Slot 1 GA-BX2000+ Motherboard problem \ VOGONS

Slot 1 GA-BX2000+ Motherboard problem

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First post, by LewisRaz

Posted on 2020-03-13, 11:38

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Hello all.

I was tinkering with this pc last night. (Swapping around some GPUs)
After I had finished I put the system back together and turned it on.
The system posted as normal but all the white text was purple. Not like when a VGA cable is loose, actual purple with a few words still in white.
After the post finished the PC speaker made some awful sounds and I shut the machine off.
Now it refuses to post. Not even any error beeps.
I have tried:
Different known working ram.
Different known working CPU (both 100 and 133mhz and slot1/slocket)
Different GPUs - AGP, PCI and even ISA.
All non essential parts have been unplugged (sound cards drives etc.)

I have studied the board in detail and cannot see any burned or damaged components.

If a modern machine still displayed this behaviour after these checks I would likely condemn it but I dont want to write off this board that easily!

Does anyone have any suggestions?

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Reply 1 of 9, by dionb

Posted on 2020-03-13, 12:22

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What about BIOS?

At the very least I'd suggest to clear CMOS, but this is also a board with dual BIOS. What happens if you switch to backup?

Reply 2 of 9, by LewisRaz

Posted on 2020-03-13, 12:35

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Oops. I should have mentioned I did a clear cmos.

I have read through the documentation and cannot find any way to manually use the backup bios. It should start automatically in case of the main bios failing.

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Reply 3 of 9, by psybyrd

Posted on 2020-03-13, 13:48

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How do the Capacitors look? Gigabyte used some pretty terrible ones in this era. However sometimes you get lucky and have one with Sanyos. Also check your power supply. I would remove everything including the cmos battery and leave it sit (for a few hours). Seen many come back to life after doing this. Hope this helps

Reply 4 of 9, by LewisRaz

Posted on 2020-03-13, 17:51

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psybyrd wrote on 2020-03-13, 13:48:

How do the Capacitors look? Gigabyte used some pretty terrible ones in this era. However sometimes you get lucky and have one with Sanyos. Also check your power supply. I would remove everything including the cmos battery and leave it sit (for a few hours). Seen many come back to life after doing this. Hope this helps

The caps look pretty good to be honest! Although I am aware they can go bad without any visual signs.
I can try another PSU. Might try that tonight in fact. This machine has sat for some time without power lately as I have been testing other machines in its space.
Really would like to get it going again but if not ill be back to AMD for my "fast" w98 system.

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Reply 5 of 9, by LewisRaz

Posted on 2020-03-13, 20:10

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So after trying a different PSU I stripped the motherboard and and fit my athlon system back in.
Before I put the P3 away for a while I decided to fire it up on a test bench and of course it booted right up..!

It did provide this error "main bios wide range protection error"

Has anyone encountered this before?

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Reply 6 of 9, by quicknick

Posted on 2020-03-13, 21:02

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Yes. 😀

Reply 7 of 9, by LewisRaz

Posted on 2020-03-13, 21:17

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quicknick wrote on 2020-03-13, 21:02:

Yes. 😀

Thankyou for finding that! some helpful reading. I think that my main bios chip is on its way out. I have had random faults with this board for some time!

It also only booted the one time while I made the last post and now fails to power on at all... One for another day now.

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Reply 8 of 9, by SETBLASTER

Posted on 2020-03-13, 22:47

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@LewisRaz did you buy the motherboard fully with box, manual and cd-rom drivers?
do you happen to have the original CD for it?

if you do, can you share an iso image?

-
thanks

Reply 9 of 9, by LewisRaz

Posted on 2020-03-14, 09:47

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SETBLASTER wrote on 2020-03-13, 22:47:
@LewisRaz did you buy the motherboard fully with box, manual and cd-rom drivers? do you happen to have the original CD for it? […]
Show full quote

@LewisRaz did you buy the motherboard fully with box, manual and cd-rom drivers?
do you happen to have the original CD for it?

if you do, can you share an iso image?

-
thanks

Sorry I got the board from ebay as cpu/board and backplate

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