mysterious issue, replacement parts suggestions needed.

[phendyr]

hey folks, I've got quite a dilemma and I'm not quite sure what to do....I appreciate anybody's time to respond with suggestions.

About 1 1/2 years ago I purchased parts to build a system from Newegg (parts listed below). Everything has been running solid and great since day 1. Today I attempted to upgrade the Nvidia drivers and after completion, I rebooted the machine. on that 1st reboot, nothing booted up. The 2 case fans, cpu fan, and video card fan all ran, but nothing would boot up. Hard drives made no noise, CD ROM light doesn't flicker once, monitor displayed nothing, just black.

reseated everything to make sure connections were good - nothing

pulled video card - nothing

bought a new hard drive, and video card - nothing

pulled power supply & had it checked at Best Buy/Geek Squad - said it was fine.

They said the MB probably up & died. I just have a hard time believing that any of the equipment would fry after updating a video driver I can't boot up in safe mode to try and resolve anything. To top it off, I broke the power switch on my case in the process of all this.

So I'm going to buy a new case, and if everything else has checked ok, it has to be the MB right? Below is the list of components I purchased on the initial build, if there are better components out now (as in say an upgraded version of the original item), I would appreciate hearing your recommendations, but I would like the MB to work with the other components I still have:

COOLER MASTER Centurion RC-534-KKR5 Black Aluminum & Mesh bezel, SECC chassis ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 400W Power Supply

GIGABYTE GA-965P-DS3 LGA 775 Intel P965 Express ATX Intel Motherboard

Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 Conroe 2.13GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor Model BX80557E6400

BFG Tech BFGR76256GTOCE GeForce 7600GT 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 SLI Supported Video Card

OCZ Platinum 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit
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I had purchased an ATI Radeon HD3650 video card to test, It's better than the BFG card so I figure I might keep that one

Was looking at this case for a replacement of the Cooler Master I broke the button on:
Lian Li PC-7B plus II Black Computer Case

any recommendations on the Motherboard, would be appreciated. I'm perfectly happy with the one I have, and can replace it, but most likely improvements have been made and if I have to buy one I might as well get something better.

Thanks again, It is a sad day, and really puts me behind the 8 ball with work, but nothing I can do but get new parts and try, try again.

 

[phendyr]

*UPDATE*

I've tore the machine apart again, and started plugging things in one at a time, and trying to start it.....I now have everything plugged back in and seated properly - when I try to start up, I hear everything trying to spin up, and then the power cuts out....tries to power up again, then the power cuts out.... I take it that means the PSU is toast?

 

[wildwestgoh]

Yeah~ your PSU is "baked", replace one.

I had one similiar incident, but it died on the night I received my new PC, and good bye old hag, welcome sweetie :lol:
The incident is very similiar, but I do get success boot up after several tries, but not get your hope up just because it can after few tries, replace it, better than fry your other more expensive component.

 

[phendyr]

Thanks WWG,
Yes I have a new PSU on order:

PC Power & Cooling S61EPS 610W Continuous @ 40°C EPS12V Power Supply 100 - 240 V UL, cUL, CE, CB, TUV - Retail

figured at the time I might as well upgrade a few other things so I got a lian li case, and a new monitor

 

[jsc]

PSU is likely the problem.

However, you might have generated some kind of BIOS problem. I had finished my new build (GA-EP35-DS3P, Q6600) and I was OC'ing my way to 3.6 GHz. I got a little too aggressive with one of my settings. Hit [F10] to save and exit. PC shut down for a moment (normal), then restarted. Fans and drives spun up, then it shut down before it completed the POST. I tried to restart and the same thing happened.

I figure there's probably not much difference between a 965 and a P35 BIOS. Try clearing the the BIOS. It won't take long and it won't cost anything.

 

[phendyr]

hi JSC,
thanks for the input, clearning the BIOS is something I haven't done in the past, what exactly would be the process to do so?

thanks in advance.

 

[jsc]

Check your motherboard manual. There should be a two pin header somewhere on the motherboard.

 

[phendyr]

googled how to do that, and read that I can remove the battery to accomplish the same thing, so I did that. after 5 minutes I put it back in, and it continues to startup, die, startup die. So hopefully the new PSU will resolve this for me.

thanks again for the suggestions and help.