quieting went well.... then :( dead rig....

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MainframeGuy
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quieting went well.... then :( dead rig....

Post by MainframeGuy » Mon Oct 18, 2004 12:55 pm

Some of you might know I am quite new to this forum and subject area - I have been trying to move as fast as I can to a sub 20DBa system on a limited budget - so far my story goes something like two orders one RMA and £300 down....

But that is not the hard part.....

The hard part is that I had a lovely quietted system i could happily sleep with in my bedroom - and then, I did the unforgiveable, I remembered the teensy detals inside - had to go backt o plug in the signal lead from the CD [;ayer that was obscured by the VGA heatsink - plus tin-snip (!gulp!) a hole for the fan-mate on the Zalmann7000b and maybe a little added frontal venting and add some foam padding to damp any reverb from case floor....

So I am HIGHLY confident (all is working and quieted) and do all that and power up and NO VGA SIGNAL! :eek: swaps cards and goes into general panic mode - no joy all remains dead - eventually get signal and BIOS boot, * PRAISE THE LORD AND THINK ALL IS WELL " *.....

OHHhhh NOOoooo power down assemble case - NO VGA signal!

So case off again - Isporpopyl in slots and delicate teasings and shaking upside down and micro vacing of case etc etc etc

Power up again - not first time, but eventually - get signal - leave power on and reassemble case - all is well - run for like 24 hours or so - next day get a BSOD whilst doing something worthy (forget what exactly, but it was an attempt to revent this kinda scenario!) AND BSOD AND AFTER BSOD NO VGA AND NO VGA EVER SINCE (that is 36 hours ago!!!)

I am in distress - typing on my latop WHICH IS A LOT LOUDER THAN THE MODDED SYSTEM I HAD BUILT!!!!

Messages of condolence or any suggestions much appreciated....

I have begun to realise -

the quest for silence costs much £ $ € ...

BUT costs a lot more commitment AND patience!

Comments?

(Oh yeah, and you are allowed to call me an idiot for the tin snips thing - but please do it kindly?)

surfed
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Post by surfed » Mon Oct 18, 2004 6:32 pm

First guess is your cpu heatsink on right? whats your temps? bsod is mostly heat / faulty ram. Voltages? Give us info.

MainframeGuy
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Post by MainframeGuy » Mon Oct 18, 2004 11:27 pm

oh yeah - CPU heatsink is nicely bolted and seated in place and temps being recorded were lovely and low (compared to recently high temps with old fan).

PLUS the problem is not necessarily in any way shape or form related to BSOD - problem is as of right now I simply cannot get any graphics signal, neither VGA nor DIV and since I have no on-board graphics I am entirely reliant on them for the system to be functional. I am confident it is not card (only one day old) and happy I correctly applied the Zalmann heatsink to it - my best guess is something is shorting somewhere and soimetimes short is not happeneing and i get signal....

oh and yes I have tried reseating my AGP card into slot MANY times..... and it DOES click in .... and I have cleaned edge connector with isopropyl....
Last edited by MainframeGuy on Mon Oct 18, 2004 11:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.

meglamaniac
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Post by meglamaniac » Mon Oct 18, 2004 11:27 pm

Following up on what surfed said, reseat EVERYTHING.
Take the ram out, the heatsink off the processor, etc etc. When it's all out check down the back of the motherboard (unscrew it if you have to) to make sure you've not got some little bit of metal from your tinsnipping down there shorting it out. Blow some compressed air (or suck some air with a hoover) over everything to make sure.
Then put everything back in carefully looking for anything that might be causing a short.

If you can get it to start, go straight into the BIOS and watch your temperatures for a bit. When in the BIOS on nearly every motherboard there is no CPU usage regulation, so it will be running at 100% (not as intensive as gaming, but it won't be idled with the HLT instruction like Windows does) which will give you a good idea of if you're overheating.

MainframeGuy
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hopefully this is the happy conclusion to this thread! :)

Post by MainframeGuy » Tue Oct 19, 2004 2:32 am

Many thanks for the encouragement your post gave me Megla - went in and took it all out (again) I did just about all you said with exception of CPU heatsink (here I was/am confident I worked more or less to best of my abilities given only had zalman thermal paste).

For some reason I had been very "down" about doing what I perceived as things I had already tried.... pessimism was getting to me.

Anyway, having lifted mobo and liberally blown a little can all around mobo and screwed it all back down - SUCCESS...

Now have other cards all back in and left rig running - was folding and climbing from 27oC case and 40oC CPU as I left it, shall post back stable under load temps with fan-mate at max later.

So far as I could tell there was not much that gave an obvious clue (I always like to know actual cause!) but I am doubting it was my tin snips actually (I really did TRY to be careful!) and edging towards a theory that the foam I added to the floor might have been pushed snug onto mobo causing it to be deflected to short to case at that side? Still seems pretty remote given the three standoffs along that side, but having released any tension and refitted it does seem to be working for now.

Have to say I am pretty nervous, but looking forward (hopefully) to some nice quiet computing once our cleaner hs finished vacuuming the room!

Thanks again - I shall definitely take out Friend or lifer status just as soon as I clear the overdraft I acquired during this mod!

MainframeGuy
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Post by MainframeGuy » Tue Oct 19, 2004 4:39 am

OK just to round off - stable 90% load temps are case at 44oC and CPU at 61oC - this is at least 5oC better than what I had - and that is even with a passive cooling solution on my 9600XT (replacing the 9700 pro with fan) I am not sure about idle temps - not too worried though and happily reducing my fan-mate to see how quiet I can go and what temps I run now....

meglamaniac
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Post by meglamaniac » Tue Oct 19, 2004 5:24 am

Yeah I like answers too - unfortunately sometimes you just don't get them. My guess would be whatever was shorting it was dislodged by all the reseating. That's half the reason I do that if I'm out of other ideas - the chance that whatever it is might just get sorted by being wiggled about. The other half of why I do it is to get a good look for dust on contacts or in sockets, or any signs of shorting (spark marks on contacts etc).

caber
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Post by caber » Wed Oct 20, 2004 9:47 am

Congradulations, you got your PC working again :wink:

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