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Asus P5A-B death ?

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First post, by oldgames79

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Hi,

Help,I recently buy a Asus P5A-B and it doesn't work
When I push the power button ON, the fan of the cpu turn ON but I have nothing on screen, no beep on startup and no POST. The screen is blank.
I have try with different RAM, PSU and CPU (AMD and Intel), I have the same result.
The CPU seems to be work, because it is hot.

Do you think that the MB need to be recap ?

Thanks

Reply 1 of 31, by dionb

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Do you have a POST diagnostic card? If so, it can give you a clue.

If not... look for obvious damage/missing components. If it all looks present & intact, start looking at things that degrade over time. In general caps are worth checking, but Asus used pretty good ones in 1998/1999, so I'd consider that less likely in this case - but checking certainly can't hurt. One thing to try is re-flash the BIOS EEPROM. Sometimes EEPROMs get corrupted and give you a totally dead board like this.

Also, double-check the CPU and the jumper settings. Test with a different CPU if possible.

Reply 3 of 31, by dionb

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Then re-flash that BIOS.

Back in my poor student days, I didn't have the cash for decent computer stuff (or if I did I preferred drinking it), so I bought up boxes of faulty motherboards. On average about 1/3 had bad caps (which could be fixed), but of the remaining 2/3 with no obvious damage, almost half could be made to work again with a new BIOS. That way I had a nice spanking (almost) new nForce2 board - in the days when that was the thing to have - for about the price of three beers, and not the >>fifty it would have cost me normally.

If you don't have an EEPROM flasher, you could try hot flashing. Just don't try that with an Asus board, they do weird stuff with flashing routines and hot flashing with Uniflash doesn't work. I find Tyan boards are a safe bet though.

Reply 5 of 31, by dionb

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Hot flashing: using another - working - board to flash the EEPROM chip of a dead board.

It's a bit controversial as you theoretically risk the working board if you mess up (short circuit either by dropping the EEPROM or incorrect orientation in the socket), but if you don't have an EEPROM flasher it's a potentially useful recovery method.

Basically you boot the working board, then when it's running (and so doesn't need to access the BIOS EEPROM anymore), remove the board's own EEPROM and replace with the EEPROM for the dead board. Then flash with a flash tool that doesn't contain safety protocols to be sure you only flash the correct board (i.e. Uniflash). After succesful flashing, power down the system, swap the board's own EEPROM back and put the flashed EEPROM in the dead board. The only requirements are that the EEPROM for the dead board needs to be supported by the donor board (i.e. not too big) and that Uniflash needs to work on the donor board (usually not a problem with either low-end or server boards, frequently doesn't work on high-end consumer boards, i.e. anything by Asus).

I've done it extensively and screwed up exactly once, by putting the EEPROM in the wrong way round. Don't do that. Check keying of socket and EEPROM, double-check again before inserting. But once again, an EEPROM flasher is a much better idea - if you have one.

Reply 6 of 31, by The Serpent Rider

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Some ALi Aladdin V chipset boards (maybe all of them) won't work if you didn't put RAM in specific order. Try to put your RAM in DIMM3 slot, which is closest to the north bridge.

I must be some kind of standard: the anonymous gangbanger of the 21st century.

Reply 7 of 31, by oldgames79

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dionb wrote:
Hot flashing: using another - working - board to flash the EEPROM chip of a dead board. […]
Show full quote

Hot flashing: using another - working - board to flash the EEPROM chip of a dead board.

It's a bit controversial as you theoretically risk the working board if you mess up (short circuit either by dropping the EEPROM or incorrect orientation in the socket), but if you don't have an EEPROM flasher it's a potentially useful recovery method.

Basically you boot the working board, then when it's running (and so doesn't need to access the BIOS EEPROM anymore), remove the board's own EEPROM and replace with the EEPROM for the dead board. Then flash with a flash tool that doesn't contain safety protocols to be sure you only flash the correct board (i.e. Uniflash). After succesful flashing, power down the system, swap the board's own EEPROM back and put the flashed EEPROM in the dead board. The only requirements are that the EEPROM for the dead board needs to be supported by the donor board (i.e. not too big) and that Uniflash needs to work on the donor board (usually not a problem with either low-end or server boards, frequently doesn't work on high-end consumer boards, i.e. anything by Asus).

