really does have a bad stick, he could rma it. It doesn't say when he bought the ram so he may have bought it used off the forums or he could have purchased it a while back from crucial.

 

[Forgotten]

UPDATE: First off, I looked for beep codes for my motherboard, but had no luck. Next, I took amdskip's advice and tried to boot it with just the necessities installed. I removed and reinstalled the video card, reseated one of the RAM sticks to slot #2 (instead of #3), and unplugged everything else. It left me with just the motherboard, processor, video card, and RAM installed. Unfortunately, I get the same error. Thanks for all the replies I have thus far and anything else is also appreciated.

 

[amdskip]

http://www.dalantech.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=construction&Number=31086&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1=

That is a link to bios beep codes. These can generally be applied to most motherboards. Does your motherboard have a FOC (fan on control feature)? FOC attempts to detect if there is a fan on the processor (hooked into the cpu fan header) and if it can't detect a fan, it automatically turns the system off. I know that holding down the insert key will disable this and you have turn the feature off in the bios.

 

[amdskip]

It appears that your motherboard does not have FOC. The last thing I would do is to boot with everything outside of the case and try to boot. You can start the computer by touching the two pins together with a screwdriver where normally the on switch is attached to.

 

[MARMADUKE]

Dont listen to skip? he dont have a 8rda and knows nothing about them!
forget beeps! LMAO
Look @ the diagnostic led on your mobo for the code it is showing? like C would mean replace that generic micron memory!

 

[Forgotten]

Alright, I took a look at the LED and it does show C1. I e-mailed Crucial to see if I can get replacement. Thanks a lot for all the help.

 

[MARMADUKE]

from now on post in the motherboard section under 8rda if you want help from people who know what they are talking about

 

[tjaisv]

and read this, it has some good tips on troubleshooting bad POSTs

Looks like Marmaduke was right, bad memory.

 

[Forgotten]

Sorry MARMADUKE, it was my first post and I wasn't sure where to post it. Thanks again for the help.

 

[Dalantech]

I also have an article on Posting, pretty good if you're having a hard time getting the beast to work.