Sorry this post is so long. I recently bought several things to upgrade my computer from newegg including a new cpu, mobo, and graphics card. Here are the specs:

AMD Athlon XP 2700+ (w/ heatsink & fan)
Chaintech Nvidia Nforce 2 Ultra 400+MCP-S (7NJL6)
evga Nvidia GeForce FX 5200
Aspire Dreamer II Case (w/ 350w ATX psu)

I also got some memory on sale at Best Buy (because it was opened):

Kingston Technology Value Ram 1GB PC2700 CL2.5 (184 pin DIMM)

Now, I also bought a tube of thermal grease from radio shack, thinking that I might need it (as I had to use it when I built my last computer). I installed the CPU, but I didn't know about the thermal pad and put thermal grease on the cpu as well. Apparently, as I find out afterward, that's a no-no. I had a little trouble seating the heatsink, but I got it on and made sure that it was centered and on the foam risers. I plugged in the fan for it too. Everything else installed pretty smoothly. I used Maxtor 120GB hard drive that I bought this summer and an old Ma****a CD-RW. So I connected everything, booted up and nothing happened to start... no monitor, no beeps or anything. I checked the processor fan and it was running fine. I hit the reset button and the monitor woke up and the bios screen pooped up and it looked as if everything was ready to boot up. It was detecting the proper amout of ram and the correct processor speed, and it went on to boot up windows. However, before the windows logo or anything even popped up, there was a brief flash of a blue screen, and then the computer restarts and goes back into bios and tries to boot again. I tried fiddling with some of the bios settings to no avail. One thing I thought might be causing the problem is that I didn't reformat the hard drive, and the currently installed drivers for my old mobo and cpu and such may be screwing with the boot process. So anyway, after going through this cycle a few times without completely powering down, I just plain shut the computer off. When I attempted to turn the computer back on, I got nothing. All the fans spin and whir, and the hard drive sounds like it's booting for half a second, but then it stops, and no signal ever comes through to the monitor. I know for a fact that the graphics card works on another motherboard, so I don't think it's that. There is no distinct smell of burning coming from the processor. I have another power supply (450W ATX) that I haven't tried yet. I haven't tried clearing the bios, trying another processor or memory (I have another processor I can try, but no other compatable memory). I'm knowledgable about these things, but I'm by no means an expert. Before I proceed with any more troubleshooting I was wondering if anyone has any additional insight. Could I be dealing with a dead cpu or mobo, or is something obviously incompatable? I feel I undertook this build without some essiential knowledge, and now I feel kind of dumb :( Any advice would be appreciated.

I think you had started down the correct path with a reformat of the drive. That should clear up the BSOD, but it now sounds like you have other issues to confront first. I would

1) Disconnect all power sources, including the power supply from the motherboard.
2) Clear the bios

If you still have no luck:

3) Try another power supply
4) Try another stick of memory
5) Try another processor

Don't feel dumb, for I have told you nothing you did not already mention.

So I've unseated the heatsink on the cpu and some of the thermal pad (the gray clay-like square that came on the heatsink) had caked on to the rectangular square in the middle. I was able to easily clean off the caked on thermal pad remains, and the bit of thermal grease that was left over (I didn't put too much on before). There did not appear to be any visible damage (and there was no burnt smell) to the processor, so I'm hoping that the second time it'll work. To rule out the new mobo or new RAM being dead, I'm going to try my old processor in it before I proceed to reinstall the new cpu again. I'm going to try this later tonight.

I would check your motherboard manual for instructions on how to clear the CMOS. Then,

> I would also suggest my canned spiel for initial building:

For new systems it would be wise to barebones boot the system initially. This is best done on a non-conductive surface such as a piece of cardboard on a table.

Connections from the case/power to the motherboard are accomplished outside of the case on the table.

Barebones is only the RAM, Video Card, Monitor, P/S 2 Keyboard...and of course the CPU>Heatsink>Fan...

See if you can make it through POST with this barebones approach...

Reboot, setting the BIOS to boot from floppy first...usually, the (0) choice, save and exit...shutdown.

If this worked add the floppy drive.

If the system booted again successfully, shutdown and reboot using a RAM tester such as: http://www.memtest86.com (http://www.memtest86.com/)...these are self booting.

If all is well, shut down and add the harddrive. If the reboot is successful recognizing the harddrive, I then shutdown and reboot using a floppy with the Harddrive's diagnostics (downloaded from the manufacturer's site)...these are also self booting...

If all systems are go, proceed to add an optical drive capable of loading your operating system...

The concept is to load one hardware device at a time which provides for troubleshooting as well as assembly of the computer. If, at any time you encounter a no boot situation, the last hardware item you added is the problem.


Did you clean the thermal pad completely from the heatsink? Alcohol of the better than 90% pure variety (most pharmacies will carry it) works well to clean the gunk off...

