I was having issues with my computer shutting down almost randomly. When I say almost, while it would be mostly random it would never shutdown while I was playing a game (mostly Minecraft or Diablo 3) and it would almost always shutdown whilst trying to apply Java updates. I bought a new SSD and moved my old HD to a secondary, scanned it and it was fine. Problem persisted. I bought and installed a new power supply. Problem persisted.

I tried to eliminate the RAM so I removed one stick (out of 3) and it failed to restart. So I tried another and it failed again. I tried to test them one by one and on one of them the RAM got so hot I burned my finger taking it out. Now even putting the RAM from my wife’s computer in it (which works fine) it won’t restart. The power comes on but the monitor does not even get a signal.

Have I fried the motherboard? It’s an ASUS P7P55D-E LX. It’s got some strange MemOK! crap that I’ve been playing around with to no avail. Anything else I should try?

think has to have RAM in slot 1/A to work, and not sure if they can be funny about size, so if you pull a card from slot 1 in might not boot, so you can juggle them but if the important slot doesn’t have RAM it may not work.

dunno, am computer dunce

Cheers. I actually read the manual (for the first time ever) which said where to put the RAM. So I think I did that right… I hope.

Twoy said:

Cheers. I actually read the manual (for the first time ever) which said where to put the RAM. So I think I did that right… I hope.

Do you get any “beeps” at all when you boot?

If not it’s likely the motherboard.

Cheers. I don’t think there’s beeps. I had taken out the internal speaker. I put it back in to see and there were none. But of course, since I hadn’t tested it prior, the speaker might be stuffed.

I have external speakers attached but I assume they don’t work until it’s booted.

jjjust moi said:

Twoy said:

Cheers. I actually read the manual (for the first time ever) which said where to put the RAM. So I think I did that right… I hope.

Do you get any “beeps” at all when you boot?

If not it’s likely the motherboard.

also known as the Mutter Vorstand if you are in Deutschland

My latest desktop never does any start-up beeps. They might be old hat.

Twoy said:

Cheers. I don’t think there’s beeps. I had taken out the internal speaker. I put it back in to see and there were none. But of course, since I hadn’t tested it prior, the speaker might be stuffed.

I have external speakers attached but I assume they don’t work until it’s booted.

AFAIK the beeps only come through the PC speaker.

have you tried a new motherboard startup memory battery?

like roughy is pointing to, dump the memory with the link on the board or pull the battery and let it all reset to defaults. Battery might be fucked too and need replacing(check contacts while at it)

near tossed my first computer out because of that, sat in shed for couple years tried it and all fired up proper.

transition said:

like roughy is pointing to, dump the memory with the link on the board or pull the battery and let it all reset to defaults. Battery might be fucked too and need replacing(check contacts while at it)

near tossed my first computer out because of that, sat in shed for couple years tried it and all fired up proper.

battery fired up
computer tossed
sat in shed
memory dumped

“have you tried a new motherboard startup memory battery?”

Nope, is that the little lithium battery in it?

>Nope, is that the little lithium battery in it?

that’s the one.

I gather you have nothing happening when it turns on, nothing on the screen at all.

Twoy said:

I was having issues with my computer shutting down almost randomly. When I say almost, while it would be mostly random it would never shutdown while I was playing a game (mostly Minecraft or Diablo 3) and it would almost always shutdown whilst trying to apply Java updates. I bought a new SSD and moved my old HD to a secondary, scanned it and it was fine. Problem persisted. I bought and installed a new power supply. Problem persisted.

I tried to eliminate the RAM so I removed one stick (out of 3) and it failed to restart. So I tried another and it failed again. I tried to test them one by one and on one of them the RAM got so hot I burned my finger taking it out. Now even putting the RAM from my wife’s computer in it (which works fine) it won’t restart. The power comes on but the monitor does not even get a signal.

Have I fried the motherboard? It’s an ASUS P7P55D-E LX. It’s got some strange MemOK! crap that I’ve been playing around with to no avail. Anything else I should try?

