WTF!? Is my Shuttle Dead?

[Theo]

I know this might be better suited to the SFF forum, but I was hoping that some non-SFF people may be able to help me too..

I have an SN41G2 that has been running 100% fine for the last week. I bought myself a shiny Radeon 9500np to put in it, because the onboard GFX wasn't enough for me.

Anyway, I installed the Graphics card as you normally do. Place it into the AGP slot, lock it in, plug in the floppy power connector. After routinely checking everything else was seated properly, I plugged the psu cable, mouse, keyboard back into the shuttle, but plugged the monitor cable into the 9500 card.

I powered up, and went straight into the bios to make sure all was okay. The temps were fine, 32C Case 41C cpu. So I exited the bios and waiting for the shuttle to load windows.

The shuttle appeared to be turned on, all the lights were on, psu fan, nb fan, AGP fan, all fine. However, the ICE fan stayed on it's high setting (quite loud). When the shuttle is turned on, the ICE fan whirs for a second or so at it's high setting, then slows down to a mild whistle. It stayed on it's high spin.

There was no monitor activity either, the monitor wasn't receiving any signal whatsoever, and stayed on Standby.

After pressing the reboot button, the shuttle made it's normal reboot noises (like every pc does), but still the same. I tried turning the Shuttle off with it's power button, but it stayed on (didn't even shut down after a few seconds). So I had to unplug the shuttle from the back.

I tried the shuttle again with the monitor cable plugged into the onboard vga out. The same thing has happened.

I have now removed the 9500np card, and tried powering up. Still no cigar.

I have re-seated all the components, reset the CMOS, re-reset the CMOS, re-re-seated all the components, tried again with the 9500np card installed, but nothing further than what I've already got.

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

[Kezzer]

that's quite odd, did you uninstall the old gfx card drivers before you put the new one in? 'cause you were going from nvidia to ATi after all

[CrapshoT]

i take it the shuttle doesnt boot with the onboard gfx and no 9500
have you got any different ram to try in your system?
have you knocked your cpu heatsink at all?

[malfunction]

Do you have a spare ATX PSU that you could temporarily rig up to the shuttle mobo (with the case open obviously!)

If not try removing everything not needed to get the shuttle to post (i.e. just leave CPU, RAM and HDD in) and the CMOS battery... Leave the machine for half an hour or so and then power back up.

[Proplus]

Have you tried soft resetting the CMOS?

- Unplug power cable from back of PSU and wait a few seconds
- Press INSERT key and keep it pressed for the rest of the following stages
- Re-plug power cable
- Power on

[iMc]

what does the above do?

[Kezzer]

a soft reset of the CMOS

[Theo]

Woke up a few hours ago, and have since tried:

cmos reset jumper
booting with insert held down
changing the ram
re-sitting the ram
replacing the old ram
re-sitting the ice unit on the CPU (reapplying thermal paste as well)
plugging in a spare atx psu instead of the shuttle psu


Only thing left to try from the suggestions are removing the cmos battery for half an hour.

If that doesn't work, I have should have a spare cpu to test in it tomorrow.

Sweet california raisins, I've only had the damn thing a week and it's already causing me grief!

[Theo]

Just put the battery back in and no change.

I'll post any results I get from trying a fresh cpu tomorrow. For now, though... I'm getting myself drunk, I think.

[Theo]

Just tried it with a 1GHz Tbird I found lying around... nope

Sent Bigpockets a message on their Technical support system thing. Vodka \m/

[malfunction]

Originally Posted by Theo

Just tried it with a 1GHz Tbird I found lying around... nope

Sent Bigpockets a message on their Technical support system thing. Vodka \m/

Sounds like the BIOS is dead then. If bigpockets can't / won't help then someone might be willing to hot swap and re-flash the BIOS.

[Ethos]

Damn shuttles....

[Kezzer]

How can you kill the BIOS from just doing that though?

Did you uninstall the old cards drivers before you put the new card in?

[malfunction]

Originally Posted by KeZZeR

How can you kill the BIOS from just doing that though?

Did you uninstall the old cards drivers before you put the new card in?

KeZZeR,

If it won't post then it's nothing to do with the OS so drivers, etc don't make any difference - only the BIOS is in control during post. As much as BIOS corruption sounds weird it's a known problem with the Asus nForce2 mobo so maybe it's happened here too. It could be something else though - maybe the PSU was overloaded (or just on it's way out) and damaged the motherboard.

[Theo]

Thanks chaps, I'm a little weary about sending it back to bigpockets because if I do, I'd guess I'd probably get an SK41G in return :/

I'll see what they say (if anything), though. If anyone fancies doing me a bios hotswap/reflash, I'll pay p&p/deliver it myself depending on distance, and include a few pints into the equation.

[Knoxville]

I had a very similar problem with my SN41 dude, i was lucky enough to get it into safe mode and use the onboard though after taking my 9700pro out and flashing the bios.

The SN41's are tricky mofo's unfortunatly, thats why i moved on to the SN45