And also, it really is not fair to feed a new motherboard the old motherboard's configuration and drivers....

And also, it really is not fair to feed a new motherboard the old motherboard's configuration and drivers....
I know... I just didn't want to buy another hard drive to transfer files. Man, it never pays to be lazy :p Guess I better pick up another hard drive.

So now that the thermal pad is gone, will this thermal grease that I've got be enough (for short term & testing purposes)? I bought it at Radio Shack, but it doesn't say anything about being used for CPUs on the tube. It just says "Silicone-Base Heat Sink Compound" on the front, and on the back the ingredients say Polysiloxane and Zinc Oxide. I'm not sure I should use this and only this. The amd website lists some recommended materials, but most seem to be on really obscure web based stores in Asia and such (I was hoping I'd be able to find someplace they distributed nearby, as I live in Maine :p ). I did however find one website that seemed reasonable and I think I'll order a sheet of thermal padding when I get a chance. So, until then, would I be alright using this generic Radio Shack compound?

This is the "cat's meow" of thermal compounds:

http://www.arcticsilver.com/

Also, since you are at such an early stage, you might want to consider "lapping" the heatsink. Your temps could lower considerably. Here's instructions...a piece of glass works fine in place of a machinist's granite stone:

http://www.overclockersclub.com/guides/heatsinklappingguide.php

Yes, lapping is easy! http://www.pcguide.com/ubb/wink.gif

If you don't have access to a machinist's granite stone, a piece of glass will work quite well.

I start with 320 Grit (Wet/Dry sandpaper), then 400, then 600, and finish with 1500...

It works well to work the sink in figure 8s keeping it damp enough to not clog and diminish the cutting effect of the sandpaper.

You should be able to see quite quickly using the 320 how far you've got to go to flat. If it's pretty high-centered the 320 will nip the edges pretty quickly.

Rule of thumb, be patient, take your time.

The sandpaper cost me around .75 cents a sheet and one of each grit was sufficient. (hint: If you wash the paper clean when finished and lay flat you can reuse! http://www.pcguide.com/ubb/smile.gif )

And, yes you can expect 3-5C temp drops...thus sayeth our moderator mjc, and I have experienced it myself! http://www.pcguide.com/ubb/cool.gif

Hi,

When you were seating the CPU how much force did you used? AMD chips are very fragile and if you use a little more force than necessary, you damage the CPU. Have your CPU checked.

I didn't use any force seating the CPU itself, I merely lifted the arm up, let the pins drop into place, and put the arm back down. Seating the heatsink was a little more awkward and I had to force down the clamps pretty hard, though I tried to avoid putting any direct pressure on the heatsink itself and the CPU.

After trying Whyzman's barebones boot advice, I've come up with a few interesting facts. I cleared the bios, preped for a barebones bones boot, and lo and behold the monitor flickers on. I heard one beep from the mobo on startup. As soon as the familiar boot up screen showed up, I saw some things that looked a little sketchy. First off, the CPU was being detected as only being an Athlon XP 1500+ (when it should be 2700+). A box on the right with a header that said POST CODE display the following numbers quickly in this order:
52
65
75
7F

Above where IDE devices are listed, it said,"MEMORY FREQUENCY IS AT 166Mhz". And below the IDE devices it said,"CPU WAS CHANGED, PLEASE RE-SETTING CPU INFORMATION IN CMOS SETUP" (Yes that is exactly how it was written, improper tense and all). So, pressed "F1 to continue" to see what might happen. I got another post code, 96 this time. It didn't make it through because there is no hard drive attached to it yet. Also, I went into bios to adjust some things to see if I could make it to the next process. I couldn't figure out how to change the processor speed. There was no option for it. So, I changed to boot device to CD-ROM (I don't have a floppy drive) and I chose to exit and save. After that, the monitor switched off, and I was back in the no beep, boot, or display boat. I remember doing this before. Flashing the bios remedied this. So, how can I get to the next step (using Memtest86) without a floppy drive? Can I use a a thumbdrive? Any clues as to what the post codes and such mean?

Well, I got bios to detect my proper CPU speed. I just needed to set the FSB to 166MHz, as it was on 200MHz by default. Now, my processor is detected at its correct speed. Also, I was able to copy memtest86 onto a CD, but it seems it doesn't want to boot from the CD-ROM. It's detecting the CD-ROM fine, but the Post Codes are still appearing, and I got an error after the POST screen saying "NTDLR is missing".

Maybe that's NTLDR? NTLDR is one of the system files needed to boot XP and Win2000. Don't worry about it, you'll be replacing that once you reinstall.

Go back into BIOS and ee if they list Performance Defaults or Failsafe Defaults. Set Failsafe first, to test it and see if it will run. Then go for Performance or Optimum Defaults.