Does your RAM work in your wifes computer?

“like roughy is pointing to, dump the memory with the link on the board or pull the battery and let it all reset to defaults. Battery might be fucked too and need replacing(check contacts while at it)”

I did pull it out and put it back in, made no difference. But I’ll buy a new one and try it, cheers. Would that really completely prevent it from booting up?

“I gather you have nothing happening when it turns on, nothing on the screen at all.”

Nope. Monitor actually finds no signal at all. Seriously better not be the video card…

“Does your RAM work in your wifes computer?”

Considered trying that but since I had tried the reverse I didn’t. I will shortly.

The beeps tell a story if there is something wrong at startup.
If you are not getting any beeps and there is nothing on the screen try turning on your monitor.

>I did pull it out and put it back in, made no difference. But I’ll buy a new one and try it, cheers. Would that really completely prevent it from booting up?

from my experience it does.

Twoy said:

“like roughy is pointing to, dump the memory with the link on the board or pull the battery and let it all reset to defaults. Battery might be fucked too and need replacing(check contacts while at it)”

I did pull it out and put it back in, made no difference. But I’ll buy a new one and try it, cheers. Would that really completely prevent it from booting up?

No that’s only the CMOS battery, that deals with mainly date time and a few other things.

Your boot is programmed in the ROM and has no bearing on the battery. It should boot with a stuffed battery.

Twoy said:

“I gather you have nothing happening when it turns on, nothing on the screen at all.”

Nope. Monitor actually finds no signal at all. Seriously better not be the video card…

You’ll get 8 beeps if your card is stuffed. No beeps at all point to the MB.

jjjust moi said:

Twoy said:

“I gather you have nothing happening when it turns on, nothing on the screen at all.”

Nope. Monitor actually finds no signal at all. Seriously better not be the video card…

You’ll get 8 beeps if your card is stuffed. No beeps at all point to the MB.

plug the monitor into the onboard video.

/tangent
Thought you’d forgotten about us, Twoy!

“plug the monitor into the onboard video.”

There’s no onboard video. Might see if it goes into my wife’s computer later.

Thanks wookie. I got the battery in and out easy enough.

“See if the RAM works in another computer.”

Will do.

“See if it boots up with another video card; are you sure there’s no on-board video?”

Yep. I wasn’t worried about onboard video. I don’t have another card that fits this computer unfortunately.

“A bad battery shouldn’t prevent booting, but replacing the battery will reset the BIOS, which might help.”

This MemOK! thing has a button which is supposed to reset the BIOS. I’ve pressed it a lot. Also taken the battery out and put it back in.

“The motherboard might by bad, but it’s more likely to be the CPU chip.”

Noooooooooooooooooooooooo…

“Do you have other hardware in the slots, eg an ethernet or USB card?”

Nope, that’s all onboard.

these power supply testers and motherboard testers can can in handy

PCI+Diagnostic+Card+Analyzer+Tester

Computer-PC-Power-Supply-Tester-Checker

look for the ones that come with instructions

this power supply checker comes with instructions

Computer-PC-Power-Supply-Tester-Checker

“these power supply testers and motherboard testers can can in handy”

Cheers. Given that I replaced the power supply with no change, it better not be the power supply. I’ll look into a motherboard tester.

Do you have a RAM testing program, like MemTest86 ? I’ve only ever used the free version, which often comes on Linux live disks. The MemTest86 site’s download page has files that will run from a CD or USB, for both Windows and Linux.

No I don’t, but I’ll look for one and install it on this computer when I test the RAM in this one.

• I’ve only ever used the free version, which often comes on Linux live disks

After pulling my hair out trying to get a new build up and running, with it falling over for no apparent reason (it was all brand new components) someone at TT recommended this to me and straight away it identified one bad stick of RAM. After removing the offending article it worked like a bought one…

• No I don’t, but I’ll look for one and install it on this computer when I test the RAM in this one.

