Possible GA-MA770T-UD3 problem

[jeggsy]

Just built myself a new system and having problems with it.

It's the following spec:-

Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3 (Ver 1.4)
AMD Athlon II X2 265 with retail HSF
2x 1Gb 1333 Kingston HyperX DDR3
550w Antec Basiq PSU
PNY Geforce 9800GT
Coolermaster Centurian 5 II case

The system build went fine but the problems started when I got to power on.

It booted OK several times at first. I went into the bios to make sure everything was recognised OK which it was. Memory, HD's, CPU, etc all detected fine. CPU temperature was about 30'C. I left it running for about 5 minutes as I was digging out my Windows CD and then went to reboot it to start installing Windows but the system won't boot properly now.

All that happens now is the fans spin up on the CPU, Case, & VGA card. The HD's spin up. I get no beeps and no VGA display.

I've tried taking out memory, VGA card, HD's etc but still get no beeps and still won't POST. All the power cables are in (24 pin and 8 pin sockets). I've tried reseating the CPU. Tested VGA card in another PC and that's OK.

Reset the bios by using the jumper in the clear bios pins but that made no difference. Removed bios battery for 30 minutes and that made no difference.

The thing that worries me is that I hear no beeps at all now. Originally it beeped during POST when it worked to start with. I get no beeps with memory out, VGA out etc.

What do you guys think ? ?  faulty motherboard ? ?

[Dark Mantis]

Well firstly welcome to the Forum.

Bad luck that. Everything working fine until you turn on the power

All joking apart it sounds like everyhting was ok to start with and then after a while something happened. Usually that would make me think of overheating somewhere. The first place to check if you are using the stock cooler is to make sure all the connections are firm and it is seated properly with the fan turning as normal. Make sure everything feels cool to the touch.

[jeggsy]

Thanks for the reply....

Thought of that straight away. The CPU heatsink was pretty cool to the touch.

That's the strange thing to me... It was all working to start with.

It just seems that what ever I change or do, the result is the same with no POST, beeps, display.

[Dark Mantis]

Are the case fans, cpu fan, PSU fan, etc all working?

[jeggsy]

Yep all fans spin up on CPU, VGA, case. The HD's spin up as well. The DVD drive tray works as well.

What I have noticed is that once you powered the system up, you have to hold the power button in for a while to power it off again. It's only done this since this boot issue.

[Dark Mantis]

The holding the power button in to shut down is just a BIOS setting.

I would suggest we start off by clearing the CMOS and loading the Optimised BIOS Defaults. That will put us back on a level playing field to start with. Make any other changes like the boot order and disabling the floppy drive to suit yourself and then press F10 to save and exit.

We'll work through the rest tomorrow.

[jolphil]

Thought of that straight away. The CPU heatsink was pretty cool to the touch.

I think I would be more comfortable if the heatsink was a bit warm..That would mean theres heat  transfer from the CPU to the Heat sink..
I know this sounds a bit strange but  it makes sense to me..
Goodluck
jolphil

[Dark Mantis]

Thought of that straight away. The CPU heatsink was pretty cool to the touch.

I think I would be more comfortable if the heatsink was a bit warm..That would mean theres heat  transfer from the CPU to the Heat sink..
I know this sounds a bit strange but  it makes sense to me..

Good point but if the OP has only had it on for a short time it might not be that different.

Jeggsy, when you installed the heatsink did you have to remove any plastic cover on the thrermal paste underneath?

[jeggsy]

The holding the power button in to shut down is just a BIOS setting.

I would suggest we start off by clearing the CMOS and loading the Optimised BIOS Defaults. That will put us back on a level playing field to start with. Make any other changes like the boot order and disabling the floppy drive to suit yourself and then press F10 to save and exit.

We'll work through the rest tomorrow.

Can't get into the bios. The PC doesn't get that far when booting up.

I have tried reseting the bios using the jumper and also removing the battery for about 30 minutes all without sucess. All I get is the fans spinning up and nothing else. The VGA doesn't get a signal from the computer either as the light just flashes on my monitor.

Still get a sneaky feeling it's a dead motherboard.

[jeggsy]

Thought of that straight away. The CPU heatsink was pretty cool to the touch.

I think I would be more comfortable if the heatsink was a bit warm..That would mean theres heat  transfer from the CPU to the Heat sink..
I know this sounds a bit strange but  it makes sense to me..
Goodluck
jolphil

The Heatsink was warm but not overly warm but then the PC wasn't on that long really.

I had checked in the bios and the CPU temperature was about 30'C and the CPU fan was spinning.

There was no covering on the underside of the heatsink/fan. I double-checked this when I re-installed the CPU. This was confirmed as there was a smearing of thermal compound on the CPU as well as the heatsink.

[Dark Mantis]

Well it could be a faulty CPU, motherboard or PSU.

[jeggsy]

I'm going to speak to the supplier and see if I can get the CPU and motherboard RMA'ed.

I can get another PSU from work to test.

I did have a thought.......

The motherboard was a Rev 1.4 board with F7 bios. Apparently this version board needs F8 bios to accept the new AMD Athlon X2 265 CPU.

When the board booted originally it picked up the CPU OK speed wise and voltage wise.

This wouldn't cause an issue would it ? ?

[absic]

Hi there,

Yes, that could well be the problem, if the board is running an older BIOS than your CPU needs.

As you can't get into BIOS you might not be able to update it without access to a compatible CPU. If you point this out to your supplier they might be able to RMA the motherboard and flash it with the latest BIOS for you.

[jolphil]

Hi Again,
It might be a good thing to check the system out of the case laying it out on a table before sending it back..It won't cost you much time and just might reveal an installation problem ie: something grounding, or shorted to the case..
Worth a try,
goodluck,
jolphil

[absic]

Good point jolphil.

These kind of things can be caused by the motherboard not being fitted properly inside the PC case or an odd screw or stand-off lying underneath it causing such problems.