Hi.
I've got a problem, and I dont tknow what to make of it. Oh! and sorry for the long post.
First, the affected hardware:
ASUS M2N4-SLI, bios rev:??
AMD Athlon 64 3500+ @ std clock
2 x 1Gb (some brand ddr2) @ std clock
1 x PALIT GeForce 7950GT 512Mb @ std clock
1 x 250Gb Seagate IDE Hdd
1 X 80 Gb IBM IDE Hdd
Sometimes when I start my computer, it won't start up properly.
The harddrives tend to spin up to just about max rpm and then spin down "halfways" to a stop, then up again. and so on and so on. In conjuction to the harddrives i also hear a a ticking sound from my DVD-rom every other second or so, which for me indicates the PATA controller resets over and over again.
This continues for a long period of time, sometimes the harddrives spin up to the point where it initializes itself (or whatever it does, it's whacking around with the drive heads a bit, I know you all heard it) and then in the middle of the initialization spins down to half rpm again. I have noticed that the longer the computer stays on in this state the longer it takes for the PATA bus to reset and spin down the disks (talking about <1 second longer).
After allot of mucking about (usually i just have to press the powerbutton or resetbutton in the exact moment) the harddrives spins up and initialises as they should, the next problem occurs.
At POST i get 1 long and 3 short beeps, which i've read means EGA graphics faliure OR Video ram falure (depends on who wrote the post, and hey what's the big difference, broken gfx or broken gfx ram
).
My first suspiccon at this point is that the PSU is bad, anyone agree?. But wait, there's more .
I've replaced the PSU with a smaller one (420W noname kind of thing, i had a 520W ace PSU before i changed), same problem. I've tried to disconnect everything except the motherboard, graphics adaptor and USB keyboard, same problem allthough if i leave the computer on i get post beeps again after 2 - 8 minutes (varies). This leads me to believe the graphics adaptor is borked or that the SLI connector on my mobo is bad. Anyone agree?
But if I (I know it's not wise to do so but anyways..) boot into windows when finally getting the puter to work, either directly from cold start, or from some muccing about, start up a game (in this case WoW) and fiddle a bit with the GFX adaptor whilst powered on. This should crash the puter/game or show bad textures if there is a bad connection somewhere in the vecinity of the gfx adaptor. Agree, anyone?
However this does not happen. Once i get the computer running it runs until i shut it down, no random restarts, no bsod's (tho WoW sometimes crashes out to windows). When i try to turn it on again after 1 minute < 20 hours, it may just start up normally the next time i power it on. Wierd!
I've tried to boot up with a PCI graphics adaptor, and the PCI-E adaptor removed and disconnected. At this point i get no errors.
Oh and i've run Memtest86 overnight, reported no errors. Is there an app that does the same thing for the vid ram?
So, Any ideas on how to proceed? If new hardware is to be bought, where should i start replacing? (GFX, PSU, Mobo?)
I've got a problem, and I dont tknow what to make of it. Oh! and sorry for the long post.
First, the affected hardware:
ASUS M2N4-SLI, bios rev:??
AMD Athlon 64 3500+ @ std clock
2 x 1Gb (some brand ddr2) @ std clock
1 x PALIT GeForce 7950GT 512Mb @ std clock
1 x 250Gb Seagate IDE Hdd
1 X 80 Gb IBM IDE Hdd
Sometimes when I start my computer, it won't start up properly.
The harddrives tend to spin up to just about max rpm and then spin down "halfways" to a stop, then up again. and so on and so on. In conjuction to the harddrives i also hear a a ticking sound from my DVD-rom every other second or so, which for me indicates the PATA controller resets over and over again.
This continues for a long period of time, sometimes the harddrives spin up to the point where it initializes itself (or whatever it does, it's whacking around with the drive heads a bit, I know you all heard it) and then in the middle of the initialization spins down to half rpm again. I have noticed that the longer the computer stays on in this state the longer it takes for the PATA bus to reset and spin down the disks (talking about <1 second longer).
After allot of mucking about (usually i just have to press the powerbutton or resetbutton in the exact moment) the harddrives spins up and initialises as they should, the next problem occurs.
At POST i get 1 long and 3 short beeps, which i've read means EGA graphics faliure OR Video ram falure (depends on who wrote the post, and hey what's the big difference, broken gfx or broken gfx ram
).My first suspiccon at this point is that the PSU is bad, anyone agree?. But wait, there's more
.I've replaced the PSU with a smaller one (420W noname kind of thing, i had a 520W ace PSU before i changed), same problem. I've tried to disconnect everything except the motherboard, graphics adaptor and USB keyboard, same problem allthough if i leave the computer on i get post beeps again after 2 - 8 minutes (varies). This leads me to believe the graphics adaptor is borked or that the SLI connector on my mobo is bad. Anyone agree?
But if I (I know it's not wise to do so but anyways..) boot into windows when finally getting the puter to work, either directly from cold start, or from some muccing about, start up a game (in this case WoW) and fiddle a bit with the GFX adaptor whilst powered on. This should crash the puter/game or show bad textures if there is a bad connection somewhere in the vecinity of the gfx adaptor. Agree, anyone?
However this does not happen. Once i get the computer running it runs until i shut it down, no random restarts, no bsod's (tho WoW sometimes crashes out to windows). When i try to turn it on again after 1 minute < 20 hours, it may just start up normally the next time i power it on. Wierd!
I've tried to boot up with a PCI graphics adaptor, and the PCI-E adaptor removed and disconnected. At this point i get no errors.
Oh and i've run Memtest86 overnight, reported no errors. Is there an app that does the same thing for the vid ram?
So, Any ideas on how to proceed? If new hardware is to be bought, where should i start replacing? (GFX, PSU, Mobo?)
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