[jjwumaster]

Hey all, just finished putting together my first computer ever. Tried turning it on and got one blink on the Phase 1 motherboard LED and kind of a high-pitched beep (did not come from the mobo speaker).

Here's the parts list:

MB GIGABYTE GA-P55M-UD2 P55 RT
VGA SAPPHIRE 100283-2L HD5770 1G RT
PSU OCZ|OCZ700MXSP 700W RT
CPU INTEL|CORE I5 750 2.66G R
MEM 2Gx2|GSKILL F3-10666CL8D-4GBRM
HD 640G|WD WD6401AALS

Any suggestions? None of the fans spin on, not even the power supply fan. But I do get that beep / flash from the motherboard, which I guess means there's power getting to it? And the power switch must be wired correctly otherwise I'd be getting no response at all. Is it a faulty power supply? Help is much appreciated. I've put so much time into this project!

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Check to make sure your memory is seated correctly. You may also need to check and make sure you have no standoffs in any place beside under the holes in the mobo. If there are they could short your board out.

[rshaffer61]

Check to make sure your memory is seated correctly. You may also need to check and make sure you have no standoffs in any place beside under the holes in the mobo. If there are they could short your board out.

[jjwumaster]

Just looked at it again. There was one standoff that was unnecessary which I took out. Plugged in the power supply with almost no peripherals (just the CPU fan, power switch, and memory) and same thing. A soft, high pitched beep and the phase 1 LED flashing once. Then nothing.

[rshaffer61]

Did you check the memory?
We may need to take the mobo out and do a bench test outside of the case.

[jjwumaster]

Yes memory was seated fine. Another thing to note was the first time I tried to turn it on I had both the extra standoff *and* had forgotten to plug in the 12v ATX 2x4 pin plug. I guess I could take it out of the case--how do I turn it on then? The power cable would have to be unplugged...

So far I've tried it with no RAM, video card, basically no peripherals and got nothing.

[rshaffer61]

This is a two step process. testing in the system with minimal connections and then outside of the system.
Disconnect everything from the Motherboard except

• keyboard
• mouse
• video output
• 20+4 powercable
• 4/8 pin 12v wire both coming from the powersupply,
• Cpu fan wire
• power and reset button to the case
• case speaker

Now you should have NOTHING connected to the motherboard except what was listed above.

The goal here is just to test the mobo:

If the computer still will not boot up the please remove the motherboard from the computer along with the power supply

place the motherboard on a piece of card board larger than the motherboard,

this will eliminate a short from the mobo to the case which could be a possibility
Install the cpu with, 1 stick ram in dimm 1, power supply, case switch and case speaker
Connect ps2 mouse and keyboard along with the monitor
Repeat the above and power on
If the computer now boots into bios you most likely had a case short so make sure when installing the motherboard in the case that you use standoffs,
and they line up with the mounting holes in the motherboard and none of the standoffs touch anything else on the underside of the board.


Thanks to Cbarnard for these instructions

[jjwumaster]

Also the PSU fan is not spinning. I don't know if this indicates that it is beat, but none of the fans are spinning.

[rshaffer61]

That would indicate a short, bad motherboard or bad psu

[jjwumaster]

HALLELUJAH! The out of case test worked! The PSU and CPU fan spun on and I got all 4 phase LED's on the motherboard lit (not sure what that means though...). So I guess it must be a short when I install it into the case? Maybe improper placement of the standoffs? Not 100% sure where to go from here...

[rshaffer61]

OK now without physically putting the motherboard back into the case check the placement of every standoff to make sure it is aligning with a hole on the motherboard and that there is a screw attaching it.

[jjwumaster]

There are 8 standoffs and 8 holes and they all align exactly. Should I try to start the system with the motherboard on the standoffs but not screwed in? Could it have something to do with the backplate (the one which covers all the connections?). I tried with th PSU in and the motherboard out and the fans turned on, so the PSU seems OK.

[jjwumaster]

OK that worked--without any of the screws in. Next I'll try with all the screws in.

[jjwumaster]

That also worked. I'm going to keep going in this order:

Video card
LED / front panel connectors
HDD
optical drive
SYS fan controller

[jjwumaster]

I've isolated the problem: when I plug in the sys fan controller, the system stops. Perhaps I'm plugging it in wrong or something? The modular plug which comes with the power supply has a bunch of four-pin plugs which I've daisy-chained to the system fans, but then it has a 4-pin connector. When I connect that to the sys fan plug, the system stops working. Not sure exactly why...

Is it even necessary to plug the sys fan into the motherboard? That allows the motherboard to control fan speed, right? That'd be nice ideally but if it means my system doesn't work...

[rshaffer61]

OK are you saying that the system fan is the fan on the back of the system?
Can you get a picture of the setup you are describing?
If the fan is a 4 pin arrangement then using one of the four pin connections to it should work.