Hello Jephree, not sure if you remember me. It has been a while. I was around when you first got your water cooled CPU going. :P

I hope all is well.

Anyway, here is my problem. I bought a new PC from Cyberpower.
Specs are:

NZXT Zero Aluminum Full Tower
CPU: (Socket AM2) AMD Athlon™64 X2 4200+ Dual-Core
18X DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW DRIVE DUAL LAYER
CoolerMaster Liquid CPU Cooling Fan System Kit
Hard Drive (74GB Gaming Western Digital Rapter 10,000RPM SATA150 8MB Cache
MOTHERBOARD: (Socket AM2)Asus M2N32-SLI Deluxe nForce 590 SLI MCP Chipset DDR2/800 MBoard w/ Dual 16x PCI-Express (only I got in case the wireless version)
MEMORY: (Req.DDR2 MainBoard)1GB (2x512MB) PC6400 DDR2/800 Dual Channel Memory (Corsair XMS2 Xtreme Memory w/ Heat Spreader
Microsoft® Windows® XP Media Center 2005 Edition
Thermaltake ToughPower 600 Watt Power Supply - Quad SLI Ready
NVIDIA GeForce 7900 GS 256MB 16X PCI Express (EVGA)
NVIDIA GeForce 7900 GS 256MB 16X PCI Express (EVGA)

Basically, I got it home and opened it up. Everything looked OK. I then proceeded to read the mobo manual. Still looks fine. I get it ready (hook up the wires for everything) but when I plug the power cord into the tower, the PC turns on (by itself) and the shuts down after a second. I hit the power button and nothing happens. Great, I am now officially hosed.

I look inside and the Mobo LED light is on. Nothing else is working. I unplegged it and plugged in again and the same thing happens. I unplugged everything except fo the main 24 pin power to Mobo. I try again with PSU and it does the same thing.

I take my PSU out of another PC and plug it into the Mobo. As soon as I plug the power cord into the PC (actually, I am flipping the switch on PSU) it repeats same problem. Now I know it isnt the PSU. Problem is that is has to be the Mobo.

I am at a loss. I don't want to RMA it if I don't have to. It will take them a very long time to even get to my PC nevermind fix and ship it back. I am going to end up having them ship me a new mobo by sending this one to them first. This takes a while too, but at least I can work on it properly and the wait isn't tnearly as long as the RMA.

If you all have any ideas, I would really appreciate any help you may have to offer. I am in a pickle here lol I would rather try to fix this mobo. It may just be something simple I am missing. I tried the wires for the power button on the tower that connect to the Mobo. I reatatched them and still nothing. I took them completely off and still same issue. It is almost like the mobo is calling for power and then doesnt want it once it gets it. Please help?

Thank you for your time,

Pystal

First off when you say you "plug the power cord into the tower" do you have the cord connected to the tower then you plug into the main and /or activate the Surge Protection device?

Point being you do not want to "Hot Wire" the PSU by plugging a hot wire into it. You want it on Standby (orange/amber) light before starting the computer.

Next: Do you have two 7900's? SLI?

If so remove any motherboard SLI power connections. This would be a molex (4 pin) connection on the motherboard. If you have SLI and are powering the cards direct from the PSU this onboard molex will short the circuit.

Just to add:

There is also a 8 or 4 pin 12V that needs plugging in along with the 24 pin main.

Hi again,

I basically Plugged the wire into the tower first then into a battery backup device which was off. I then hit the power button on the battery backup and the PC started up and shut off by itself. I didn't touch any power button the PC.

I realized then that I had a problem. I do have 2 7900's and they are in sli mode (I guess as I can't turn the pc on to look in bios etc, lol). Only the 4 pin for the CPU and the 24 pin for the MOBO are connected.

I have since then taken all of the main components out of tower and laid them out on table. I took the MOBO out and connected 1 7900 card, the HDD, DVD Drive, PSU, Memory, and the CPU. I turned the PSU switch (with hopes of nothing turning on) and the MOBO turned on and shut down again.

I then started unplugging one item at a time to see if it was anything besides the MOBO. I got down to the MOBO and it was still doing the same thing. I really think the guys that built it killed the MOBO, or they had a refurbished one that they gave me. Maybe it got hurt during shipping but I doubt it.

On a side note, I looked on the back of the MOBO and saw that the Stack Cool 2 was missing. The ASUS boards have a cooling unit on the back under the CPU area to help dissipate heat. It seems as though when they put the Cool Master unit on the MB, they had to use the holes that the Stack Cool was using. They must have forgotten to place it back when they were finished, or the screws they had weren't long enough to fit both items on the board, so they left it off. How important is that to the MOBO?

If they left that off, I can only imagine what else they might have forgotten to do. Or did wrong for that matter.

