Unable to play bloated MPEGS of Linus Torvalds!

[ShAdOWmoNkX]

Hello, My Master Uber Geeks ,

It was suggested that I break my insanely large set of questions into a few posts to make them easier to, er, digest. Again, sorry for all the questions -- but I'm really baffled and you guys are nothing short of brilliant!

Here's the *THIRD* in a three-part series. For those of you confused, that means this is the last one, lol. Honestly. Scout's Honor. For you other males, would Girl Scout's Honor (the older ones) be better...?

Here goes:

Someone else mentioned that they had a computer problem. As they said, Windows flickers the video randomly but intermittently; the screen then goes black and the computer reboots without fail. Doesn't seem to happen in POST, thus I suspected a video driver issue.

This was the case until I changed a BIOS setting -- I think it was enabling ACPI -- and rebooted. WHAM! NO video. Nothing. Nada.

I tried locating the CMOS reset jumper, but there ISN'T one -- only what appears to be solder points (the manual says "JP5, pins whatever whatever, ha!). Heh, no battery, either. And the BIOS is just one of those old alligator clip thingees. I'm too much a weenie to pull that out at the risk of breaking it to clear CMOS or find if the battery is under it (it probably is, but not that it would matter if I pulled out the BIOS chip to begin with, haha).

So I swapped the video card with another one in the same PCI slot. Nothing.

I moved the original one up into another slot. Voila! I got video.

...Then I rebooted. No video. Again. Ditto.

Swapped PCI slots again. Nada.

Then again ... and it worked! Then not, then ... well, you get the idea. It seems to be playing mind games with me. And succeeding. FWIW, I was able to disable ACPI and some other "risky" BIOS settings, but to no avail.

I think it even manages to weird my monitor out when it happens (I'm sure you know that the monitor defaults to 60 Hz when turned on after computer video is loaded; otherwise video card determines the frequencies and modes used -- my saying it gets "funked" has to do with that phenomenon, long story short).

What can I do? What does this sound like to you -- bad mainboard, bad power supply, bad video card, resource conflict...? Not sure how to tell.

FYI, this is her board:

http://www.powerspec.com/support/sy...rds/p5hx_b.html

http://www.powerspec.com/support/sy..._b_closeup.html


Many thanks and cheers,

-ShAdOWmoNkX :)

PS - Original post with all questions and some background here: http://www.pcguide.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=17963

[ski]

Sounds like a bad MB.

[ShAdOWmoNkX]

How can I be sure, tho? Assuming I don't have a spare MB/PS laying around, which I don't. Bad PS is equally likely. Least likely is a resource problem (BIOS), but it even BEING "likely" in any sense makes it problem enough. :(

Thanks!

-ShAdOWmoNkX :)

[ski]

Please read between the lines.
I said "It sounds like a bad MB", and not "It's definitely the MB".
The fact that the problem continued after swapping out video cards and trying them in different slots points to the MB as the most likely problem. I've seen it happen many times.
The PS was the cause in only a few instances.

And when you physically troubleshoot a computer problem, be prepared to swap out components. Because sometimes that's the only way to determine the cause.

[ski]

Forgot to mention that having an inexpensive voltmeter also comes in handy when troubleshooting computer components, specifically the PS.

[Budfred]

The main way to tell is to try alternative parts. Try the video card in another computer to see if it works or try another video card in this computer. Try the mobo with a different power supply and/or test the power supply with a multimeter. I would try the video card swap first since that would leave only the mobo and ps to worry about if it is clean.

Budfred

[mjc]

OK.....some more info about this board.

You are installing a PCI video card.is the video set to look for the PCI card first?

Does this board have onboard video? an AGP slot? is it (onboard video) disabled?

[ShAdOWmoNkX]

Yep, of course set to look for PCI first! ;)

No on-board video afaik.

No AGP slot, so no need to disable.

Still sound like the same prob?

-ShAdOWmoNkX :)

[mjc]

It's not from an off the shelf machine like a Compaq is it?

Have you tried using the "reload defaults" option from within the BIOS?

It seems very strange that there is no way to claer the CMOS if it isn't a proprietary machine.

[ShAdOWmoNkX]

MJC,

Yep, tried that ... to no avail. Nothing on the board or in the spec (I provided the links to the mobo manufacturer earlier in this post).

I suppose it's under the BIOS chip itself, but I dunno.

Oh -- again, this isn't my computer, but someone's I'm helping with! :) It's not pre-built, but IS ancient.

At any rate, here's an update: I think it's either the motherboard, power supply, or resource conflict. But can resource conflicts cause a computer not to show video at boot (computer, not Windows, boot)?

If so.. how does one deal with that? IRQ's and DMA's are one thing I don't quite "get" yet... sigh. So much for knowing the ins and outs of computers EXCEPT for that stuff. Grrr!

Thanks and cheers,

-ShAdOWmoNkX :)

[mjc]

It seems like the machine is an off the shelf system.

Often, the motherboards for such systems are "customized", certain features found on the retail versions of the board do not exist on them. So you probably that is why you don't have the clear jumper...

At this point, I agree, even if there is nothing really wrong with the motherboard, there is a problem with it...you just do no have the something that you are able to proerly diagnose because of manufacturer idiocy. It should probably be replaced on general principle...