f13.net

Sorry to post this here but I need some options before I go home to fix this after work.:P

Was installing a CD burner in my PC last night and after putting it in the box and hooking up power and ide cable I attempted to start my PC.

First thing I noticed was the monitor giving the old 'Check video cable connection' message. Checked, and it was find.

There is power, when I switch the PC on all the fans go etc, but it doesnt seem to be 'initializing'?

Two things I noticed...For whatever reason the 'power' LED doesnt come on and two I had accidently disconnected the IDE cable from my primary HDD...putting that back in didnt change anything.

Im thinking I fried something but I would figure that more shit wouldnt work if I done this. Anyway to test if my mobo or HDD is toast?

Thanks for any ideas.

You probably disconnected another cable.

Do you have a front-panel button as well as power switch?  If so, there's a cable that runs from your front-panel power button to the board... you need to reconnect that.

Alternatively, you disconnected some other cable, like the power from the power supply to the motherboard.  (Or the 12V one if if you have one of those.)

Bruce

Nope MB power cable is in place.
The power LED doesnt come on, but the computer powers up when i switch on the FRONT button..(there is also a button on the PS that has to be switched on).

Basically the computer is turning on but not booting up, turning on the monitor etc.

This sort of thing has happened to me three times before.  

First time, the motherboard had just up and died on me.  No fix but to replace the whole bloody thing.

Both other times were after installing new hardware.  In one case, my old Soundblaster card was the cause (I don't know why).  It was an old piece of crap anyway, so I just yanked it and turned on the MB's on-board sound.  No loss.  In the other case, after swapping out my old DVD-ROM for a DVD burner, I ended up having to disconnect everything but the video card and main hard drive, and then re-connect the other stuff a piece at a time.  Insert/connect one, boot up, let the system recognize & install it, power down, go on to the next.  I think it helps "Plug & Pray" sort out conflicts easier.

Check the IDE cables. I had the same problem with my pc the last time I built it and I had the HD cable in backwards. I never thought to check it because I didn't realize you could install them backwards. After talking to a friend he told me to make sure the stripe was toward the power supply. Sure enough it wasn't. I switched it and things booted up fine.

Make sure all your ide cables are in the right way around, all your devices have power, and EVERYTHING is hooked up.

If it still doesn't work, go back to the way it was when it worked.  

If it still doesn't work after that, take out everything except the video card, cpu and ram and see if it boots then, then add stuff back until it stops, or hopefully doesn't stop (working).

If it doesn't work with just the mobo, cpu, ram, and vid card you may have fried something.

Did you check the jumpers on your IDE devices and make sure they were all set to the proper settings?  My IDE ribbons were choosy about which device was on the first hookup and which was on the second when I installed a new HD last week. That might be it as well.

The LED thing is probably just a loose wire if you're actually powering up.

Is this an AT or ATX motherboard?

Try disconnecting the power from everything but the motherboard, CPU fan (if it isn't plugged into the motherboard) and video card (if it needs one). In other words unplug the power from your hard drives, CD/DVD drives, case fans and so on, and see if you get the boot screen.


If you see the power LED on the motherboard light up (assuming it has one) and it isn't beeping at you (make sure your little internal speaker is hooked up to the motherboard) then it's probably okay.

thanks for the suggestions all, now if I could stop falling asleep getting my son to bed I'd get this fixed.:P

It might be that you are pulling too much power from the power supply now that you added something new. I concur on the above suggestions, just adding insight as to why it might have happened.

Thanks all for the suggestions unfortunately to the best of my knowledge the mobo is toast.

I had a ASUS A78VX-X mobo that I'll probably buy again unless someone can recommend a better one for $50-60 US

The NVIDIA nForce2 is the best Socket A chipset. I'd go with the A7N8X-X (Single Channel RAM) or A7N8X (Dual Channel RAM, $10 more expensive) instead.