750i help

A friend of mine just did a new build and its not powering correctly. Everything appears to be hooked up the right way and I've done a thorough inspection to be sure.....the problem, however, is that when he tries to power on the PC 1 of 2 things will occur. 1 being that it will power for a few seconds and then turn off....2 being that it won't boot at all. The motherboard is displaying a red LED light on it and a blue light flashes briefly for a second or two then turns off. The POST code is FF which stands for boot on the LED screen attached to the motherboard, which is what my 780i does when it is booted.

That all I can diagnose on it so far...any help would be much appreciated. And questions are gladly accepted so I can answer them to help you help him ^^

Thank you,
Xen00b

Hi Xen00b,

Two things I would try. Assuming you are an experienced builder and all connections are correctly seat and secure, I would first reseat the CPU cooling module with appropriate amount of thermal past and make sure it is secure. Another is trouble shooting for a short by using minimal components. If this wouldn't help, try a bench test. Don't know anything about the Zumax, but test your power PSU also.

Hope this helps.

Bruce

All MBoard standoffs in place ?
4 pin ATX MBoard plug in firmly ?
Thermal paste was applied correctly as asked above ?
Does the vid card also have a 4 pin connect ?

More info on the hardware involved would be helpful...

You could enter BIOS, go to Power menu -> Hardware Monitor and see what's happening with the CPU temperature...It shouldn't be above 45-55...If it increases fast, you've got a cooling problem as bruce2 suggests. You might have not placed the CPU cooller/fan firmly too.

Does the mobo make any beeps besides just one short one? I know my manual has a code of beeps, and different beeps indicate errors. Possibly might give you something.

~Lordbob

@bruce2: This isn't my PC so the PSU isn't a Zumax (ePower), his PSU is a 680W BFGTech.

Hardware on his build are as follows: e8500 cpu, xfx 750i mobo, 750gb seagate barracuda hdd, xfx 8800gt gpu, artic cooling freezer 7 pro, vista home premium x64, 2x2gb ocz fatal1ty edition RAM 800 (PC26400)

Also when I said 'boot' earlier, I meant 'power'. The PC does not do a full system boot...only powers momentarily. And when I said it does 1 of 2 things...it actually does both everytime you try. First it powers for a few seconds then turns off completely, then when you try to retry it doesn't power at all.

Anymore questions are welcomed if it will help the cause, thank you guys for trying ^^

-Xen00b

EDIT: Also, the mobo is not making any kind of beep....so its not trying to POST I think.

That sounds like your mobo may not be getting power.... I am not sure what no beep means. You may want to contact the company or consult your manual.

Also, make sure all the plugs in the mobo are fully seated.

~Lordbob

All plugs seem to be fully seated. Would a mobo not getting enough power cause the entire PC to just turn off when its trying to power? Could it possibly be a bad PSU? And for the secondary power connector we used a 8-pin connector but we had to remove a plastic piece from the other 4-pins to be able to plug in the 8-pin connector. Could it be that its supposed to use a 4-pin and not an 8-pin? It doesn't make sense to me that that would be the problem, but figured I'd ask for a second opinion on the matter anyway.

@ xen00b

To chime in, you have not said if you tried Bruce2's idea.

Did you try removing all non-essential components, then plugging them in one at a time while attempting to power on? This way you can isolate problem components.

As to the secondary power connector, did you check you manual(s) for the proper connection?

All the PSU cords should fit in nicely, nothing should need to be modified. If you have the wrong connector for your mobo, then you either need a new PSU or a new mobo.

If the mobo is not getting power, it will not cause the PC to shut down, it will simply not start up. The BIOS screen will never come, and so the hard drive will never be accessed and so on. Nothing will happen, as the power button will not even work.....

And Bruces suggestion is your best bet right now. Unplug all non essentials, and try to start it with that. Does your PSU have a light on the back? If it does, does it turn on when it is plugged in? If there is a switch as well then try flipping it, it could be off (I have done that before....)

There are lots of things to try, and if you need to, take the PSU into someplace lie Best Buy or Fry's and have them test it. They will tell you if its broken in about 30 secs....

~Lordbob

We are RMA'ing the mobo now.

And yes, he tried removing the non-essential parts and powering it. XFX said it could be the mobo so they are going to test it for us and send us a new one if that's the problem.

Thanks for the feedback everyone, I'll let you know the results from the mobo.

-Xen00b

Also go test your PSU, it might be bad as well. (The last one I bought was dead out of the box, so I had to exchange it...)

~Lordbob

I've seen a few problems happening with XFX boards lately. I have an XFX 750i motherboard, and that works fine, but my friend got the XFX x58i, and there was no display output on his graphic cards. The LED lights showed error code 88, so looked in the 750i manual as mine use the same LED lights, and there was no error code for 88 :S

He's RMA'ing the board, and going to buy the ASUS P6T Workstation, but the RMA for an XFX board is a joke...he bought it from Computer Hardware - All - Scan.co.uk and he got the RMA code and everything in a couple of hours, but they said he must wait 20 days for a refund or a replacement board because XFX must examine the boards themselves.