ASUS A8N-SLI Premium Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 SLI ATX AMD Motherboard
AMD Athlon 64 3700+ San Diego 1GHz FSB Socket 939 Processor Model ADA3700BNBOX
eVGA 256-P2-N517-AX Geforce 7800GT 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 Video Card
CORSAIR XMS 512MB 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Unbuffered System Memory x 2
Antec TRUEPOWERII TPII-550 ATX12V 550W Power Supply
Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD3200KS 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
PLEXTOR Black IDE DVD Burner Model PX-740A/SW-BL
Monitor, keyboard, mouse, speakers, etc.
I started by essembling all of the components, and powering on to get absolutely nothing, no beeps from the case speakers, no voice warnings from the motherboard on board audio system (it has a voice warming POST error system) no text to the monitor (SAMSUNG 940b Silver 19" 8ms LCD)
Actually, the green light on the motherboard comes on and the fans spin, and the LEDs on the case come on (COOLER MASTER Ammo 533 RC-533-SWN1 Black/Silver Aluminum+Plastic front bezel; SECC chassis ATX Mid Tower Computer Case... in case that maters) the eVGA card fan spins, and the drives do a little something. But, not apparent POST
I then unhooked the power, took out the little nickle sized battery, changed the CMOS jumper to reset the CMOS RTC RAM, changed the jumper back, rebooted -> to get the same as above.
I then unhooked everything except for:
The CPU and heat sink (the fan on this spun as well at first power up)
The 2x 512 MB memory (A1 and B1)
The graphics card (and the 6 pin power connector to the card)
power to the mother board 20 + 4 12V and the auxillary power (4 pin - ? 5V ?) for the graphics card
Monitor
Speakers (from on board audio, and to case speakers)
and keyboard
Still got nothing on the monitor, and no beeps or warnings... Frustrating.
I then took the board out of the case and hooked up the above components -> nothing
I then took off the keyboard, and graphics card -> nothing
I then took out the memory, and FINALLY I good a warning -> some beeps and the on board audio 'system check - memory failure' or something along those lines.
Put the memory back in -> then got a warning 'System Check VGA failure' - Interesting???
Put the eVGA card back in and went back to nothing
Took the card out and this time no warnings - just nothing
Took the memory out and got the warning 'system check - memory failure' This is very reproducible, and this is where I am stuck.
SO, right now it seems that rather than a computer I have a very expensive and somewhat ugly fan (as far as fans go) that says in a very pleasant voice 'system check - memory failure'. I was hoping go get more from this experience, which is why I ask, most humbly, for help.
I thought I had done my reasearch well and picked compatable and high quality components. I feel like I must have been delusional to think this would be as easy as some suggest. Anyway, If I have forgoten anything important (or have included too much junk) in this post please forgive me, as I said, I'm new at this...
Thanks.
Mike