Don’t install it, just run it off a live CD…

It takes forever too

Will it work in the computer that won’t boot? Or will it need to boot to get to that?

• Will it work in the computer that won’t boot? Or will it need to boot to get to that?

Can you get into your BIOS? Or doesn’t it get that far? You just need to make sure your computer goes to the CD (or USB if using that) first in the boot order. I ran the memory test on a PC that had no OS at the time so I don’t think booting is a problem. But I could be wrong, it has been a while since I needed it and I was never an expert…

I can’t even get to BIOS, so I’m going to go with no…

poikilotherm said:

It takes forever too

True, MemTest86 does take a while, especially if you’ve got lots of RAM. And when it’s finished all its tests it starts running them again from the beginning. But if a RAM stick is definitely faulty then that should show up fairly early in the test sequence.

Twoy said:

I can’t even get to BIOS, so I’m going to go with no…

Yeah. The computer needs to be healthy enough to at least start booting to run MemTest86.

As Furious says, you normally run it instead of booting your regular OS – it runs in it’s own DOS-like OS, so that no other programs are using RAM.

> I was having issues with my computer shutting down almost randomly.

Ditto.

Update: Thanks all for your patience. RAM is fine. GPU seems to work fine in my wife’s computer. Left with motherboard or CPU. Doesn’t even give a signal to the monitor so I have no way of knowing how far it boots up, but this may suggest not at all. Can anyone confirm this is definitely the motherboard? Or is there still a chance of something else being the issue?

About to choose a new motherboard. Any help selecting a new one? Is there some way of making sure it is compatible with the existing parts?

Cheers.

Twoy said:

About to choose a new motherboard. Any help selecting a new one? Is there some way of making sure it is compatible with the existing parts?

Cheers.

Yes. Yes.

What CPU do you have? Any other ‘odd’ requirements?

Twoy said:

Update: Thanks all for your patience. RAM is fine. GPU seems to work fine in my wife’s computer. Left with motherboard or CPU. Doesn’t even give a signal to the monitor so I have no way of knowing how far it boots up, but this may suggest not at all. Can anyone confirm this is definitely the motherboard? Or is there still a chance of something else being the issue?

About to choose a new motherboard. Any help selecting a new one? Is there some way of making sure it is compatible with the existing parts?

Cheers.

Have you tried a motherboard tester?

had to look him up. cheers is a really old sitcom.

CrazyNeutrino said:

Twoy said:

Update: Thanks all for your patience. RAM is fine. GPU seems to work fine in my wife’s computer. Left with motherboard or CPU. Doesn’t even give a signal to the monitor so I have no way of knowing how far it boots up, but this may suggest not at all. Can anyone confirm this is definitely the motherboard? Or is there still a chance of something else being the issue?

About to choose a new motherboard. Any help selecting a new one? Is there some way of making sure it is compatible with the existing parts?

Cheers.

Have you tried a motherboard tester?

yeah, she said it was the best fun she’d had in ages…

Twoy, I have one you can have if you want a P58UDR3 Gigabyte. Major drawback is only one of that Sata plugs works – which means only one HDD.

poikilotherm said:

Twoy, I have one you can have if you want a P67UDR3 Gigabyte. Major drawback is only one of that Sata plugs works – which means only one HDD.

scratch that, it’s not compatible if you have a 1156 chip.

poikilotherm said:

What CPU do you have? Any other ‘odd’ requirements?

Intel Core i5 760 Processor LGA1156 2.80GHz 8MB Cache CPU

No other odd requirements, but my last one had no onboard graphics because I was relying on my graphics card. I don’t mind if my next one does or doesn’t. Other than that, I assume any motherboard will fit in my CoolerMaster RC430 case.

CrazyNeutrino said:

Have you tried a motherboard tester?

