Please Help - Garbled Bios Characters!!

[b16a2]

Hey Guys,

I have a really strange problem!! I have an Abit A8N SLI with an athlon 64 3000 and Leadtek 6600GT pci express graphics card, all running at stock speeds. I decided to play GTR GT Racing so i loaded up the game, and walked away from the machine for about 30 seconds. I came back and the screen was black. I moved the mouse, to no avail. I then couldnt get the machine to respond so i hit the reset button, and this was my result (click on the links, they are pics of the screen):

Post Screen
Bios

What the heck happened guys??!!!??! I have tried powering on and off, but no dice. I think maybe the graphics card went belly up!! The machine does not get into windows xp either - it just reboots when it tries to go into full gui mode. Anyways please reply back with what you think could be causing it! Thanks in advance!

 

[montag451]

Try a new vga card, or cable.
Check also the monitor is working correctly.

 

[b16a2]

Hi,

I have already tried plugging the monitor into another machine - it works fine. I was wondering... I noticed a few weeks ago that the gc core temps sat around 60-65 degrees C during system idle. I thought this was a bit high but figured eh, should be ok. Could it be a temp-related issue? Oh yea, and I dont actually have any spare vga cards lying around unfortunately - only have agp, which is useless in this motherboard, and since its easter no luck with stores either .

Thanks guys, any other suggestions? I will try the vga card as soon as possible.

 

[Harvey]

I've seen several things cause that, including a bad hard drive, a bad or mis-seated vid card and some viruses.

Since you noticed the problem earlier when your vid card got warm, that could be the problem. Does it happen when you turn off the machine long enough for the card to cool?

Have you tried another vid card? You wouldn't have to go all the way into having Windows recognizing and installing it. All you need to do is check whether the text for the initial boot screen comes up correctly.

 

[b16a2]

Hi Harvey,

I have tried reseating the graphics card, unplugging the hard drives, and also letting the machine cool down for about an hour with cold air over it with the case open. Still no luck. Unfortunately there is no way for me to try another vid card today since i dont have any old pci graphics cards, and i dont have any spare pci-express graphics cards. I guess thats all i have left to try - ill have to try that first thing tomorrow. Thanks for your help.

 

[montag451]

Please let us know what the result is, one way or another.

Good luck

 

[yliu]

I suspect that the memory on your video card has become defective.

 

[wh3nd42]

To be honest I reckon it could be the motherboard itself.

I had some grabled characters on POST yesterday (I have an ASUS A8N-SLI) tried different monitor, graphics card, memory (not tested for long though - counted the RAM out too quickly so need to test more), and hard drives and still no luck. Figured it must be the chipset.

Strange thing is that it's working reasonably well now, without funny characters although I get random reboots under heavy stress.

Let us know what happens with your system, I'm REALLY INTERESTED in what the problem is.

 

[montag451]

It could be the mobo, But it is worth ruling out the above suggestions first......
Cos you ain't gonna be a happy bunny if you find the same happens with the new mobo!