motherboard problems

So i put my computer in standby mode and then when i came to turn it on later it wouldn't work. Got a new powersupply and as soon as you turn it on at the back, the computer comes on (nothing on the screen) as if the motherboard is broken and not waiting for the button at the front to be pressed. So it seems like the motherboard is broken. Not too much a surprise since it has died quite a few times before and been sent for repair

Obviously I can't tell whether any other components were take out too.

It was an ASUS k8n.

So i'm just wondering what I should do about a new motherboard. It would need to be a 754 one as that is my processor (amd athlon 64 3200+).

Apparently I need 2? IDE connectors cos each connector connects 2 things? and i need to connect 2 optical drives and a hard disk. I have another hard disk too but that is sata.

It would be nice if the replacement motherboard could be pci express and also firewire would be helpful (although I guess this can be added with a cheap card later if necessary).

I am guessing refurbished or second hand is the best bet seeing as that would give me more choice as its so old. Anyone any ideas? Ebay doesn't seem to have the best range - any other places to look?

Any more info needed then just ask.

cheers Daniel

H E L L O



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/27/2009 10:02AM by mortal.

Socket 754 boards going around? Without looking, I expect you'll be limited to Ebay I guess. There's only been 3 new sockets from AMD since then, and any new board you do find won't be especially cheap (it might even be cheaper to consider a new CPU, board and RAM).

To be honest, it just sounds like the switch or the cable connecting it to the board is faulty, rather than the motherboard. I can't see how it's even possible that a motherboard can fail in that way. It's the simplest of devices - 2 pins routed from button through the board to the PSU that it that things are good to go. I'd look at that first.

Hmm the thing is the button on the front buzzes through on the multimeter when pressed.

There is no display on screen or anything when it "turns on", no motherboard postbeeps either.
The light is on on it though.

A strange thing is - before it all died, there was a very odd thing happening (i think since its last repair?). You had to turn on the computer from the front, but it would not turn on - THEN you had to turn on the monitor and magically this would cause the computer to actually turn on from the previous button press. I can't see how this can be happening - they are only connected through dvi lead from the graphics card. Unless it's something to do with voltage, both using the same power output. Please don't confuse this with what happens now though, but it might provide some insight.

Do you know of any places that do refurbished motherboards or anything?

H E L L O



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/03/2009 08:18PM by Daniel Knott.

You had to turn the monitor on to get the computer itself to spin-up? OK.... I can't understand that one little bit.

To be honest, I'd just throw it all away and start again.

I doubt there'll be any refurbished 754 boards going around. Seriously. It's a standard from 2003. There'll be some 2nd-hand ones somewhere (though their value will almost render them pointless to sell), but other than that, I guess very little.

Got this exact same problem on one of the computers at my house, it doesn't seem to be a major problem so we just make sure to turn it off at the back after its been used.

---

"Arguing on the internet is like taking part in the Special Olympics...Even if you win you're still retarded"

Naboo - you don't have the same problem, as your computer actually works - this one doesn't hehehe :P

And yes, the thing is I don't know anything about new computers or things to get

H E L L O

Are you sure it's not the graphics card?

Your first problem was the monitor with no picture.

Your 2nd problem was no picture when the PC was switched on.

Got a spare you could chuck in, or borrow a friends?

Hmm it was the motherboard. Sadly couldn't get a pcie one so just ended up getting a second hand "new" replacement of exactly what I had.

On a side note, is £40 a waste of money for a second hand 512mb x1950 pro? (agp)

H E L L O



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/19/2009 05:15PM by Daniel Knott.

I wouldn't have expected to get that much if I was selling (maybe £30), but then it's hardly a rip-off either. I guess it's also one of the fastest AGP cards, so it's probably a bit more expensive due to that.

Yes cos I saw you could get a 3850 512 AGP new for £85 but the I doubt I would really need anything that high and the rest of the pc would probably bottleneck that.

I guess I may as well try it for £40 at least. Eventually I will have to get a new pc mind - but probably worth waiting for a bit until solid state drives or something? Or is that going to be a long wait. It just somehow gives the impression that a big transitional period is not far off?

