Computer fails to boot after I click restart?

[systemlord]

I have been seeing some strange bios behavior lately. When I first turn on my computer sometimes right after POST I see bios image logo freeze with lots of colors that are distorted. Also sometimes when I click restart computer it just hangs and doesn't reboot my computer. When in bios menu I see the letters and the [ ] around the letters blink really fast. This all started when I upgraded my graphics card from my old 7800GTX to my new 8800GTX, might this be why all this is happenning?

 

[hughyhunter]

WEll I am no expert but it really doesnt sound like a software issue. What I would do is double check everything that you layed your hands on in when you swapped cards. Double check all connections even ones you know you didnt touch. Then after you do that and it still doesnt work unistall you new card and see if it boots with your old card. If it does boot with your old card then bring your power supply to a computer place where they can benchcheck it to make sure it is supplying efficient power... you should keep in mind that a new 8800GTX will suck up a way more power than your older 7800GTX. If they are sketchy about whether your PSU is supplying sufficient power then I would shotgun the PSU, buy a PC POWER and COOLING and you'll never look back.

 

[systemlord]

WEll I am no expert but it really doesnt sound like a software issue. What I would do is double check everything that you layed your hands on in when you swapped cards. Double check all connections even ones you know you didnt touch. Then after you do that and it still doesnt work unistall you new card and see if it boots with your old card. If it does boot with your old card then bring your power supply to a computer place where they can benchcheck it to make sure it is supplying efficient power... you should keep in mind that a new 8800GTX will suck up a way more power than your older 7800GTX. If they are sketchy about whether your PSU is supplying sufficient power then I would shotgun the PSU, buy a PC POWER and COOLING and you'll never look back.

I already took my PSU to be benched, the reason I thought it was my PSU is in bios menu under "Hardware Monitoring" I saw all the voltage flucuations on my CPU Vcore, +3.3v rail and my +5v rail. My Enermax Infiniti 720W did very well under stress and all rails were solid. Sometimes my PC will lock up during Windows loading and other times it will hang after I select "restart" right before it begins to boot from bios. Any other suggestions?

 

[hughyhunter]

Did you try to install the old video card and see if that would fix the problem? Try to install the old card and if everything reverts back to working normally than maybe your dealing with a card that has hardware issues and you may need to return it for a new one. I think that a dead card would cause some problems like the ones your having... did the new 8800 gtx ever work or has it been doing this since you got it?

 

[systemlord]

Did you try to install the old video card and see if that would fix the problem? Try to install the old card and if everything reverts back to working normally than maybe your dealing with a card that has hardware issues and you may need to return it for a new one. I think that a dead card would cause some problems like the ones your having... did the new 8800 gtx ever work or has it been doing this since you got it?

Wow your not going to believe what just happenned, I went to play GRAW 2 and my game ran super choppy with lots of shuttering with my fps at 22 max. So I Alt Tabbed out of game launched CPU-Z and under Mainboard it shows Link Width 1x Max Supported 16x, so next I shut off computer then restarted my PC went to play GRAW 2 and in CPU-Z now it shows Link Width=16x Max=16x and my frame rates are back to normal.

My Graphics card has been amazing with all the games I have thrown at it since I got it, even Crysis run great. I don't get what is going on here? I don't have my old card anymore nor do I have one that I could use, damn! My bios is the only component that can change PCI-Express link speed, right?

 

[systemlord]

I restarted my computer and noticed that my Graphic Interface in CPU-Z is changing from 1x-16x PCI-Express. Which component has the ability to change my PCI Express Link Width speed from 1x to 16x? First my bios starts acting strange, then my computer fails to reboot and last something is changing my PCI-Express Link Width speed.


****UPDATED****

I just got done playing Crysis for ten minutes, so I decided to reboot and see what happens. Well I rebooted my PC and went to play Crysis again and it got really choopy right off, so I launch CPU-Z and it shows I'm at 1x PCI-E Link Width speed. The first time I played Crysis CPU-Z showed Link Width speed as 16x, so it seems that its reproducable at least. Is it possible that my bios is setting the wrong values for PCI-E?

 

[hughyhunter]

well after doing some research and reading other forums I think that your bios is the ONLY thing that can change PCI-E speeds. The only time it should is when you go SLI on older mobos it will set speed to 8x. I think that you should double check once again. Also I've heard that if you installed the new driver for the new card without unistalling the old driver first a lot of really weird things will start happening like the problems here. So unistall all display drivers new and old and go to NVidia's website and download the latest driver 169 beta form and I think that your problems will be fixed. You just need to make sure that your drivers are all unistalled first before reinstalling the new one. Stay away from the driver on the disc that came with card too.... Maybe at the same time check for bios updates.

 

[systemlord]

well after doing some research and reading other forums I think that your bios is the ONLY thing that can change PCI-E speeds. The only time it should is when you go SLI on older mobos it will set speed to 8x. I think that you should double check once again. Also I've heard that if you installed the new driver for the new card without unistalling the old driver first a lot of really weird things will start happening like the problems here. So unistall all display drivers new and old and go to NVidia's website and download the latest driver 169 beta form and I think that your problems will be fixed. You just need to make sure that your drivers are all unistalled first before reinstalling the new one. Stay away from the driver on the disc that came with card too.... Maybe at the same time check for bios updates.

Well after my last post my PC died and refused to boot, I knew there was something strange about my bios. When ever I'd go into bios menu it seemed very slow through the options and during POST I would see very bright colors in the Asus boot logo. I have had good reason to believe that it was my bios going bad, a week priror when in bios all the number would flicker crazy like.

At least I was able to rule out eveything else before anything hit the fan. In bios my voltage reading would flucuate on all my rails, So I took my DVM to the 24 pin mobo connector very carefully checked each rail and my bios was 31% off on the reading taken at the 24pin mobo connector. I have since RAM'ed the mobo and should be up and running December 5th. I will let everyone know the final outcome when its up and running again. Thanks everone for helping!