Re: Black screen on boot: MB or PS defect?
- From: Paul <nospam@xxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 15 Oct 2011 15:14:16 -0400
Tom McCreadie wrote:
My elderly system consists of: Asus P4C800-E del, 2Gb ram / Antec Truepower
480W PS / Matrox P650 AGP video / Iiyama AS4332U monitor /Win XP SP3.
This has been hitherto rock solid, but after a recent incident, it now only
gives a black screen on start up Not a case of Windows hanging, methinks, as I
don't reach the Win XP start up screen. Indeed, I no longer even get the Asus
splash screen...or any scrolling post messages!.
The issue started some months ago: monitor screen would occasionally suddenly
start to fracture into a crazed mess of fuzzy, unreadable text. This problem
happened sporadically, but, perhaps significantly?, I could always reliably
induce this screen corruption simply by visiting the BBC iPlayer website. (Flash
overwhelming my Matrox card?). Till now I could always restore proper screen
working by restarting the pc, but on the last occasion, the screen corruption
was so severe that I had to power down the pc...and since then I only get the
black screen, thus am denied any chance to dive into the bios, or
install/uninstall other drivers etc.
The monitor works fine when hooked up to a different pc
Things I've checked so far without success:
- replacing Matrox with a Geforce 6200 AGP card
- resetting bios via MB jumper settings
- booting to a bootable Win CD
- reducing load on MB / PS by removing all peripheral cards and HD's, except for
video card.
I've no other PS available to swap in for the Antec, but last time | checked
with a software utility, the system hardware voltage rails all seemed healthy. Any pointers? Asus MB blown? I guess it's time long overdue to move on?
If you're done a "Clear CMOS", that returns the P4C800-E Deluxe to using
"full screen logo" during startup. That would normally be covering the text
during POST. One of the first things I do on that motherboard, is disable
"full screen logo", so the text will be visible. Not that it matters in this case.
Removing full screen logo, makes it easier to determine how far along in POST
it is getting. And I like to leave it that way, in case of later troubles.
So what I think we know in this case is:
1) Machine stuck at BIOS level.
2) No beep pattern to speak of (as the machine beeps a code if the BIOS detects a problem).
3) No audible error messages (as the board has the Winbond Voice chip and if you're using
motherboard Line_Out connector and have the Winbond enabled, you could also potentially
hear a message on there).
Along Krypsis line of thinking, I'd remove *all* memory DIMMs (with power completely
removed). Then, start the system. Does the computer case speaker beep a repeating
"bad RAM" message ? If it does, that means the processor has been able to execute
enough code, to be able to attempt startup of the RAM. And that's a good sign, that
BIOS code is loading. If the machine will beep, that helps test CPU, NB/SB chipset,
BIOS ROM, and so on. A lot of the system has to work, in order for it to beep.
If you get no reaction, no beeps, black screen, then that means the processor is
not able to execute code. You'd want to get a multimeter and verify voltages at
that point, because, after all, you did mention Antec Truepower, and some of
those have died with bad caps inside the power supply. I have two dead Antecs here.
On one of them, the five volt output eventually died (went out of spec), due to
leaking caps that filter that output. You get the orange/brown crud seen on the
caps in this picture. There are at least five bad caps in this picture.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/PSU_Caps.jpg
If a replacement supply won't bring it to its senses, then you have
many possibilities. If it won't beep, with the RAM removed, then also
remove the video card and retest. If a video card was to "short out" the
AGP bus, that might load the Northbridge enough to prevent proper operation
of the rest of the interfaces. So a second "beep test case", is with
both RAM and video removed.
That might leave motherboard or CPU, of which motherboard is the "weak link".
CPUs are generally pretty good, with the odd batch that "escapes proper testing"
at the factory. You don't see that too often. Your system is old enough, the
processor is not an "infant mortality". I'd tend to look at motherboard
first in that case, unless the processor has already been giving signs of
trouble. If you'd been torturing the processor, you probably would have
mentioned that by now :-) Northwood processors suffer from "sudden death"
syndrome, if you apply the right value of boosted VCore. But that might take
the max setting the BIOS has to offer, for VCore.
With regard to the chipset, there have been many motherboard failures due to
ICH5/ICH5R. But that kind of failure is very sudden - one day it works, the
next day it doesn't. The root cause could be a "latchup" failure. Sometimes,
all the USB ports blow, and the board still boots. But if you see this
burn mark, "she's dead Scotty". If it's burned like this (and the warranty
is long gone), it means finding another motherboard.
http://onfinite.com/libraries/179057/2ea.jpg
Paul
.
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