PC boys-Where art thou?

Guys Im more frustrated with pc's than removing ball joints from a fronty :evil:

Who knows whats up here:
Im finally building a pc from oldish parts to run Linux on but have not even got to see the bios setup screen yet as there are no graphics at all.I have tried alternative monitors and graphic cards but still no activity on the screen.When I switch the pc on,the fans(including the graphics card fan) & harddrive start up but no connection to the monitor.(Monitors led remains orange when it should be green when properly connected). Would clearing the cmos maybe help?
The main kit im using is:
Gigabyte GA81848PM motherboard
Gainward G4TI4200 128MB graphics card
512mb ddr memory
P4 3GHZ HT Prescott chip

Thanks guys :oops:

Check the graphics card is in the (correct) slot on the mobo securely
Also check other cables are in the correct place, check if the ram is seated properly too

have a look at the pins in the (monitor)plug,for damaged /missing pins

If it is a bios prob, remove the battery then find the reset pins if it has them (close to battery)and short together momentary
then reboot, this may load the default bios options

Check to make sure the CPU and heatsink are seated correctly and have a thin smear of thermal paste or a thermal pad between them. This can cause the problem you are having. If the CPU and Board are relatively old the paste/pad can 'dry up' so to speak.

When powering on, is there a beep ? If not, then possibly something is connected incorrectly.

Disconnect the hard disks and other ancillaries and try powering up.

Once you get the beep (or beeps), you can start adding drives and cards ntil you find the offending part.

Lawrence

Yeah, as Lawrence said is it making all the noises? single beep at post and all the hdd jittering like it wants to boot. If so its vid card.

reset bios, take it the gf4 is agp, the mobo may be booting off a pci vid card. The vid card doesnt draw much juice, but what wattage is the psu?

Got the manual for the mobo here

http://uk.giga-byte.com/Support/Motherb ... uctID=1705

Its an 8x agp, I remember the gf4's were around 4x . there was some conflicting with older agp's and newer, something about the voltage difference and possible motherboard damage.

Whats the specific vid card? do you have any old pci vid cards to plug in for a mo?

Thanks chaps but still no luck :cry:

Checked pins on cables
Redone the thermal paste
Disconected all ancilleries and still no go but did note that there are no beeps at all
The vid card is definately a AGPX8
I have tried another monitor as well as plugging in the original video card which came with the mobo(radeon 9200se) and still nuttin. Also tried removing the cmos battery .I think the absence of beeps may hold a clue.

Is the spaeker fitted to the board? no beeps, mobo dead mate.

Shame mate, are all the fans turning?

yup!Not to worry :wink:

I have pulled out an old celeron based pc to have a go on :lol:

I will looking out for a used socket 778 mobo on fleabay as I think its probably that which is knackered :lol:

have you tried re configuring the twirly swizzler :roll:

Another thing to check, is the power supply big enough for that cpu, should be at least 350 watts, preferably 400 watts for a Prescott cpu.

Also, on some motherboards there is a 2nd, 4 pin power socket that also needs to be attached. the pins will be arranged in a square. newer motherboards have this built into the main motherboard power connector as they may have 24 pins, older boards have 20 pins and sometimes the extra 4 are on a seperate block on the board, this is most common on intel based boards. Also some graphics cards need a feed from the power supply as well.

Here is a picture of the little blighter in the foreground with the 20 pin connector in the background to the right of the RAM chip.

Has to be said that it sounds to me like a dead motherboard on there, as it's failing to POST. I would just see if you have another PC to test the graphics card in, but usually an AGP fault will force the motherboard to give an error beep on boot.

If you remove the memory from the slots, do you get any error beeps from the motherboard? If not, double check the speaker is ok, and if it is, then it is almost certainly the motherboard that is dead.

If you do get error beeps then the motherboard is probably ok. Try firing up the system without the hard drives connected, to make sure there isn't an IDE error (has been known to stop motherboards POSTing in the past).

Gigabyte motherboards can be a little flakey from time to time, and are not well known for giving useful diagnostic information when something isn't quite right.

Cheers Phil & Jay for those last suggestions,it would seem that the mobo has gone as there are no beeps at all and the g/card works fine on another pc I have going.
The power supply is a 400w unit, and as said is connected up proper with the additional 4 pin plug attached.
Its a pity really as the prescott HT chip would have been a nice base for a linux machine.On fleabay you can get plenty used 478 boards but the HT types seem to be far more expensive. Guess I carry on lookin :lol:

Well gents

I am now using my linux(ubuntu) pc to write this and so far so good :wink:

Spoke to a mate this afternoon who kindly donated me a P4 2.6ghz base unit :dance:

Fitted a harddrive,memory,new cooler and THAT graphics card and away it zoomed! Well happy that Uncle Bill has nowt to do with this :lol:

I know you already have a pc up and running but it seems a shame to give up completely on the old one. Another thought, have you tried resetting the BIOS on the m/board?