I am just very upset with this company. They have lied to me continuously amoung other things. I just wanted a new PC and I got something odd instead.

When I asked them to send me a new MOBO and to make sure that it comes with everything I need to connect it, they said I should just use the stuff I have here to connect it. I asked them what happens if they send me the wrong or different MOBO? The guy told me that won't happen. So I asked him why they sent me the wrong mobo in the pc then? He said that my item was out of stock so they upgraded me. Nice huh? When were they going to tell me that? Im going off on a tangent here, sorry about that. I am just stuck and well stuck lol I have more horror stories I can tell you about this place.

Anyway. Thank you for your help. If you can think of anything I might have missed please don't be shy. Even any tips on what I should do about the whole mess would be great too. I may need some help (if I get a new MOBO) connecting new MOBO to tower and updating bios. I have never done that before.

Thank you again for your time,

Take care,
Pystal

SLi can only be enabled after you load an Operating System and your Graphics Drivers.

Prior to this point leaving the bridge off is recommended.

However your problems appear much deeper.

If you power on the motherboard with no RAM installed does it BEEP!

Assuming the case speaker is wired it should without doubt BEEP!

Also leave the UPS out of the equation at this point.

As to the rant I have many to add. I have found many great on-line retailers and many more that are far from great. Please post links to your Pros and Cons. I think this would make a good sub-section here somewhere. I certainly have many to offer on both sides and will.

Not to mention notes on Technical Support. At least you talked to someone (although that is not always a good thing). Many that I have had problems with I get caught in a Voice Mail Loop and no e-mail response.

Like Windows rebooting but at least there I get error messages and know how to debug that.

Just to add:

The basic behavior of an instant shutdown like that is a short circuit.

It does not mean the board is bad but some connection or lack thereof is causing a short circuit.

Thanks again,

Once this horrific episode of PC purchasing is over, I will have to list the errors and horrible customer relations (concerning many aspects of the business). Basically, I have nothing good to say about Cyberpower except the price. After this ordeal ( which isn't over yet), knowing what I know now about this company I have no problems purchasing my own parts and building my PC myself. I saw the price and the things I was getting and it just couldn't be beat. Now I know better.

I wish I could find the cases speaker wires to hook up to the MOBO. At least then I could hear BEEPs, and have a clue as to what the deal is. I am thinking about taking one of my older pcs apart (I have many) and use the speaker from them to hook up and listen.

Is that a good idea? I am confused as to why there is no speaker hooked up to mobo. If you think I should try it, I will do so tomorrow and see if I can get it to beep. I have already taken the PC apart and placed parts in boxes etc. I have no problem with trying out anything that you think may help.

I just wish I knew what was causing the short. Oh, I forgot if I mentioned that the MOBO LED light is on after the PC shuts down. There is a 12 in one flash memory reader that has a LED light on too. Would the short alow that to happen? Also, I understand that a short may be the problem, but what I can't figure out is why the mobo calls for power in the first place. It is like there is a circut somewhere that is malfuntioning and asking for juice. It's all too strange.

I really can't thank you enough for helping me and listening to me. It is great to be able to talk with someone who knows what they are talking about. Also, it is good to be able to vent a little as well.

Take care,
Pystal

Perhaps the problems are related; perhaps not.

The only thing I can think of is the front panel wiring is somehow "stuck" on ON and or the case button is "stuck" on ON?

Check the pins and connections at the Front Panel Header. Perhaps the short is there. See what happens if you power on with no connections to the Front Panel Header.

The instant shut down is usually a PSU function. It detects a short and shuts itself down to protect the board. Even after this it would be common that the LED's would remain on as the low voltage 5V is usually a constant supply.

In hindsight if this is happening you would probably not get to a BIOS BEEP stage as the BIOS isn't even being activated yet most likely.

Just incidentally newer high end PSU's and motherboards have LED error displays which is nice.

Also some newer boards have on/off/reset buttons on the board itself so you can run and test without the case or the front panel header involved.

Just a further note Re: the Front Panel Header: Some cases have 3 pin switch leads whereas some boards only have 2 adjacent pins. In such cases the 3 pin lead (which only contains 2 wires) needs to be reset to adjacent locations or literally cut out the empty middle socket. In this case if the 3 socket is used with 2 pins the ground is not there and this could short the circuit.



.........

Hi,

I am now at the point of cross shipping me a new mobo, or having them charge my credit card, send me the new mobo, then release the charge when they recieve the old mobo.

I just need to see if I can live without 200 or so bucks for a while. Otherwise it will take 2 weeks before I see a new mobo.

I will keep you updated. Once I get the new mobo going, I may need some help

Either way, thanks again for your wisdom and patience.
Take care,

Pystal