GPU Faulty? Possibly?

[Disturbedguy]

Hi all,

So I went to turn my PC on tonight and it spam up for a second, then the fans kept spinning up and then going off and the power light on the case was doing the same.

Unplugged it and checked everything was seated correctly, turned on and this time it sounded like the system was doing a full boot, however the monitor wasn't displaying anything.

I turned the monitor off and back on and it displayed the monitors "splash" screen so to speak but then went off with "no signal" being displayed. Have swapped cables and dvi adapter, still the same. Im getting my hands on another GPU to test with tomorrow.

Can anyone think of anything else it could be, other than the GPU?

[peterb]

Only other possibility really is the PSU. I would pretty much rule out the monitor, given the other symptoms (although the input circuitry could have failed, but I'd check out PSU then GPU. Reason for checking PSU first is just in case a faulty PSU takes down the replacement GPU. A low risk, but if you can avoid it, then you might as well.

You didn't say what make of PSU it is, or the age. If it fairly new and a reputable brand, then that tips the balance against the GPU.

[Disturbedguy]

Only other possibility really is the PSU. I would pretty much rule out the monitor, given the other symptoms (although the input circuitry could have failed, but I'd check out PSU then GPU. Reason for checking PSU first is just in case a faulty PSU takes down the replacement GPU. A low risk, but if you can avoid it, then you might as well.

You didn't say what make of PSU it is, or the age. If it fairly new and a reputable brand, then that tips the balance against the GPU.

Its a modular Corsair thing, cant remember exactly how old it is though...

[peterb]

Corsair are fairly solid, so it is looking more like GPU. It would be good to try the card in another machine rather than put a good card in the machine with a small question mark over the PSU, but if that's not possible, you don't really have a choice.

[Disturbedguy]

Corsair are fairly solid, so it is looking more like GPU. It would be good to try the card in another machine rather than put a good card in the machine with a small question mark over the PSU, but if that's not possible, you don't really have a choice.

That's my concern I don't want to risk potentially killing someone else's GPU, I'll speak to the person lending me one. I know its his spare, but want to make sure...

[Disturbedguy]

So I borrowed a card off mate and have the same issue...Anyone got any recommendations as to what they think the problem might be?

[Jonj1611]

Have you tried resetting the bios? Other than that could well be the PSU, was the replacement card one that needed power(from a psu)?

[Disturbedguy]

Have you tried resetting the bios? Other than that could well be the PSU, was the replacement card one that needed power(from a psu)?

Nope GPU didnt require any power from PSU...will try a BIOS reset...if its the PSU i might be a bit stuck, as i have no spare to test with. Everything else seems to power up fine which is frustrating

[Jonj1611]

Oh and as stupid as it may sound make sure the monitor is set to the correct input, on mine I had HDMI, DVI and VGA and can't remember what I was doing at the time but turned it on and no input, after much hair pulling I realised it was set to DVI and not HDMI, even though I thought it should change the input itself, it actually didn't.

[Jonj1611]

Nope GPU didnt require any power from PSU...will try a BIOS reset...if its the PSU i might be a bit stuck, as i have no spare to test with. Everything else seems to power up fine which is frustrating

Indeed, I have been caught out like that in the past, now keep a cheapo PSU around just for testing in case anything like that happens again.

[Phage]

Yep. Corrupt BIOS.
I get this semi-regularly. Needs a re-flash.

[Disturbedguy]

So here's my plan of action for tonight (Not in this order) -

Connector monitor to laptop and see if I get output to the monitor, to fully rule out the monitor being the issue
Reset BIOS (Pull CMOS Battery) and plug the GPU in and give it another go
If the above works, will make sure system is stable, back up and then flash the BIOS (eeek!)
If above doesn't work - use a spare PSU borrowed from a friend
If none of the above works, ill completely strip the machine and rebuild....

After that I'm not sure, I guess ill do / try whatever comes to mind.

Anyone else got any suggestions?

[DBarber]

make sure you disconnect the psu cable/s to MB when you pull the battery.

[Millennium]

I've had my system not start up when there's been a phone plugged in via USB. Make sure you only have keyboard and mouse connected for your testing (you've probably done so already).

[Disturbedguy]

So bit of an update, spent a few hours looking at the system today...

And.....

Have managed to get it to display, not sure what fixed it but did the following this morning -

Removed CMOS, booted for a few seconds, powered off, but CMOS batter back in and booted - didnt display
Noticed a RAM stick was somehow very slightly loose, made sure was firmly in and tried again and this time it displayed...yey..or maybe not

The system is now telling me that it can't find the boot device. When I go into the BIOS I see all four of my drives, but when the system is booting and it lists the drives, its not picking up my SSD's.

I've gone into the BIOS and tried swapping it's various modes AHCI, compatible etc but it's still not detecting the SSD's, the OS SSD has power (it has a green light on it) and I feel it spin up, my second SSD isn't detected and my third SSD (brand new - only attached today after not being able to see other SSD's) isn't seen / doesn't display.

I've disconnected the cables from the drive and reconnected and made sure the cables are firmly connected...but still not able to boot from it.

My motherboard is an ASUS P6T Deluxe V2

At this moment hoping its just a setting I've missed.

As usual, any help would be appreciated

[Disturbedguy]

IT'S ALIVE!!! ALIVE I TELL YA!!

Anyway.....left the PC alone and just went back to it. Decided to check the boot configuration and noticed that the SSD's weren't showing.

Checked another section, cant remember what it was called and saw the SSD's listed, swapped the SSD position in the BIOS to the first position, it then showed in boot configuration.

Restarted the machine and woohoo! into Windows it went!

Hopefully it will stay stable.

Thanks for the help everyone!