Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler Dead MOBO?

Need some help here.

My son plays COD - MW2 and tends to leave it on all day when he goes to school, he at least turns the monitor off, big energy savings there . He came home yesterday and said the computer was doing something strange, the monitor was displaying the "no signal" screen, So we shut it down unplugged everything, reconnected and still no signal. I have tried all the video outputs (the board is a Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H and I had been running with the onboard video), VGA, DVI and HDMI to no avail. I noticed this morning the keyboard appears to be not functioning as well (not able to toggle Num lock). I fear he has baked this motherboard. Any thoughts?

Is the machine powering up? Try unplugging it, and holding the power button for 30+ seconds, then plugging it back in, and trying again.

But if the machine powers up, with no video, or keyboard activity, something broke. Could be the CPU or MB. You should get video and keyboard activity even with bad RAM. And keyboard activity even with bad video.

You need to start swapping out some parts to confirm if it is the mobo. Easiest would be the power supply and RAM.

Or, you could disconnect the power cord and let it sit for a few hours and then try again if you have no other parts to swap.

Also remember to disconnect everything except the monitor.

Good luck!

It powers up, I can hear the HDD spin up, all the fans come to life. I guess I should check the PS outputs, time to get the meter out or go buy one of these which would be more fun.

I guess it could be the PS, but that's not a very common failure mode where it can power up the motherboard, but not allow it to pass the POST.

Try unplugging everything from the board, USB headers, drive connections, etc. Leave only the monitor connected. See if it can complete the POST then (it obviously won't boot without the drives, but you can still see if it initializes the video).

If you have a spare video card around you could try installing that too. But to me the main factor is still that the keyboard doesn't show that the system is progressing through the booting process.

No spare video card and the dead keyboard is what has me worried too. I will try the disconnected MOBO method and see what happens.........

I would tend to suspect peripherals first. I'd disconnect everything but the monitor and a PS/2 keyboard (if you have one) and see what happens. Repeat with just a mouse, if it will boot without a keyboard.

As Chris mentioned the POST is your computer passing its? Listen for a “Beep Code” as the computer powers up and tell us what if anything you hear. Also look at the Motherboard itself for a LED readout. If there is one tell us what it reads after the PC powers up. If something major is failing the POST may be the easiest way to tell what it is.

I believe your motherboard uses an “Award BIOS.” though I don’t know what version you are using usually 1 short beep indicates a “good POST.” 1 long beep +2 short beeps indicates a problem with the video card. 1 long beep +3 short beeps indicates the no video card or bad memory on it.

Gigabytes usually have a 2 digit readout on the board that will give you an error code.

I suspected as much but some people are reporting beep codes on various sites with that board. Either way the POST code is IMO the place to start the troubleshooting from.

Ah, you actually did research. I just made stuff up.

It still could be the power supply or RAM, just make sure you try another P/S or RAM before scrapping the mobo.

It's more common than most people think. Besides, I'm just trying "will it" for his sake since that would be a fairly easy and inexpensive fix.

Hi, I am a computer science major

If you're son plays COD as much as some of my friends do, it is very likely that the onboard video has been burned out. This is very common among gamers. This is a disadvantage of using onboard video, because a standalone graphics card can be replaced. As the other have hinted at, I do not believe it is the power supply or any other peripherals. If I am correct, the bios codes will not tell you if it is the onboard video anyways. Good luck!

The link to the manual may help.

http://www.gigabyte.us/Support/Motherboard/Manual_Model.aspx?ProductID=2691&ver=#anchor_os

I would also try removing the watch-like battery from the motherboard for about a minute. This will reset your bios and it may start up. Its a long shot, but it just might work.

The battery trick doesn't help much these days. The settings are stored in flash on most boards now. The only thing removing the battery does is make the clock lose its time. There'll be a setting reset jumper or solder pods on the board, which will be the recommended way to reset the BIOS settings.

You can still do the battery trick but you have to keep it out for at least a minute, shorting out the jumpers is much quicker, but ti didn't help in my case. I have tried all the suggestions, no luck. I have even bought the PS tester I linked to earlier and the P/S is good. Looks like I am buying a new mobo. Luckily it is an older system and they appear to have dropped a little in price, only $65-100.

The reason my son was using my computer was his was in need of a better video card so it looks like I will simply buy him a new card and then get my system back together when I feel I need to.

I like the price/features of the Sapphire Radeon HD5750. $150 was the limit I set for my search crteria.

$150 for a Radeon 5750 is highway robbery. I would go with a 4870 or a 4890 for that price, if you can find one. Sure, you don't get DX11, but you'll actually be able to run games at a respectable resolution.

OK, fine, Canadian prices, but still!

Oh well, it was worth a try. Gotta eliminate all possibilities before buying right?

I have a single EVGA GTX 260 in my pc!

Or make it a 5770.

I had thought about the older but slightly better 4870/4890 but was unable to locate any around here. The 5770 up here was beyond my price point, granted by only $30 but I was pushing my luck with spending $150. The 5750 looks to get respectable numbers compared to what is/was out there. I am busy reinstalling Vista on my sons PC as it didn't take kindly to a previous set up we had going on it. I should be able to see how the revamped system runs with COD - MW2 later today

Thanks for all the help!