I've done it extensively and screwed up exactly once, by putting the EEPROM in the wrong way round. Don't do that. Check keying of socket and EEPROM, double-check again before inserting. But once again, an EEPROM flasher is a much better idea - if you have one.

Ok, I'ts a risky methode. I Prefer to buy a EEPROM programmer.

Reply 8 of 31, by oldgames79

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The Serpent Rider wrote:

Some ALi Aladdin V chipset boards (maybe all of them) won't work if you didn't put RAM in specific order. Try to put your RAM in DIMM3 slot, which is closest to the north bridge.

I have try to put RAM in different slot and also with different RAM. (I use a PC100 and PC133 SDRAM)

Reply 9 of 31, by cyclone3d

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What video card are you using?

Is it verified working in a another system?

Yamaha modified setupds and drivers
Yamaha XG repository
YMF7x4 Guide
Aopen AW744L II SB-LINK

Reply 11 of 31, by cyclone3d

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oldgames79 wrote:
cyclone3d wrote:

What video card are you using?

Is it verified working in a another system?

I tried with an S3 PCI and a TNT2 AGP and I have the same result.

Do either work in a different system?

Yamaha modified setupds and drivers
Yamaha XG repository
YMF7x4 Guide
Aopen AW744L II SB-LINK

Reply 13 of 31, by amadeus777999

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I'm having the same problem with a GA-486AMS board. Board is looking perfect, cpu is getting hot but it does not work.

I had a SS7 die on me a few years ago due to having a too power hungry AGP card installed... only "useful" hint I can give here.

Reply 14 of 31, by oldgames79

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amadeus777999 wrote:

I'm having the same problem with a GA-486AMS board. Board is looking perfect, cpu is getting hot but it does not work.

I had a SS7 die on me a few years ago due to having a too power hungry AGP card installed... only "useful" hint I can give here.

Thanks but before test with a AGP card I put a PCI video card on the first startup.

Reply 15 of 31, by oldgames79

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dionb wrote:
Hot flashing: using another - working - board to flash the EEPROM chip of a dead board. […]
Show full quote

Hot flashing: using another - working - board to flash the EEPROM chip of a dead board.

It's a bit controversial as you theoretically risk the working board if you mess up (short circuit either by dropping the EEPROM or incorrect orientation in the socket), but if you don't have an EEPROM flasher it's a potentially useful recovery method.

Basically you boot the working board, then when it's running (and so doesn't need to access the BIOS EEPROM anymore), remove the board's own EEPROM and replace with the EEPROM for the dead board. Then flash with a flash tool that doesn't contain safety protocols to be sure you only flash the correct board (i.e. Uniflash). After succesful flashing, power down the system, swap the board's own EEPROM back and put the flashed EEPROM in the dead board. The only requirements are that the EEPROM for the dead board needs to be supported by the donor board (i.e. not too big) and that Uniflash needs to work on the donor board (usually not a problem with either low-end or server boards, frequently doesn't work on high-end consumer boards, i.e. anything by Asus).

I've done it extensively and screwed up exactly once, by putting the EEPROM in the wrong way round. Don't do that. Check keying of socket and EEPROM, double-check again before inserting. But once again, an EEPROM flasher is a much better idea - if you have one.

Up,

I have buy a POST card and the POST card return "OO" and stop.

A suggestion ?

Reply 16 of 31, by dionb

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Is that an ISA or a PCI card?

00 means the BIOS isn't even initializing, or that the POST output isn't being sent to the bus the card is in. But my next suggestion is in my post you quoted: one way or another, re-flash that BIOS EEPROM.

Reply 17 of 31, by oldgames79

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dionb wrote:

Is that an ISA or a PCI card?

00 means the BIOS isn't even initializing, or that the POST output isn't being sent to the bus the card is in. But my next suggestion is in my post you quoted: one way or another, re-flash that BIOS EEPROM.

It's a PCI card.

OK, I will re-flash the bios when I find a EEPROM programmer.

Thanks

Reply 18 of 31, by meljor

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Do a ''hotflash'' on a different board, it's not that hard.

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