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a couple things come to mind.
the video card may be tricky to get seated properly. I had a vid card once that I seated and removed 4 or 5 times before it finally just worked. Try seating and reseating it a half dozen times, and gently clean the contact points of the card with isopropyl alcohol.
the power supply may be flaky. I had a server one time that powered up OK, but no video, the hdds were spinning the cd rom was working and all other indicators, just no video. Swapped in a new power supply and presto. Try a different power supply, and check that the plugs that go into the mobo are free of particles of packing foam or plastic etc.
The motherboard might be bad. My work PCs mobo died couple weeks back, it was a pain to isolate the problem, but that was it. (luckily it was a 2yr old part and the replacement only cost $10 off ebay). Try taking the mobo out of the case and reseating it, look for loose screws or other things in the case that might be grounding it out.
Good Luck~
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If you have 2 systems exibiting the same symptoms and you suspect the vid card to be at fault - try a different vid card. Any vid card.
Try using known good components if you have any spares, swap 1 thing at a time until you get it going.
Also, reseat the RAM and the CPU, especially the RAM. Also - what slot is the RAM in? You may not have it in the 1st slot (which should be marked).
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Well it isn't the video card because we have now between the two of us tried 3 different vid cards on 3 different monitors. It turns out we also have different power supplies so I don't think that's the problem either. And a ground would be a likely culprit IF both of us didnt have the exact same problem which would require a ground in the exact same area. But I still need to try flashing the cmos and check the ram to see if it's in slot 1, so I'll check that now.
update: neither flashing the cmos nor moving the ram fixed the problem. I'm down to thinking either we both got bad dimms or bad mobos. Maybe they didn't properly insulate the board where it touches the mounting posts, but i really don't know and I don't know how I could check that.
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Have you tried it outside the case without the video card installed,to remove the possibility of shorts against the case and video card errors?
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If you smelled something funny check your CPU!!! I killed my first Athlon XP because i didn't have the heat sink seated right. Athlons have tendency to fry easily if they are not cooled off properly
Molten material may cause thermal skin burns
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I almost forgot if you see any darking or even a small dark spot on the CPU its toast:flame: also the cpu will smell terrible
Product may have an unpleasant odor and taste
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I havent tried it completely out of the case to completely eliminate the possibility of shorts, so i guess ill try that too. The burning smell seems to have faded, I think it was just the thermal grease warming up or something. Hopefully.
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did you remove the heat sink and check the cpu? just give it a try, my system behaved the same way untill i relized i had killed the cpu
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One thing I am noticing is that you are saying is that it it is posting and you have flashed the bios. How did you flash the bios if you don't have a display? Kind of hard to do if you can't boot from floppy and don't have a display.
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maybe flashing is the wrong term. I cleared the cmos. i guess that's different from flashing the cmos.
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Yup, loads.
Flashing it means you overwite the BIOS with a newer one. You must have video for this.
At this point start looking for bad parts. Use the CPU, RAM and other parts in other systems to see if they work and figure out which part is the culprit.
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mmmm...crispy. I currently have a $350 toaster. :(
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If the floppy light stays on the whole time, and you get no video try changing the ribbon cable on the floppy. Move the red stripe the opp. direction. That can casuse this type of prob.
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Sometimes the drawings in the mobo manual can be misleading. I think your "clear CMOS" jumper is in the wrong position. Move that jumper and try to boot again.
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Sounds like you fried your cpu :(. That nice burning smell is usually a result of that.
The other day I had someone come into the shop and ask me about cpu fans. He said that he had an Athlon XP processor with a system he had just put together, and that he wasn't getting any video on boot up. He then tells me that he thinks he needs a cpu fan because it hasn't been booting while he has been trying it WITHOUT A CPU FAN. I almost fell over....
