Intel S5000XVNSATAR dual xeon build problems, please help

[metro_digital]

I have just built a dual xeon E5420 workstation and have run into a couple of issues. At firt when I started it up for the first time, there was no post test, and no signal to the screen. After a lot of cable checking and readjusting, it finally got into bios. I have now successfully installed windows and everything seems fine. There are just a few niggling issues I have though.

Firstly, when the system wasn't booting for the first time, I hastily removed my 2nd Xeon processor thinking there was a fault with it. I now want to stick it back in, but the thermal compound from the stock intel heatsink is now all messy on the heatsink and heatspreader. Will it matter if I just stick it back as it was, or do I now need to clean all the paste off, and reapply new compound?

Secondly, I am using the Intel S5000XVNSATAR workstation board, and just want to confirm with anyone who is using this board how it starts up. When I power up I get about 30 secs of no signal to the screen, and all the LED's are flashing between red, amber & green, it then eventually settles down to just 1 green one at the top that blinks, then the system boots up? Is this normal, as I thought red & amber led's mean faults in the hardware setup

Lastly, I bought 2 Thermalright HR-01 X's with silent 120mm fans for cooling my xeons, but sadly they do not fit in my case (an Antec P190) They would fit, except the P190 has a huge 200mm fan attached to the side panel, and it hits the top of the HR-01's. Has anyone successfully removed the 200mm fan. I am currently now using the stock coolers that came with the xeons, but they are unbelievably loud, so I'd love to be able to use my HR-01's.

Also if I can't remove the big fan, does anyone know how to make the stock coolers quieter, by maybe throttling their speed or something?

Any help will be more than appreciated.
Thanks

 

[evongugg]

1) Clean it off with rubbing alcohol or acetone. Follow these instructions for reapplying:

http://www.arcticsilver.com/ins_route_step2intelas5.html

 

[themagni]

I'm in the middle of pricing out that board for a CAD system.

The user's guide for that board is here:

http://download.intel.com/support/motherboards/server/s5000xvn/sb/d36222004_s5000xvn_user_guide.pdf

System Boot Quiet Time

The power-on self test (POST) process includes a quiet time, during which the system
may appear to be hung. This may last as long as 40 seconds. Do not power off or reboot
the system during this time. The POST LEDs will indicate activity. They may alternate
blinking between amber and green. When the quiet time completes, the status LED will
change to solid green.

So, that's normal. It's weird for a board to do that, but it's normal for this board.