H E L L O



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/19/2009 09:51PM by Daniel Knott.

SSDs will be the single biggest component introduction since the hard drive replaced the floppy. The only thing that I can think of that comes close is 3D accelerated graphics.

Prices aren't exactly plummeting yet, but let the momentum take hold, and they will. Currently you can get a decent one for an almost realistic price for a boot drive, then have a 2nd regular hard drive as a data drive. It will be a long time before they are level to hard drives in terms of pound-per-GB though.

//edit: a cheaper way to almost replicate an SSD (and in effect it will be faster too) is to get @#$%&-loads of RAM and use Vista or Win7 x64. Let SuperFetch do the rest. You'll be missing the super-fast startup and shutdown times, but any commonly used data loads up in no time at all. Photoshop in 2 or 3 seconds as opposed to 15 or 20 - it doesn't sound like much until you actually use things like that frequently, or when you go back to XP or systems with less RAM.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/19/2009 11:09PM by gav.

Yes, indeed. Although it seems for these solid state things defragging takes like 2 seconds :O :O :O Mind you I shouldn't let mine get in such a mess - it won't actually defrag parts of it - I will end up formatting soon anyway.

I'll probably end up putting a bit more ram in this for xp since its so dirt cheap - how much can xp support? 2gb? or is it more? currently have 1gb anyway (2 * 512 or whatever exact number they are :P) and 4 slots so 2 free so I guess xp is the limit haha.

H E L L O

clear the cmos or just remove the m/b battery for about 10mins..unplug from the mains as well....you said this started after putting it into hibernation mode ? was is working ok before this ?

Daniel Knott Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I'll probably end up putting a bit more ram in
> this for xp since its so dirt cheap - how much can
> xp support? 2gb? or is it more? currently have 1gb
> anyway (2 * 512 or whatever exact number they are
> :P) and 4 slots so 2 free so I guess xp is the
> limit haha.

XP 32-bit can address around 3.2GB with most modern graphics cards. Any single process (let's say application) can address 2GB. It's not a limit of XP itself, but of every 32-bit operating system, Vista 32-bit included. 64-bit (including XP64, which is a different OS to XP so licenses can't be swapped around) raises the limit to something silly that we'll never see used in a standard workstation in the next decade or 2.

Just beware that some older boards can be a bit picky with all 4 RAM slots filled, so if you experience instability that may be the cause.

jimbob1 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> clear the cmos or just remove the m/b battery for
> about 10mins..unplug from the mains as well....you
> said this started after putting it into
> hibernation mode ? was is working ok before this ?

Hmm it's fixed now - I just got a 2nd hand replacement of the same type of board (apparently it was new old stock or something and is actually new and unused). But anyway I think my motherboard was just faulty as one time my power supply blew up and killed it, the processor and my mouse and keyboard and when the motherboard was repaired they seem to do a crap job each time as it died again and was repaired again by Asus only to die this time. At least this "new" one shouldn't hopeful be so dodgy.

gav Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Daniel Knott Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > I'll probably end up putting a bit more ram in
> > this for xp since its so dirt cheap - how much
> can
> > xp support? 2gb? or is it more? currently have
> 1gb
> > anyway (2 * 512 or whatever exact number they
> are
> > :P) and 4 slots so 2 free so I guess xp is the
> > limit haha.
>
> XP 32-bit can address around 3.2GB with most
> modern graphics cards. Any single process (let's
> say application) can address 2GB. It's not a limit
> of XP itself, but of every 32-bit operating
> system, Vista 32-bit included. 64-bit (including
> XP64, which is a different OS to XP so licenses
> can't be swapped around) raises the limit to
> something silly that we'll never see used in a
> standard workstation in the next decade or 2.
>
> Just beware that some older boards can be a bit
> picky with all 4 RAM slots filled, so if you
> experience instability that may be the cause.


Ah ok. I'll try 2GB then and see how it goes. Could go for 3 but there isn't quite as much point and with 2 it's easy just to use 3 slots then.

H E L L O