stormy Posted August 24, 2007 Share Posted August 24, 2007 Hi, I am clutching at straws now with my PC, I have the following system: Antec P180 Case Asus P5K Deluxe/WIFI-AP Intel E6600 Core 2 Duo (no overclocking) 2Gb Crucial Ballistix PC8500+ Ram HIS Radeon X1900XT 512Mb PCI-e Corsair HX520W Power Supply WD 500Gb SE16 SATA II WD 320GB SE16 SATA II Soundblaster Audigy 2ZS PCI I have a problem where my system usually will not post (it sometimes does) with my Corsair HX520W PSU. I thought the motherboard was faulty so returned it and got a replacement, this new one is doing the exact same thing. For more background: http://www.houseofhelp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=62642 Someone has mentioned on another forum about ram voltage levels and I have set those to 2.2v manually (although I assume the mobo must have done it automatically anyway?). Does this behaviour of sometimes posting and sometimes not suggest a faulty PSU? Anyone have any ideas? Cheers, Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormy Posted August 24, 2007 Author Share Posted August 24, 2007 Hmm. I am beggining to think its either PSU and Memory related with respect to compatibility with the motherboard: See: http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?t=230083 and http://www.redflagdeals.com/forums/showthread.php?t=455924 Both seem identical to my problem but with different ram and different PSU. Hmmm.. Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yellowbeard Posted August 24, 2007 Share Posted August 24, 2007 You'll need to set that memory voltage to 2.2v max. The MOBO will not do this automatically. At this point, I would suggest testing the memory with http://www.memtest.org Since you have an ASUS MOBO, you'll need to disable Legacy USB Support in the bios to run this test. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsair Employees RAM GUY Posted August 24, 2007 Corsair Employees Share Posted August 24, 2007 Also make sure you have the latest BIOS for the board and be sure to load setup defaults after updating the BIOS. Then you will want to configure your memory and test it with http://www.memtest.org! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormy Posted August 25, 2007 Author Share Posted August 25, 2007 Hi, Thanks for replies, I have the latest release P5K Deluxe/WIFI-AP BIOS which is 0404 (I dont want to risk Beta BIOS revisions at this point) Memtest had 3 clear passes before I stopped it, seemed fine. http://i204.photobucket.com/albums/bb181/stormyuk/IMG_0125.jpg Any more ideas? Cheers, Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yellowbeard Posted August 25, 2007 Share Posted August 25, 2007 Can you describe EXACTLY what you are doing on the occasions the system does not post? Do you mean it does not even power on or spin up the fans or, does it black screen or what? Then, what is it you do to get it to post? FWIW, we have a LOT of these MOBOs being run with our PSUs in the lab and there are no compatibility issues. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormy Posted August 25, 2007 Author Share Posted August 25, 2007 This is the problem. I am doing NOTHING. The machine has standby power, green light on motherboard. I then switch on the power button, power comes on, PSU spins up, drives spin up, CPU fan spins up, case fans spin up and they keep spinning. The machine just never posts, it just *sits there* with full power, spinning away but no graphics output, no post, nada. Then *randomly* the machine will post. The old board just stopped posting completely, I had it out of the case on the bench, tried other PSUs, the works. I have already returned one P5K board to Novatech UK last week who said the board first worked for them, and then wouldnt post again. This replacement board seems to have the same behaviour, I can't troubleshoot the problem because I can't see any reason why it sometimes works and sometimes doesnt. The only thing I changed with the old P5K was to add the Corsair HX520W PSU. So thats why I wondered if the P5K: a) some compatibility issue, where the PSU didnt initiate propely with the board and hence no post, but powers. b) a faulty PSU or c) RAM which the P5K doesnt 100% like properly, Memtest is fine and the memory is listed as QVL certified by Asus. (I have only just forced it to 2.2v though so that may have cured it, I really don't know until the day I power down and suddenly I cannot post again! or the day I have to do a BIOS upgrade! :( ) Its truely the most odd problem I have ever had with a PC. As I say, at the moment the PC is working fine and I dare not switch the power off for fear that I wont be able to boot back up again, I am not sure if there is some problem with the P5Ks in general either as my last one I only noticed the problem when I replaced the PSU, then it worked for a while until I changed the GFX card cooler, then it was never working after that. I have to at some point take out my soundcard and fit some fans for my GFX card, that will be the next *big test* on if I can get power back. The original board may *always* have had the problem because I usually leave my system on 24/7 anyway, and it might just be coincidence that when I *upgrade* hardware I get the problem again. I am trying to get in touch with Novatech support guy to see what hardware PSU, RAM etc he used to test my old motherboard. I am stumped. Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yellowbeard Posted August 25, 2007 Share Posted August 25, 2007 Do I understand correctly from all of this that you only today set the RAM voltage to 2.2v? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormy Posted August 25, 2007 Author Share Posted August 25, 2007 Yes, forced 2.2v and 5-5-5-15 timings. But I have not tested powering down since this was done as I dont want to risk losing the ability to post. :) I am hoping thats fixed it, but I wondered if anyone had seen a fault like this that the PSU could cause? Cheers, Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yellowbeard Posted August 25, 2007 Share Posted August 25, 2007 Yes, forced 2.2v and 5-5-5-15 timings. But I have not tested powering down since this was done as I dont want to risk losing the ability to post. :) I am hoping thats fixed it, but I wondered if anyone had seen a fault like this that the PSU could cause? Cheers, Mike No, it's not the PSU. Your memory is designed to run at 2.2v. Your MOBO boots at a default of 1.8v. This is why you only rarely got it to post and why you were advised to raise the memory voltage to 2.2v. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormy Posted August 26, 2007 Author Share Posted August 26, 2007 Ok, thanks I hope this is the key and that I will no longer have any problems. Thanks for the advice. Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsair Employees RAM GUY Posted August 27, 2007 Corsair Employees Share Posted August 27, 2007 Please let us know if you have any more problems. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormy Posted August 28, 2007 Author Share Posted August 28, 2007 Will do, the first test will be when I need to remove my soundcard in a week or so. I will see if I can then get it to post again! :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsair Employees RAM GUY Posted August 28, 2007 Corsair Employees Share Posted August 28, 2007 NP Please let us know! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abyte2it Posted November 1, 2007 Share Posted November 1, 2007 Yes, please let us know! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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