is my mobo dead?

folken

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Sep 15, 2002
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I am fairly certain that my mobo is dying on me. When I try to start the computer it will randomly freeze during boot up, it also freezes when I'm in the BIOS. When and if I can get to the desktop it freezes in about a minute or less. Each time it freezes the monitor will blink off and then blink back on and everything will be frozen. I first assumed it was the video card doing something because of my overclocking it but I ruled that out by putting several other video cards in and having it do the same thing. Also, the hd acess light just stays on, it no longer blinks it just stays on. I tried tearing the machine to the bear minimum to boot just in case it was one of the cards causing problems but it still failed. I have already tried flashing the cmos and reconfiguring things but it either would freeze before I could change anything or it didn't help. Another thing it does is turn off or reset for no reason. It does that when/if I get to the desktop sometimes. That made me think of the powersupply being overloaded, but it still did it when I unplugged everything but what was necissary to boot. I'll try a different powersupply but I don't think that will work.

Here are my stats:
PIII 801mhz
ECS P6IWP-FE i810e motherboard
nVidia Riva TNT2 m64 32mb PCI (overclocked)
SoundBlaster Live! Value
512mb pc133
120gb ata133 7200rpm maxtor
52x liteon cd-rom
8x4x32 sony cd-r
16x48 Pioneer DVD
250watt power supply
Windows XP Pro (sp1)

I have been wanting to replace my mobo for a while now so this could be a reason to. If there is something I should try let me know, I could still get some use out of it. If you need more info just ask.
Any suggestions are welcome!

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by folken on 02/16/03 11:18 PM.</EM></FONT></P>
 

scamtrOn

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ram then power suply. i think you fried your ram also the psu could be it

<font color=orange><b>as you get older, your hard drive becomes floppy, but don't fear viagra is here. viagra puts the hard back in your drive!!!
 

folken

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I put in new ram and a new powersupply and it still isn't working. Can I now blame the motherboard? Or could it be the cpu now?
Any more ideas?
 

obironbo

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Feb 18, 2003
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Folken,

I had the same problem with an MSI 1GHz Athlon motherboard with KT133 Via chipset. After several weeks of doing the same things you did, I discovered that the motherboard was blown. Most likely a power surge blew the caps on the board in several places. If you look at the caps (at least the electrolytics) their tops should be flat. If they have domed tops then they may be blown. That was my problem. Replaced the board with a Gigabyte board and everthing is ok so far. I'm still concerned about the power supply but it's not been a problem yet.

Hope this helps.

Ron
 

Crashman

Polypheme
Former Staff
I suggest you replace the board with an Asus CUBX. Why the CUBX? It's a good, solid BX chipset board (the best PIII chipset), Socket 370, and cost around $25 on Ebay. BTW, I don't trust Ebay sellers with more than $100 of my money.

<font color=blue>Watts mean squat if you don't have quality!</font color=blue>
 

farhananwar

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Mar 14, 2003
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Definitly its a Powersupply prob., ur mobo is not getting enough power to suit the needs, RAM might be second option if the prob persists after changing the power supply. Plz turn off overclockin till the prob is solved. OC takes a bit more core voltages at high load times....