Computer won't boot...sometimes

[Lt_Cobalt]

I Just recently completed my first DIY rig, the specs are posted below. It took awhile to put it all together, first my case was shipped from Newegg in peices, then once i assembled it my initial power supply, an Antec Truepower II 550 watt decided to emit dangerous buzzing sounds, like something was loose. Not wanting to destroy my fairly high-end machine, I went to Best Buy and purchased an Antec NeoHE 550 watt PSU. I reinstalled everything and connected my main power cables to the mobo. However, the PSU came with both a 4 pin CPU power cable and an 8-pin. My mobo supported 8 pins, and the manual said 8 pins were preferable, so I went with that. The computer didn't boot. I promptly swapped out the 8 pin for the 4 pin and everything worked fine. After gaming for a few hours, my computer locked up on the desktop, I took this as Windows being stupid and paid it no heed. The next day my computer experienced boot problems; it would turn on, the lights and fans were active, then it would die. From that point forward the power button did nothing. In fact the computer would not turn on again until I switched off my PSU then turned it back on again. I did some research into this problem and found that resetting my CMOS might work...it didn't. The funny part about this problem is that my computer will start up and work fine sometimes, and then other times not at all. Please help me, I need my Counter-Strike fix!!


Specs:

Xion II Midtower Case
DFI Lanparty UT CFX3200-DR Socket 939 Radeon Xpress 3200
Sapphire Radeon X1900XT
Antec NeoHE 550 PSU
AMD Athlon X2 4400
2x1GB G. Skill DDR400 RAM
Samsung Floppy Drive
WD Caviar 250 GB SATA Hard Drive
Sony DVD/CD ROM Drive
Pioneer DVD+/-R Drive
Arctic Cooling 64 Pro CPU cooler
Arctic Cooling Accelero X2 VGA Cooler

 

[mrface]

you sure you didnt accidentally ground out your mobo?

other than that, it kinda sounds like a power issue.

 

[Lt_Cobalt]

No, i think the mobo is installed correctly, however it could be that the built in standofs in the case are too wide, they looked a little iffy. I am just puzzled because usually when something is broken, its broken; however when i can get my comp up and running it works awesomely.

 

[mrface]

yeah could be a fualty psu then man, do you have a known good one?

 

[Lt_Cobalt]

Unfortunately no, the only other ones i have is my initial Antec, which shipped busted, and the PSU that came with the case whcih i have heard is crap. I may have one from my old Dell comp, but I will have to see if it even has enough juice to fuel my system.

 

[mrface]

try doing barebone with only mobo, hard drive , (if you have onboard video) if not then vid card and ram and see if it is stable. and work from there

 

[Lt_Cobalt]

Yea, I was planning on eventually doing that. Some part of me just hoped that this was just something stupid that I overlooked so I wouldn't have to take my comp all apart again.

 

[Neowarex]

Well, how did it go ? Does your system work now ?

 

[Lt_Cobalt]

Yea, it works now, sorry for not posting my results. So anyway, I finally got to the point where I had to take it to Geek Squad--bad choice. They told me it was the PSU, so they replaced mine. That didn't work, still had the same problem. I then decided that it was probably my mobo, so I e-mailed Newegg and swapped it for an Abit AT8 32x. That solved it, turns out the DFI mobo I had was culprit because my comp works like a dream now! Newegg saves the day again!

 

[Neowarex]

Hehe, cool I have friends working at Geek Squad and I can say most of them are under qualified, thanks for the update and I am glad it's working now.