Nah, I thought it probably wasn’t worthwhile if there’s nothing else the problem could be.

poikilotherm said:

poikilotherm said:

Twoy, I have one you can have if you want a P67UDR3 Gigabyte. Major drawback is only one of that Sata plugs works – which means only one HDD.

scratch that, it’s not compatible if you have a 1156 chip.

Cheers, but I need to run my SSD and HDD most of the time, so wouldn’t have been possible anyway.

Cheers.

If you are lucky you might get a nice Indian gentlemen who will ring you out of the blue and offer to assist you in your computer difficulties.

• I assume any motherboard will fit in my CoolerMaster RC430 case.

One should never assume…

M/B Type: microATX, ATX

• Cheers, but I need to run my SSD and HDD most of the time, so wouldn’t have been possible anyway

You can get cards that add extra SATA ports…

What sort of puter is it?

• What sort of puter is it?

Dead…

furious said:

• I assume any motherboard will fit in my CoolerMaster RC430 case.

One should never assume…

M/B Type: microATX, ATX

Cheers, well I thought since it wasn’t that old it would be fine but yeah, probably good to check.

Cymek said:

What sort of puter is it?

A black one…

It’s this:

Intel Core i5 760 Processor LGA1156 2.80GHz 8MB Cache CPU Asus P7P55D-E-LX P55 DDR3 RAID GLAN SATA PCIEx16 USB3 Kingston 6GB(3 × 2GB) DDR3-1333MHZ Seagate 1TB SV35 7200.5 SATA 32MB Gigabyte ATI HD5750 OC PCI-E 2.0 1GB 128-bit DDR5 Asus VH242H 23.6inch Wide 5ms 1920 × 1080P HD DVI Speakers Pioneer BDR-205BK 12X Blu-Ray Writer Drive SATA Black Retail CoolerMaster RC430 Elite Black No PSU CoolerMaster 650W Extreme Plus Logitech G110 Gaming Keyboard Logitech G700 Wireless Gaming Mouse Microsoft Windows 7 Pro 64bit OEM

Except I made that HDD the slave and got an SSD and replaced the power supply.

furious said:

• What sort of puter is it?

Dead…

LOL true

Twoy said:

Cymek said:

What sort of puter is it?

A black one…

It’s this:

Intel Core i5 760 Processor LGA1156 2.80GHz 8MB Cache CPU Asus P7P55D-E-LX P55 DDR3 RAID GLAN SATA PCIEx16 USB3 Kingston 6GB(3 × 2GB) DDR3-1333MHZ Seagate 1TB SV35 7200.5 SATA 32MB Gigabyte ATI HD5750 OC PCI-E 2.0 1GB 128-bit DDR5 Asus VH242H 23.6inch Wide 5ms 1920 × 1080P HD DVI Speakers Pioneer BDR-205BK 12X Blu-Ray Writer Drive SATA Black Retail CoolerMaster RC430 Elite Black No PSU CoolerMaster 650W Extreme Plus Logitech G110 Gaming Keyboard Logitech G700 Wireless Gaming Mouse Microsoft Windows 7 Pro 64bit OEM

Except I made that HDD the slave and got an SSD and replaced the power supply.

Do you game with it?
I treated myself and bought myself an Alienware laptop for gaming

Laptops aren’t for gaming :P

• Do you game with it?

It is hard to say but there are some subtle hints…

• it would never shutdown while I was playing a game (mostly Minecraft or Diablo 3)

• Logitech G110 Gaming Keyboard

• Logitech G700 Wireless Gaming Mouse

furious said:

• Do you game with it?

It is hard to say but there are some subtle hints…

• it would never shutdown while I was playing a game (mostly Minecraft or Diablo 3)

• Logitech G110 Gaming Keyboard

• Logitech G700 Wireless Gaming Mouse
  

I can’t see any subtle hints in that lot.

• Laptops aren’t for gaming

Not a big gamer but personally I prefer consoles to computers when it comes to games…

Am I allowed to say that?

furious said:

• Do you game with it?

