Tried everything - still no post with K7S5A

Well, i read all or almost all msgs related to post problems with this board, and still have the problem: no video and no post on boot.

little background:

ECS K7S5A w/ LAN, AMD 1GHz 266 TBird
ATI Radeon VE (also tried TNT2-Vanta)
Crucial 256MB DDR
300W AMD & P4 approved PSU from Codegen
Win 2000

When first built, the board would post np,
i went thru the install of w2k, had some problems w/ lan. audio, but fixed it all w/ 082701 bios upgrade.

Powered down since bios flash, plugged in the rest of h/w and ... no post. Removed h/w - still no post.

So, here is where I am right now:

MB outside w/ CPU, RAM and Video, nothing else. (did try w/o RAM, Video & CPU also :( )
on power on, the fan spins, keyboard lights up when plugged in, but NO BEEPS and NO VIDEO!

Tried L7 bridge voltage change to 1.85, no luck.
Tried w/ floppy - no light.
Twisted PSU cables, left it out a bit - still nothing.

Obviously, CMOS jumper and JP1 were pulled in and out about a thousand times also.

I know the CPU/Video are ok since I tested them in a separate environment.

The only thing left to do afaiac is to hit it w/ something hard (the old fashion way!) :(

Anyways, so now I am totally puzzled, the thing worked on arrival, but in comma now.

So, do I RMA and spend forever waiting for a replacement, or try something else you guys found and I might have missed???

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Brk.

try a pci video card and see if it will post
i have heard reports that radeons have problems on the initial post , im can not confirm this but, its worth a shot

I agree with the PCI card approach.I have a trident handy just for that purpose.

Also, change out the Power supply, one of your regulators may be blown. Twisted PS cable is simply a wives tail or problem with the PS plastic connector casting. Just trim with a knife if you see a problem.

One other thing. My gut tells me you flashed your bios with a corrupt file. After you build your flash disk, ALWAYS use scandisk on it to check the data files and disk before flashing. Why? Because if you make your system disk in 2000, it is very intollerant to bad quality or old disks and it will write bad sectors. Make sure when you flash you use a UPS. A voltage drop on the flash and you will corrupt.

Core voltage changes has nothing to do with posting. Drops in core voltage are generally associated with bus and latency problems. Clearly that is not your problem.

Also reseat you DDR, may even try just one stick or test a known working stick of PC 100 or PC 133. Never underestimate the ability of Crucial DDR to foul up the system.
I do not believe that Crucial is approved for use with the K7S5A. Stick with the known varieties in your mobo book or Kingston.

keep us posted.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR> Also reseat you DDR, may even try just one stick or test a known working stick of PC 100 or PC 133. Never underestimate the ability of Crucial DDR to foul up the system.
I do not believe that Crucial is approved for use with the K7S5A. Stick with the known varieties in your mobo book or Kingston. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> [img]redface.gif[/img]

I hope your kidding.
Crucial is one of the best brands going bar none!!!
Hmmm maybe thats why it power MY ECS K7S5A!!! :D
That and it was 35.95 shipped to my door for 256 megs PC2100. :D :D :D

[Loopy]

My guess would be that the problem came from the additional hardware install. What did you add to the system and later remove?

I agree with the reseating of your DDR but for different reasons. The mobo's only 4 layer and seating the suckers can be hit or miss. Crucial is a subdivision of Micron and there are three listed Micron (misspelled as Micon) chips.

Just to rule it out, do you have another PS to test out on your system?

1. Dont have the "luxury" of a PCI video. however, i did try with a TNT and w/o a card, and no beeps...

2. I thought PSU might be the problem, but the other one I have was only 250W, and the board didnt work with it either. Plus, why would it work in the first place?

3. I did try reseating DDR RAM, but always in the first slot. Can I stick it in the second slot only?

4. Here is another interesting bit of info. Before the problem, but after I flashed the bios, I managed to successfully reboot several times, just never cold boot. The problem occured the first time I cold-booted, it gave me some kind of usual bios error - like the NVRAM or something - and froze. From that point on - cold feet.

5. The h/w I tried to add were a couple of drives and cdrw, all IDE. And just like in many other posts in this forum, the lights would blink on them, but nothing happening. And no light on the floppy -- most discouraging.

