Flashing Red LED's on Sabertooth Z77

tsabotta

Honorable
Nov 5, 2013
4
0
10,510
Hi all...new to the forums here so bare with me if I leave details out.

I have a confusing issue as there is really no red LED that actually stays on.

Basically, the build consists of: Sabertooth Z77 mobo (bought off eBay used), GTX 660 TI (Refurb), i5 3570K, G. Skill Sniper F3-12800CL9D-8GBSR (9-9-9-24 1.5V), Western Digital Black 500GB, cheap PSU that will be replaced in a couple days with a Rosewill 750W, Azza Solano 1000 case.

So, I can boot the computer, I see the main screen and it goes to boot windows. About 5 seconds in, I get three LED flashes and the computer restarts. In order, there's a light by the CPU, then by the Ram, then by the video card. I can get in to the bios and change settings and really have no issues there. The hard drive is good as I am using right now to make this post. Same with video card.

I have tried different ways of having the memory in, such as single channel, dual channel, different channels (A1,B1, A2,B2, etc).

I am a bit baffled about three different LED's coming on though. They don't all come on at the same time either, The CPU one comes on first, then goes off, then the RAM one comes on and off then the video card comes on and off then the computer restarts (does not actually shut off). All the lights go on and off in about 3-4 seconds. Also, with the intel cooler, is there supposed to be a back metal plate on the motherboard? I had to take this off to even have a chance of getting that cooler on. I've seen pictures of the cooler seated from the front but never from behind the mobo so I can't see if anyone has that metal plate on. I am assuming that the previous owner used an aftermarket cooler and this is the mounting bracket/plate that came with the mobo to use.

Steps I've done to try and narrow down my issue:
Taken mobo out of case and put on a box with nothing connected but 1 stick of ram and the PSU (yes, the eight pin IS connected)
Tried to reseat the CPU, but I am having a real hard time getting the stock intel cooler off.

I've always been shady of going intel because of the cost, and I just don't know now. I'm ready to turn around and send everything back and go AMD. I'm not sure how to flash bios and all that and really don't think I'd need to considering I actually get the windows boot screen, but it crashes after that.

Any ideas would be great. I really want to get this build going as I'm really excited about it, but super baffled also.
 
Solution
the newest bios file for our mb is the 2104 bios. all you do is download it and then go into the bios and run the bios updater.point to where the file is. if you want it even simple rename the file to z77st.cap[ put it on a usb stick and put the stick into the usb flashback port on the back of the mb with the power off. push in the flashback button and let it run. in the bios make sure the bios running standard speed and you have the ram set to xmp profile under the ai tweeker (dram speed line). the mvp video software is junk if you installed it it can cause reboot issues. if you did use f8 safe mode and remove it. in the bios set the primany display to pec/pci to ipgpu and make sure muilt monitor is off.
the newest bios file for our mb is the 2104 bios. all you do is download it and then go into the bios and run the bios updater.point to where the file is. if you want it even simple rename the file to z77st.cap[ put it on a usb stick and put the stick into the usb flashback port on the back of the mb with the power off. push in the flashback button and let it run. in the bios make sure the bios running standard speed and you have the ram set to xmp profile under the ai tweeker (dram speed line). the mvp video software is junk if you installed it it can cause reboot issues. if you did use f8 safe mode and remove it. in the bios set the primany display to pec/pci to ipgpu and make sure muilt monitor is off.
 
Solution
on your build did you wipe and do a clean install of windows?? if not the mb and rig going to do wierd stuff. boot into safe mode and remove the older mb drivers and make sure the newer z77 chipset drivers are installed. (on your cheap power supply look to see if there one or two rails).
unit may be so weak it dropping and your seeing the mb reboot from it.
 

tsabotta

Honorable
Nov 5, 2013
4
0
10,510


I did not do a clean install. I ordered a 120GB SSD, but didn't realize that I needed to get a 2.5" kit to be able to mount the SSD in my case. So, I just wanted to use this HDD until the kit came in. What button gets you to safe mode? F8? Also, when the computer restarts, it asks to start windows normal or run in recovery mode. When it goes to recovery mode, all USB functions are disabled so I can't even do anything.
 

tsabotta

Honorable
Nov 5, 2013
4
0
10,510
Well I have it sort of working. I hooked my ssd hdd up and did a clean install. Booted up no problem but windows didn't install any kind of drivers or anything. So I have no Internet. Could have sworn I had the disk for the mobo but can't find it anywhere. I don't have access to another pc. Is there any easy way to at least get the ether net controller installed?

Update: I put the old computer back together and have everything downloaded hopefully. Will update this if/when I get this thing working lol.
 

tsabotta

Honorable
Nov 5, 2013
4
0
10,510
Well everything is working now it seems and all I can say is wow fast! Got all the drivers installed and am posting from the new computer! It seems all I needed to do was wipe the hdd and install a new OS. Drivers must have been so mismatched that windows wanted nothing to do with it.