Oh no no mate never under estimate my stupidity. A lot of the stuff you came up with was stuff i hadnt looked at, once i start going down certain route i can become a wee bit blinkered, plus im not very tech savy. Id put most of my energy into researching s/ video cables and wot not when i should have been looking at the graphics card side of things.


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Errrrrr I seem to have broken it now.

I opened it up to clean the case fan and try and fit the psu in properly (it doesent fit the case i have now discovered)and when i tried to turn it back on it doesent seem to work, dang it!!!. Everything powers up on the front and all the fans start up, disc trays open and close but it doesent boot. The screen displays a logo that matches one on the mother board, so i thought everything was pointing to the power to the hdd being accidently disconected but it seems ok.

Any ideas.

My pc


Thanks
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If you are seeing the motherboard logo on-screen then the PSU, motherboard and graphics card are all working correctly. Do any of the keyboard LEDs flash when you switch it on, or are there any beeps from the system?

If it were the HDD disconnected then the system would post and then try to boot the system and after not detecting an OS to load it would show a message asking you to insert a system disk.

You might have knocked something inside the case such as the ram, which you could just make sure is all seated correctly in its slots.

Another thing could be an intrusion detector. Some motherboards have a microswitch which detects when the case is opened, then then won't boot.

Try getting into the BIOS first before doing anything else. Normally this will be by pressing the Delete key soon after switching the system on. Just keep pressing it continuously and it should eventually enter the bios. If that doesn't work then some motherboards use F2 or another key.
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Connect your pc speaker (if you haven't) to hear any sounds. Different sounds represent a different problem. Check your mobo's manual for that or search it on internet.
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This will probably end up being something really silly stopping it from booting.

As Harrision said, there are clues to what's going on in the bios and as Phantom said speaker beeps help too - also are there any messages when he computers logo is displayed?

In the bios, you have settings to halt on certain errors, all errors or no errors. Try changing it to halt on no errors. It may get it to boot, but you still have to identify the problem.

Things that can stop it booting:

• CPU fan not being connected.
• Hard drive power connector not properly seated (I know you've checked this one)
• Floppy drive cable in the wrong way (easily done if it's not tabbed)
• Memory not seated correctly
• Graphics card not seated correctly
• In fact any connector not seated correctly!
• Boot order not correct in bios (eg Hard drive, CDROM, USB stick)
• Motherboard shorting out on something (like a case standoff or something metal touching the components)

If all else fails:

Go in and check everything again - every connector - make sure the case isn't in contact with the back of the motherboard or anything metal has somehow made contact with the board.

Turn the power off by the mains (and I mean the mains) and reset the CMOS (should be a jumper to change over, or pull out the battery for 30 seconds). Don't forget to put the jumper back in its original position or it won't boot.

Start up the PC - hit delete or F2 or whatever it is for that board to enter the BIOS.

Load optimised defaults.

Set every option as you want it and make sure the hardware is being detected correctly in the various menus.

Save and restart.
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Hmmmm thanks for all the help. I havent got any speakers for pc so i cant check the beeps, i tryed to access the bios but no joy.

I checked all the connections and they seemed ok, but when i turned the computer back on the monitor isnt receiving a signal. Hmmmm a step in the wrong direction LoL.

Thanks for all the help but i think im going to call it a day i cant see me fixing this on my own.
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If the monitor is now not receiving a signal then the most obvious thing is the graphics card. Remove the graphics card from the motherboard and then put it back in. Giving it a firm push into the slot. Also make sure that if the card needs any power connectors from the PSU to be plugged in that they are, or this can stop it working.

To hear motherboard warning beeps, there is normally a PC speaker header on the motherboard close to where the HDD, power LED etc wires are plugged into the motherboard. Normally at the bottom right corner. The PC speaker connector will be a 3 or 4 pin long connector and will normally say speaker on it and be colour coded red and black. This just requires a basic speaker that is often fitted as standard to the front of older PC cases. It is worth trying to find a speaker to plug into the motherboard as the motherboard warning beeps will tell you exactly what the problem is.
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Thanks for all the help you guys gave me on this i finaly fixed it today. I reseated the graphics card and removed a stick of ram and its working fine now. I was waiting ages because id ordered a set of speakers off ebay and they took ages to arive and when they did didnt get any beebs after all the waiting.

Anyway thanks again.
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That's great to know, that you got it working again.

I guess the project is back on! If you had to remove a stick of ram, it sounds like a bad stick but it could be a config issue also. You can test each ram stick with memtest+ http://www.memtest.org/

Your board probably supports dual channel mem, so have a read about mem configs for you motherboard: http://www.nvidia.com/object/designe...50i_ultra.html

Sometimes you have to play aound with the settings in the bios to get two sticks stable in dual channel, or run them in single channel mode (they will run about 5% slower; not much difference in real world apps between dual and single channel).

Good luck with your Arcade build!
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Yes, that is great news that you managed to get it working again.

Good luck with continuing the project.
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