Boot sequence should be in BIOS too, make sure CD ROM is listed as the first boot device. It depends on your BIOS of course, but boot sequence should be in Advanced BIOS Options. I would also start working with barebones until the post error messages are gone. Motherboard/CPU/heatsink, video, RAM and keyboard are all that's needed to test boot. Use nothing but that setup until you get it to boot clean and I usually let it sit in BIOS for a half hour and watch temps.

Then add drives, starting with floppy usually, but in your case I suppose CD ROM would be a better bet. Put it on IDE 2 channel, the hard drive needs to be on IDE 1. The main thing is to remove all possible hardware that may be causing POST codes, reset BIOS, then add one at a time until it either works or the errors start again.

I set the failsafe defaults, and the post codes went away! Alas, it was only because the option to display post codes is disabled under the failsafe defaults. Otherwise, I've gotten rid of the 7F post code. I tried looking up the meaning of the post codes I found, but the only one I could find was 52, which is listed as "test keyboard". 65 and 75 I couldn't find under any bios listings, they only had even numbers. What else could be causing these post codes to appear? Another weird message I'm getting is this:

Intel UNDI, PXE 2.0 (Build 082)
Copyright (C) 1997-2000 Intel Corporation
For Realtek RTL8139(x)/8130/810X PCI Fast Ethernet Controller v2.13 (020326)
PXE-E61: Media test failure, check cable
PXE-MOF: Exiting PXE ROM

It tries to do this after I see the "Verifying DMI pool" message. After the second time, I get a "boot device failure, insert system disk" message.

What I can find on the PXE error mesage indicates that it is trying to run a network boot. Check your BIOS boot sequence and set it to CD ROM first, Floppy next, Hard drive 3rd and turn network boot OFF, if you have a 4th boot device option also turn it off.

Set hard drives to Cable Select, BIOS IDE detection to Auto on all drives, and reheck your IDE cables, make sure they are connected and oriented properly, and it might be a good idea to try new or different cables if you still have problems. Newer drives use 80 conductor cables, and I find that sometimes CD ROM drives like older 40 conductor cables better, but most should also run fine on 80 conductor cables.

The PXE boot also sometimes runs if the hard drive is bad, BIOS finds no valid partition or boot files so it tries to boot from a network device. That could be caused by bad hard drive, unpartitioned/formatted drive or bad cable, and possibly if the IDE controllers have been disabled in BIOS.

That should give you some things to check...

Also, I would suspect that the "test keyboard" might be a result of using a USB keyboard?? If it's USB, that is probably what's triggering the code. This early, you haven't any drivers for the USB loading... It would be best if you've a PS/2 keyboard for troubleshooting your initial build...

The "boot device failure" just has to do with the barebones boot...there's no system files to load... Not to worry, we're just trying to get this through POST, we'll add the operating system after a successful POST...

Also, I would suspect that the "test keyboard" might be a result of using a USB keyboard?? If it's USB, that is probably what's triggering the code.

Nope, I've been using a PS2 keyboard all along. I even tried a different PS2 keyboard, thinking maybe that would clear up that code for me, but it didn't.

I'm think I'm going to return the 1GB of PC2700 Kingston RAM I bought and get 512MBx2 of PC3200 Corsair Value Select (for a much cheaper price, I might add). There's something fishy about the Kingston RAM, and I can't quite put my finger on it. In other news, I got rid of the PXE Errors (Pete was right about it trying to boot from LAN), and I found a list of POST Codes for Phoenix Bios. Though, for some reason, I can only determine the meaning of one of the codes I have left (that code being 52: test keyboard). I can't find the meaning of codes 65 or 75 anywhere, however. Are the codes supposed to be an exact match, or is it more of a proximity thing? For instance, would I look to code 64 or 66 to figure out what's going on?

Well, I've fixed all the errors, loaded Windows, and everything is running super smooth. Thank you, everyone, for all your help, I couldn't have done this without all your advice :D

I'm having the same problems: Sorry to hijack the thread. Running the barebones setup, I still cannot get a display at any time, it has the same symptoms as when a CPU speed is set incorrectly. Everyting about this setup is new. I've used my old motherboard/processor setup and it has worked, which means that somthing is incorrect with the mobo/cpu.

Motherboard: Asus P4S800-MX
Processor: Intel P4 2.80A 533MHz FSB
Video Card: Radeon 9700
Memory: I have 4 sticks of DDR of varying sizes, all of which are working properly. Using a single stick of Bravo 512/266 now.
Harddrive: Maxtor 40gig
CD-Rom: Sony
Power Supply: Antec 350watt


I replaced my old motherboard because it was damaged in a Power Supply failure that caused my CD-Rom to have I/O errors. Probably an IDE problem, as if I switched IDE witht he harddrive, I would have inconsistant startups and random crashes.

