Well, my luck has run out

[Wolf52]

I started the day with two working computers and some new hardware, and now i have 0 working computers. My plan was to put my current motherboard, cpu and ram into a new case with a new power supply for my parents. Even before i opened the case to work on it, already something was wrong. Even though it was working this morning just fine, now merely moving it home has made it completely fail after working flawlessly for 3 years. When i try to boot it up, it starts for about a second and the fans spin, but then it immediately shuts off. No post sounds, nothing. After many many troubleshooting methods i finally butterboarded it, with only the processor, ram, and psu connected to the motherboard while it was on a piece of wood. Still has the same problem. Both the power supply that was working perfectly today and the new one i bought (350 watt) do not change the problem. So thats problem number 1.

For the second one, i had bought a new motherboard, processor, and ram. I am still using the same power supply however (550 watt 3 years old, only 4 pin 12v cpu power connector though). The system powers up, but now i just get a short beep that repeats once every 3 seconds. After doing that for a short time it powers itself off, then after a couple seconds it powers back up and tries again, to no avail.

Ive spent all day on this, and i am at a complete loss.

 

[knuckles356]

Go through the new build checklist:
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/ [...] -checklist

After the checklist, try this:
Pull everything except the CPU and HSF. Boot. You should hear a series of long
single beeps indicating memory problems. Silence here indicates, in probable order, a bad PSU, motherboard, or CPU - or a bad installation where something is shorting and shutting down the PSU.

To eliminate the possiblility of a bad installation where something is shorting and shutting down the PSU, you will need to pull the motherboard out of the case and reassemble the components on an insulated surface. This is called
"breadboarding" - from the 1920's homebrew radio days. I always breadboard a new or recycled build. It lets me test components before I go through the trouble of
installing them in a case.

If you get the long beeps, add a stick of RAM. Boot. The beep pattern should change to one long and two or three short beeps. Silence indicates that the RAM is shorting out the PSU (very rare). Long single beeps indicates that the BIOS does not recognize the presence of the RAM.

If you get the one long and two or three short beeps, test the rest of the RAM. If good, install the video card and any needed power cables and plug in the monitor. If the video card is good, the system should successfully POST (one short beep, usually) and you will see the boot screen and messages.

Note - an inadequate PSU will cause a failure here or any step later.
Note - you do not need drives or a keyboard to successfully POST (generally a single short beep).

If you successfully POST, start plugging in the rest of the components, one at a time.
Reply to jsc Revove from the list of quoted messages Add to the list of quoted messages

 

[Wolf52]

Well, after the ram step the beeping changes to the short beep every 4 or 5 seconds thing i had when everything else was connected. I'm not sure what its supposed to mean, because i dont think that counts as "continuous". One short beep should mean success but then why does it repeat after a long delay? The manual says if its continuous beeps that theres a "power error", even though i know the power supply works perfectly fine. The only other thing with short beeps is a cmos error, i'll reset that next.

 

[mamw93]

on the second comp the beep is a RAM problem

 

[Wolf52]

You mean the very short beep every 3 or 4 seconds? Ive heard that only having the 4 pin 12v connector will cause issues with that motherboard, theres another thread on here someplace about that. I also doubt its the memory because its brand new and definitely of the correct specs that are supported by the motherboard. Ive also gotten different error posts after connecting and disconnecting items like fans and cd/hard drives, so my conclusion is that it was the power supply.