New Power Supply - Boot Problems

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jaredwold
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Joined: Fri Apr 16, 2004 3:38 pm
Location: Wisconsin
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New Power Supply - Boot Problems

Post by jaredwold »

Greetings:

I just had a 300W power supply blow on my system which contained the following components:

BP6 w/ Dual 366 Celerons
3 256 pc100 sticks
TNT2 ultra video card
3Com 3c905b NIC
Soundblaster Live sound card
Standard 1.44 FDD
7600 RPM 27 GB WD hard drive running off one of the ATA 66 headers
Adaptec 39160 SCSI Card supporting the following peripherals:
Cheetah 10 GB 10,000 RPM hard drive (Ultra 160)
Plextor 8X Plexwriter CD Burner
Plextor 40X CD-ROM
Pioneer 303S 12X DVD-ROM
Plus a conformal fan and bay fan to cool the Cheetah, and three additional case fans.

All of this was running comfortably of the 300W supply (some overclocking instability was common).

I just purchased a new Antec 400W supply which has the +12V 4-pin connector and the AUX connectors, which the old 300W supply did not have (and the BP6 does not have headers for anyways).

I installed the new supply, and as soon as I flipped the master power switch on it, it started to spin up. It was obviously supplying power to the peripherals (CD drives and so forth) and fans (LEDs were all lit up). However, the power seemed to be pulsing (the LEDs on all components pulsed in unison), and if I would hold down the RESET button, the pulsing would stop, and everything seemed to be spinning up. However, the typical sounds associated with my hard drives powering up seemed to be absent. Moreover, no video signal was reaching my monitor.

Normally, one would need to actually press the "POWER ON" button on the front of the case to get a power cycle started. The power switch seems to have no effect on anything anymore (I could hold it down for the usual five seconds, but it did not force a shutdown as it normally would). Obviously, some power is making it through the motherboard if the RESET switch has some effect (other than resetting the power, of course).

I am at a loss, because I have tried some of the suggestions I have read on other posts. I have not checked to see if any capacitors got fried when the old supply blew. I plan to look into that tonight. However, I have stripped the whole system apart and reseated everything except the processors themselves (the heatsinks are a real pain to reseat). That includes the video card and fully reconnecting all peripherals. I have not tried removing everything except the video card to see if I at least get into the BIOS.

Is there any obvious thing I am missing? Should I try a total stripdown with only a video card and one stick of RAM? (One processor rather than both?). Is the fact that the power supply is more powerful (and has the additional power connectors) a problem? The Antec documentation says the newer supplies are backwards compatible.

I do plan to upgrade to a Tiger MP s2466 or similar soon, but I cannot really afford it yet. If I can get this new power supply running properly, I would much prefer to keep running my trusty BP6 for a little while longer.

Any ideas anyone has would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Jared
BCN
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Joined: Tue Nov 26, 2002 9:50 am
Location: Barcelona, Spain
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Post by BCN »

maybe it is not the board but the PSU...
Dual C366@550MHz 1.90V :) (History)
yet single PIII-S 512Kb L2 cache at 1400MHz@700MHz
BP6 (not modded yet)
256MB PC133 C2
GF4Ti4200-8x
Maxtor 2x60Gb - all on promise ATA133
Lite-On LTR 40125S@48125W!!!
Plus P4 system
jaredwold
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Joined: Fri Apr 16, 2004 3:38 pm
Location: Wisconsin
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Post by jaredwold »

That is what I am testing shortly. I just yanked an old 250W supply from an unused machine at work. I suppose it is possible I just got unlucky and bought a bad supply.
BCN
Posts: 508
Joined: Tue Nov 26, 2002 9:50 am
Location: Barcelona, Spain
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Post by BCN »

it seems so right? :(
Dual C366@550MHz 1.90V :) (History)
yet single PIII-S 512Kb L2 cache at 1400MHz@700MHz
BP6 (not modded yet)
256MB PC133 C2
GF4Ti4200-8x
Maxtor 2x60Gb - all on promise ATA133
Lite-On LTR 40125S@48125W!!!
Plus P4 system
hyperspace
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Joined: Wed Jul 24, 2002 7:39 am
Location: Lincoln, NE USA
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Post by hyperspace »

I'm using an Antec TruePower 430 Watt PSU in my BP6.

The way you described the behavior of the RESET and POWER buttons, it almost sounds like the RESET and POWER connectors going into the PN1 and PN2 mainboard headers, are not where they should be. Maybe you have already checked this possibility.
Quantum WormHole

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lost in hypertime...
jaredwold
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Joined: Fri Apr 16, 2004 3:38 pm
Location: Wisconsin
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Post by jaredwold »

Yeah, I thought that the connectors might be in the wrong space on the headers, but they are currently where I have always had them. I rechecked the manual this afternoon, and I even tried reversing them in case I had pin 1 in the reverse spot. No dice on any of it.

I went ahead and stripped the system down to one CPU in the CPU 1 socket, one dimm in the dimm 1 slot, and just the video card. This I tried with both the new 400W supply and the 250W supply I yanked from that old system. Both exhibited the same behavior.

Thus, either both PSUs are bad, which I don't think is the case, or there is some blown circuitry on the system. It is as if something between the power pins on the PN header and the power connector is bad, as well as something between the power and the AGP slot. I happened to notice that the fan on my TNT2 Ultra was not running, which I think is a problem. I believe that usually runs as soon as you power the system on. I am coming to the conclusion that part of the BP6 got fried when the old PSU blew.

If not, it is that my TNT2 got fried somehow, and maybe the system can't function at all if the video card is not working. That said, I would still think the power switches would work correctly. Obviously you wouldn't get to see the Bios power up and such.

I may just have to buy a new board.

what a PITA.
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