Asus Z87 Pro Mobo shows Q-Code A0 and Power LED glows RED

MoneyMark3

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Nov 30, 2013
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Hello,

I just built my first gaming pc and here are the specs:

Intel I7 4770
Asus Z87 Pro Motherboard
1 TB Western Digital Hard Drive
2 Asus GTX 760's OC Editions
8 GB ( 2 x 4 GB) G Skill Ram

The case I have is an Azza Hurrican and it has four hot swap bays inside of it. I have my hard drive connected to/ inserted into the top hot swap bay.

The following is the long story, scroll down for the short story version. Thanks.

So, I built my system and booted it and the mobo recognized every component including the optical drive and hard drive. I installed Windows 7 and other updates and updated my graphics drivers. I even went onto the Asus site and downloaded what I could in terms of updates for the motherboard.

Anyway, I noticed a glowing red light from inside my case and as I looked at the motherboard the power icon LED was glowing red and the q code screen was showing A0 (a zero). I looked it up in the manual and saw that it stands for "IDE initialization has started." I had no idea what that meant so I Googled it and found two forums where people explained that that is what is supposed to be shown.

I called up Asus and the first guy I spoke with said that it shouldn't be showing A0 because the IDE initialization should have finished and he wanted me to reconfigure my hard drive so that it doesn't use the hot swap bay. Being lazy, I didn't want to do that. However, I remembered that when I hooked up the sata cable from the hard drive to the motherboard I plugged it into the ASMedia SATA port of the motherboard which is colored dark grey and not the yellow colored Asus Sata port.

I called Asus Tech Support a second time and the next guy said to switch the SATA cable so that the hard drive connects to the lowest number yellow Asus SATA port. So I connected it to the yellow Asus SATA port 1 and the optical drive to SATA port 2.

After doing that the q code is still showing however the computer still works like it normally would.

As I write this I remember that I did not connect the e-SATA port that is at the top front of my case next to the power button and USB ports. Could this be the cause of this error? I didn't connect it because I don't plan to ever use it.

Short Story:
Built my first gaming rig. Connected everything except for the eSATA port at the top front of my case since I won't use it. At first, I had my SATA cable from the hard drive connected to the ASMedia grey colored SATA port on my mobo. Then when I switched it to the first yellow colored Asus SATA port on the mobo I still got the A0 q code. I read online that the A0 q code means everything is ok. For me, everything does seem ok since everything works on my computer and the motherboard recognized all of my components.

Am I receiving this error because I did not connect the eSATA cable to my motherboard?
Should I connect that cable or should I leave it unconnected? Does this code signify any real problem?

Anyway, what can you guys and gals suggest to me?

Thank you very much!
 
Solution
Hi Mark

A0 showing as the Q-Code once booted to the operating system is what should be shown. The code will be different if resuming from sleep or hibernation. There is nothing to be concerned about.

Praz-1

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Jul 9, 2013
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Hi Mark

A0 showing as the Q-Code once booted to the operating system is what should be shown. The code will be different if resuming from sleep or hibernation. There is nothing to be concerned about.
 
Solution

MoneyMark3

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Nov 30, 2013
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Thank you very much for your quick response. I am glad to have a piece of mind. After investing so much money into something I built by hand... it's reassuring to read your message haha. Thanks again!
 

XBrett13

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Feb 13, 2014
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But what if it stays on? should i do something about it?

 

Praz-1

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Jul 9, 2013
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Hello

As popatim wrote above different Q-Codes will be displayed depending on the state the system is booted from. The various boot up Q-Code values can be found in the owners manual of the motherboard.
 

Joe Fairweather

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Jul 16, 2014
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Well thank you for making this Qustion because this has been buging me for weeks and thought the lights go out on the Q-Code . and i did not think of looking on the web kool thnak you.