Do I have a Bad Mobo or A Bad CPU or Both, Don't Know how to tell

[FatTireDrinker]

A computer I built for my mother a little over six months ago, asus PS400-MX mobo, 2.8 prescott, radeon 9800 pro, antec 350W fanless power supply, 80g hd, and run of the mill cd writer and cd rom. Two days ago she went to turn it on and only the fans came on, no display on the monitor, but the green led is lit on the mobo and she had to unplug the power cord to get it to shut off. Now I have the PC at my apartment and I disconnected everthing from the mobo except the video card, reset the cmos and I still get the same thing. I even took my working 2.4 pentium out of my desktop and put it in the other mobo, same thing. And since I was at it I took the Prescott out of hers and put it in mine, the same thing happened in my desktop but this time I could shut it off by holding the powerswitch for about 5 seconds. Now I am just guessing but it seems to me that the mobo and the cpu are shot , but I am not sure that I am leaving any tests out. Do I have to do anything before/after I switched the cpus between motherboards other than resetting the cmos? I'm pretty sure I am going to have to order something new but I don't want to order both a cpu and mobo if only one of them is bad, any help would be greatly apprectiated.

 

[rclarke250]

Her 2.8 prescott has what speed FSB? does your system board support the prescott cpu and at that FSB speed?
Can your board support it with a bios flash? the prescott cpu when installed in your system board, acts like not detecting or an unsupported cpu...Mother's system board is exhibiting the symptoms I've seen as a bad system board. Did you try clearing the cmos? and then putting it back together? Also it should be noted that CPU's don't fail all that often, unless there is a problem with heat.

 

[FatTireDrinker]

You know now that I think about it I don't think my board does support a prescott, it is older, I did clear the cmos though. Would you suggest I replace the mobo with the same asus board then and try that.

 

[FatTireDrinker]

O yeah, her FSB is 800 mine is 533, my board is a VIA p4px-400

 

[FatTireDrinker]

sorry my board is a p4pb-400 FL

 

[rclarke250]

I would say given what you have already done, then replacing the system board is the way to go, If you have the receipt, Asus has 3 yr warranty on motherboards.

 

[paparazi]

FatTireDrinker
Much more likely to be a bad power supply! although this would be unusual for a high quality Antec PSU.
Second choice would be the graphics card
The motherboard would be right down my list
Obviously a Prescott needs a Prescott ready motherboard on which to be tested but like I say the CPU and Motherboard would be way down on my list of suspects.

Martin


We like members to GIVE and not just TAKE.
Participate and help others.

 

[rclarke250]

Easy to test the vide, as the -MX should have integrated video, just pull the agp card and try to boot. swap power supplies between the 2 computers to test the power supply. But if the system hasn't been moved, and the power supply tests good, it acts like a system board that is not finishing post.

 

[FatTireDrinker]

I forgot to mention that I did try my 460w power supply on the non working computer, samething as with the antec. I also pulled the video card and tried the onboard graphics samething. Sorry I forgot to leave those details out but my message was pretty long to begin with and I didn't want you to have to read a book to help me out. Thank you very much for the replies.

 

[shawna]

shawna

i had the same problems with my new abit vh6 board.
The answer for me was a new sdram (dont use the old ones)and wonder it start up np anymore .