I have enough patience to try more things for another day or two, so ANYONE knowledgable about this please share your opinion on this problem.

Regards,
Brk.

[Schole]

I encountered a no-POST situation just this morning. I am using Kingston PC2100 DDR, and after a BIOS flash I forgot to set the CPU/DRAM ratio to 100/133 (I'm using a Athlon 900 200 FSB). Then after rebooting it won't post. I tried clearing the CMOS, it didn't work.

Then I tried my old PC-133 SDRAM, it worked! Being persistent I switched back to DDR ON THE SAME SLOT (I was using 2nd slot), no POST. Finally I moved my DDR to the other slot (1st slot), POST!
I wonder if my second DDR slot is fried?! :(

brarky, NVRAM is usually a message driven from a corrupted boot disk.

Ok, let's get this right...

1. Simple config. floppy, CDROM in IDE 2, Hdd in IDE 1. Make sure your CDROM is master and that Hdd is set up as factory neutral.

2. Check your cables. CHECK THOSE PINs including the floppy, and CDR and HDD. Check the mobo switch. connect only the power sw. Check your case switch.
3. REmove cpu and carefully seat back into position examine all pins.
4. Use PC 100 or PC 133. DDR by itself can cause problems only use the ECS recommended DDR. Micron. Again I don't care for Crucial, it is second line DDR in spite of the dork's post. It is very batch dependent. I did not see it recommended in the mobo book.
5. place power supply conector on board. discharge the cmos for a few seconds then short pins 2 and 3 or Normal operation on JP4. Make sure jp1 is not set for keybord boot.
6.Use the TNT card.
7.To answer your memory question about DDR, you can use either slot one or two or both. But please use PC 133 or PC 100 if at all possible for initial boot.
8. hook the monitor.
9. Power up.

If you were able to reboot but not cold boot, this could very easily be a corupted bios. TAke out your disk that you used for flashing and get a friend to load a copy of scandisk on the floppy. Then run a command line and scan the floppy. This will tell you if you have file corruption or a bad sector. This seems sadly likely.

When you flash this BIOS, you really have to be very careful about corrupt files. Win 2000 will corrupt virtually any system or dos files that you try to load onto a floppy. It is far better to run an exe file and build a boot disk, then throw away all files but he command file. You may copy ROM and flashinf file with click and drag. Don't forget scandisk too. You must run scandisk out of DOS and it will give you the scoop on your disk. THESE DISKS IF CORRUPT CAN NOT BE "FIXED". The software will fix the bad sectors but the softare is doomed. So why bother. Get a nice new floppy disk and start over.

Anyway, if you don't start this time, then there are only two things left. CPU is shot, or your bios is corrupt. Check the bios disk with scandisk. If it is corrupt, then you have met the enemy. Good luck guy.

Did you measure your CMOS Voltage when system
is completed switched off.
If you have or can get a DVM (Digital Volt Meter) connect the ground wire to Ground.
(One of the black wires of your PS and the
other one to:

Lithium Battery: should be 2.9..3.3Volts.

then measure the Voltage directly at the
TOP of the Clear CMOS Jumper (when the Jumper is set to normal).
This Voltage should be > 2V. And when System
PS is switched on, but Powerbutton still off.
should be 3.4Volts.

If this is only 0.8V your mobo is damaged.

(This happens when you set Jumper to Clear
CMOS when System is swithed on) or you dont
wait at least one second after switching off.

I deal with Crucial daily and it is not second line DDR at all,if anything this board is more of a second line product than Crucial Ram.Crucial is the retail division of Micron and they do not select special pieces for crucial, all that differentiates them is the Crucial consumer orientated warranty and a sticker placed on the dimms.The chips are otherwise identical thay are all micron 2-2 75as.Please dont post misleading information about ram in here.If you read the post he stated that he had no problems with the board untill he flashed the new Bios, all of a sudden it becomes a Ram Fault, ask Crucial what the return rate is on their ram, then make some comments about it being Second Line.
The power supply he is using is the likely culprit, it is defiantely second line, it comes as standard in all the cheap cases.