problem with a7n266-vm

[bidnessman]

hey everyone,

I just received a new asus a7n266-vm motherboard from newegg, and upon the first boot up, the computer freezes after posting the cpu speed and the ram. i unplugged everything else except for cpu, ram, and k/b. I believe there is something funny going on with the keyboard. when I unplug it, and plug it back in, that seems to 'unfreeze' the screen and i can get into bios from there. I searched all over the net and just one other person on some other newsgroup has this problem, but no luck yet. any ideas? thanks.

 

[WalMart1564]

do you have another keyboard to test ? and is the keyboard usb ?
some older chipsets dont like usb2 devices

 

[bidnessman]

thanks for the fast response.

yea i tried two keyboards, and then tried both on another comp and they worked, so i'm sure the k/b's work.

both keyboards are ps/2

 

[mechBgon]

More details please and do not hot-plug PS/2 devices (round keyboard/mouse plugs).

 

[bidnessman]

hi,

i plug in the k/b before booting it up and that's when I get the frozen screen. i actually learned not to hot plug in ps/2 devices from a friend, but on another newsgroup someone said when they unplugged the k/b and then plugged it back in they were able to get it to work.
thanks.

 

[WalMart1564]

ps welcome to forums

 

[WalMart1564]

does it post just fine with no keyboard >?

 

[mechBgon]

Please give a full rundown of all the components in your computer, including the brand/model of power supply.

 

[bidnessman]

yea it does, i'm stumped. :frown:

 

[bidnessman]

let's see, i have an
asus a7n266 m/b with built in sound/vid
an athlon 1.2ghz
the power supply says "L&C technology switching power supply - model LC-300 ATX"
I got it with the case I'm pretty sure it's a cheap p/s, but i don't think it's the problem.

 

[WalMart1564]

Originally posted by: bidnessman
yea it does, i'm stumped. :frown:

you may have a bad ps/2 port do you have an usb keyboard handy ?

 

[mechBgon]

Is your 1.2GHz Athlon a 100MHz-based model, or a 133MHz-based model? It could be that your jumpering is incorrect.

Also, would you please post all the parts in your system by brand and model? It helps with the troubleshooting, which I am rather good at, since I have 22 A7N266-VM systems in my care now. edit: make that 21. Startin' to lose track here

Another possiblilty is that you've got the keyboard plugged into the mouse port (the keyboard port is the one closer to the surface of the motherboard).

 

[bidnessman]

nope all i have is a usb mouse. what's odd is that the keyboard works after i unplug and plug it back in.

 

[bidnessman]

i'm pretty sure my 1.2ghz is set for 133mhz b/c i actually changed the jumper settings to 100mhz and it posted at 900mhz. i did the same for the RAM (put it at 100mhz) as well just to see if that would help. wow 21 systems with these m/b's? i'll be happy if i could just get this '1' to work.

other parts in my system: a 30gb maxtor hard drive (plugged into the ide1) (which when i get past the frozen screen problem blue screens trying to boot up win2000, but that may be another issue)
and i have a pacific digital 48x cdrw drive as well (plugged into the ide2)

 

[mechBgon]

And your keyboard's plugged into the "bottom" PS/2 port, right, the one closest to the surface of the motherboard?

 

[bidnessman]

yep, it's plugged into the correct port. just for fun i plugged it into the mouse port and it didn't freeze up on boot up, so i'm sure it's the k/b ps/2 port

 

[mechBgon]

Try this next: take the motherboard out of the case and try it with just the keyboard, CPU/heatsink and memory. You can trip the power-switch pins with something metal to start it. If it works in this situation then maybe the I/O shield is keeping your keyboard from getting a good connection to the PS/2 port.

Also, 1) L&C power supplies = ewwww and 2) what brand is your RAM? I mentioned my work fleet and I'm afraid I am a quality snob but here is what we run: my "kids". I still need to add the latest ones, two more at work and one at home. Crucial RAM, Antec power supplies, high satisfaction

 

[bidnessman]

hi. i tried what you said, shorted the power pins and everything, and i get the same problem. you think maybe i should try to flash the bios if it happens to be an older version?

 

[mechBgon]

Next thing to try, make sure the keyboard wakeup jumper shown on page 20 of the manual is on pins 1-2, and make sure that the three jumpers shown on page 21 are also set on pins 1-2. Your PSU probably doesn't supply enough +5VSB power to meet the requirements, so you don't want any of those set to the +5VSB settings.

If all of those are set on pins 1-2, then try running the CPU and RAM at 100MHz/100MHz if you haven't already. Not knowing what brand of RAM you've got, I'm speculating a bit, but you never know. Keep trying I have to get to bed soon but I'll see how it's going when I get up.

 

[bidnessman]

so i checked all those jumpers (they were defaulted to those positions anyway) and they were all like you said. I also lowered the frequency to 100/100, and still no luck. i decided to flash the bios because the version i have is 1004 and the newest version on Asus's website is 1005. So i thought why not i'll try it. after flashing the bios i thought i had success, because now when i reboot from the 'a:' prompt (I have a boot disk in the a the screen doesn't lock up anymore right after posting cpu and ram. however, when i turn on the computer from a cold start (not rebooting) the screen still locks up.
so here are the three scenarios (with bios version 1005):

1) k/b plugged in, computer off, turn on computer, screen freezes
2) k/b unplugged, computer off, turn on computer, boots normally
3) now plug keyboard in (with computer on), and the keyboard works fine in the dos prompt. ctrl-alt-del and the computer resets and boots fine. turn computer off or hit the reset button and i am back at number 1)

it posts cpu and ram, and the next line is

"Award Plug and Play Bios extension v1.0A"

and it freezes there. the lines after this (when the k/b is not plugged in) is:

"Initialize Plug and Play cards...
PNP init complete"

thank you for your time mechBgon, and anyone else who contributes.

 

[Pilsnerpete]

I had a L&C 300w psu powering my a7n266-c. It was the crappiest, least stable psu I've ever seen.:disgust: As a result of that, [I think] my Corsair ram failed. I also tried some Crucial, to no avail! Very similar problem it seems.
I bought an Antec 350w and all my troubles went away (once I got my ram back from Corsair). At the very LEAST, change the psu and save a headache. Start from there. You don't want to wonder if it's good enough.
Next time, I'll buy a bare case for $25 and get a nice psu from the getgo


--->>Pete

 

[mechBgon]

At this point, I'm with Pete: get a name-brand power supply (Antec TruePower330 works flawlessly for ours) and name-brand RAM (Crucial PC2100 is da bomb for this board, just $45 for 256Mb right now at newegg too). If that doesn't help, RMA the motherboard but keep the new PSU and RAM... in the long run, I think you'll be glad you did.

 

[unbiased]

I have athlon1700+ with A7N266-VM mobo.Since you guys are already at it, please solve my problem also.

The system is under dual boot(win98/XP).Under win XP everything is fine .Under 98 graphics and sound crawl and blue screens occur.(I am using onboard graphics and audio).

As was instructed by mechBgon very patiently and in much deatail ,I downloaded the latest nforce driver package from Nvidia for win 98 and installed the same. still no improvement.Do I have to flash the bios to latest version? I have downloaded the same and am ready with the floppy.will it solve the problem.

 

[grifterspawn]

unbiased how old is your install of win98? maybe you just need to wipe it and start from scratch.

 

[Doomer]

FWIW, I've had this board for about 2 weeks now running a XP1700+ (b) and Windows 2000. Using a noname 320w PS from Directron. 512mb Crucial PC2700 stick. I've had zero issues.