I have cleared the CMOS, run a barebones (no mouse, HD, CD-Rom, NIC) setup with the same results: computer powers on, but no display. Reset the computer with no results, holding delete. I've tested all the hardware on the old motherboard (sans the processor, the old motherboard is Socket A) and it boot and ran fine. There has never been any burning smells and I used only the piece of thermal paste that was on the CPU heatsink. No force was used to install the chip.

On my old motherboard, I could use a jumper system to manually set the CPU speed, thus letting me get to the BIOS screen. This motherboard does not have that feature, and I am running out of ideas as to why I cant get this machine to boot.

Have you tried a different video card (or the onboard video, if you have it) on the new mobo? Also, did you remove the plastic tab covering the thermal pad on the heatsink before you attached it to the processor? One thing I did when my new setup wasn't working is try some different ram. However, I did have a display until I changed some of the bios options. You said you've never had any display at all?

Are you getting any beeps? Fans spinning up??

I would suggest beginning your own thread with the information you've given...just copy paste. That way your problem will be given the attention it deserves...

I get no beeps. Started the computer without RAM, still got no beeps (my old motherboard would continually beep if it could not find DRAM). Removed the processor and still no beeps. I have never had display with this setup.

The fans and harddrive are both spinning, and I did remove the plastic cover. The video card worked perfectly with the last motherboard. I'm beginning to think that I may have a lemon board. Should I buy another board for the P4? The private computer shop won't even test the board I bought from them because I did not have them install it. I'm beginning to think that I may have been ripped off.

Hmm... yeah, that does sound like a bad mobo. Is the board under warrantee? Usually the manufacterer has a limited warrantee. That may be a way to get a replacement board (though it would take some time).

The private computer shop won't even test the board I bought from them because I did not have them install it.That bites! You'd probably have better luck with www.newegg.com, or a reputable on line vendor...

Well, I got a new motherboard and i get display!

But I get a red LED when I click in the power switch, and I can't press TAB or DEL at the splash screen or the system info/IDE screen (tab for POST). I get a message saying "Bad CMOS Checksum - Restoring Default Settings" and it just sits on that screen. I cleared the CMOS and I still have no change in results. Another bad mobo? I'm a few shades past irritated.

Feralfox, I have a similar problem to yours. I built a system around the Chaintech 7NJL6 mobo with 1gb Ultra pc3200 ddr, sata, dvdrom, fx5200 graphics card. I'm seeing postcode errors 52,65,75,84 and I think 96 and 8b which flash by too fast. Before getting my WinXP system installed I was getting the PXE-E61, PXE-M0F, etc errors too, which now don't show with the system installed. Anyway, the computer is crashing after a few to several minutes... click, then shutdown.

A friend suggests the problem stems from the RAM memory. I noticed the Ultra brand memory is not validated with this mobo. Is this the problem? Do you know where I can find out what the post codes mean?

Lately, I had a "No Beep, but fans spinning" problem out of the blue. Restared the machine, and it went dead, with no monitor, keyboard, or mouse, except the motherboard light and the cpu fan.

I tried every single possibility, every combination to rule out the components, but couldn't figure it out. Dismantled everything, and put together everything. Jumpers, batteries, everything.

I was suspecting cpu failure or motherboard failure, as many folks here are desperately suggesting. But it turned out to be a AGP port failure; and my video card had gone dead somehow because of it.

All I did was to plug in a PCI video card and boom; everything was fine again.

So, as an advice, don't reply to these kinds of threads to post your "suggestions", or "I doubt it is the..." messages. Unless if you have experienced the very exact problem. All that can be said for a computer breakdown is already said here. Motherboard, cpu, fan, video card, ram, power supply, bios battery, etc. It's funny, because it means the problem can be ANYTHING. Very true, actually.

This is the rule of thumb. If you don't know the exact answer, don't answer. What is 3 x 5? It can be 5, or 7, or 10, or 15, or 20. Post only if you are sure it is 20 ((EDIT: :p 15, apparently) . This is forum ethics.

So, in my case it was the AGP port.

(The funniest was : "Was the guarantee period over? If not, go change the mobo." Hell, yeah. How could I not think of that!)

Interesting maths. I would suggest the answer to 3 x 5 is 15 not 20. Anyone else concur? ;)

I recently bought several things to upgrade my computer from newegg including a new cpu, mobo, and graphics card.
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However, before the windows logo or anything even popped up, there was a brief flash of a blue screen, and then the computer restarts and goes back into bios and tries to boot again.
Seems like the answer is quite obvious.

Windows is having a conflict with the new motherboard. It is looking for the old components. The CPU and graphic card are not a major issue when upgrading. The motherboard is.

Simply reinstall Windows and everything will be right as rain. :)

If this not the case, my apology for the suggestion.