It is hard to say but there are some subtle hints…

• it would never shutdown while I was playing a game (mostly Minecraft or Diablo 3)

• Logitech G110 Gaming Keyboard

• Logitech G700 Wireless Gaming Mouse
  

Shoosh you I was lazy reading

• Shoosh you I was lazy reading

That’s okay, Minecraft isn’t really a game anyway…

furious said:

• Laptops aren’t for gaming

Not a big gamer but personally I prefer consoles to computers when it comes to games…

Am I allowed to say that?

Alienware laptops are for gaming, I don’t have the space for a PC.
When it said laptop its not particularly portable as it weighs 8.5 kgs

Cymek said:

Alienware laptops are for gaming, I don’t have the space for a PC.
When it said laptop its not particularly portable as it weighs 8.5 kgs

I think that’s more than my desktop weighs.

do you want fries with that fried computer?

Sorry all I’m in and out for a while.

As has been pointed out, I game a fair bit. Not as much as I’d like. And no, you can’t say that furious, you console industry stooge…

Sorry for the formatting of my computer specs, copied it from an email. Hope it was understood.

I have a slightly older gaming laptop at work (I’m FIFO), ASUS G2. Great, but expensive for what it is. The video card died one time and I had a hell of a time getting them to fix it. The motherboard is the only ASUS part in this computer. I’m starting to go off ASUS a bit.

Twoy said:

Sorry all I’m in and out for a while.

As has been pointed out, I game a fair bit. Not as much as I’d like. And no, you can’t say that furious, you console industry stooge…

Sorry for the formatting of my computer specs, copied it from an email. Hope it was understood.

I have a slightly older gaming laptop at work (I’m FIFO), ASUS G2. Great, but expensive for what it is. The video card died one time and I had a hell of a time getting them to fix it. The motherboard is the only ASUS part in this computer. I’m starting to go off ASUS a bit.

TBH, I’ve not had a good experience with Gigabyte or ASUS. Yet to try MSI. Could be worth a go

G’day again.

So looking at getting this motherboard: http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Z97M%20Pro4/

That’s in place of this fried one: http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/P7P55DE_LX/

They look almost interchangeable. New one has video out for easier trouble shooting. :) I put an Asrock in my wife’s computer and never had an issue, however that’s a sample size of 1. Anyone had any experience? Anyone see any issues with that replacement? Also, anyone still think it’s worth buying a motherboard tester? I really wanted to get it all up and running tomorrow which is why I’m jumping the gun.

Twoy said:

G’day again.

So looking at getting this motherboard: http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Z97M%20Pro4/

That’s in place of this fried one: http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/P7P55DE_LX/

They look almost interchangeable. New one has video out for easier trouble shooting. :) I put an Asrock in my wife’s computer and never had an issue, however that’s a sample size of 1. Anyone had any experience? Anyone see any issues with that replacement? Also, anyone still think it’s worth buying a motherboard tester? I really wanted to get it all up and running tomorrow which is why I’m jumping the gun.

Doesn’t support your processor afaict

poikilotherm said:

Doesn’t support your processor afaict

Hmmm, ta. I thought when it said it supports 1150 socket CPUs it meant all 1150 series but I admit I don’t really understand it. So I need something that says 1156 socket specifically?

Twoy said:

poikilotherm said:

Doesn’t support your processor afaict

Hmmm, ta. I thought when it said it supports 1150 socket CPUs it meant all 1150 series but I admit I don’t really understand it. So I need something that says 1156 socket specifically?

Isn’t yours 1156?

poikilotherm said:

Twoy said:

poikilotherm said:

Doesn’t support your processor afaict

Hmmm, ta. I thought when it said it supports 1150 socket CPUs it meant all 1150 series but I admit I don’t really understand it. So I need something that says 1156 socket specifically?

Isn’t yours 1156?

Yes. The socket types are not interchangeable.

the 1150 socket is the newest gen of intel chips.

Ah thanks for that. Damn so I need something backwards compatible or I need a new CPU as well… fun.