OK, I"m stumped-boot problem

**confus-ed** · January 1st, 2003, 08:48 AM

Originally posted by Rkring1
....There are critters called "post cards" that run in a motherboard slot and indicate problems by a series of lights , but I don't know if they will indicate a faulty CPU.

All the ones I've used do, they do need a known working good psu to power the board though .... they are good for system builders, but if its a one off they may not be worth the outlay....

**constructor** · January 1st, 2003, 04:09 PM

Originally posted by Bug Mekanic
NooNoo, tried it, no joy...looks like a DOA board. Have any favorite amd mobos you can turn me on to? BTW, Happy Boxing Day! Hey, do you know hwat boxing day means? While I was living in England, I had several friends (native Britts) that didn't know how boxing day started...I still got several different answers.

* sorry bout the mispellings...just got four stiches in my flipper offer finger and it's splinted...hard to type- damn flouresent light toobs!

Have you checked the cooling?
You have not fried the CPU?

BOXING DAY

Well in the old days servants worked at Xmas (Day). Their presents were given to them by the Master in boxes the following day.
QED

**Bug Mekanic** · January 1st, 2003, 08:02 PM

Originally posted by Rkring1
OK , grasping at straws again , but..............have you been using the same electrical outlet and/or surge protector to do alll this from ? I had one job that nearly drove me nuts until I found that the AC outlet was not delivering full power.Try hooking up to a different circuit and don't use your surge protector.

I thought of that as well. When building the system outside the case, I not only didn't use my surge protector, but used a completely different circuit. Can a bad motherboard fry a good cpu?? It's hard for me to imagine my luck is so bad that I got a bad mobo and an bad CPU from two different vendors... Tomorrow I'm going to see if I can locate an inexpensive socket A CPU that IS KNOWN GOOD, and see if that won't fire some life into the mobo...If no good, then I have alot of RMA's to start...

**NooNoo** · January 2nd, 2003, 05:56 AM

From ECS bios download page...

BIOS Type AMI® BIOS Release Date 2001/12/04
Version 01/11/21 File Size 419 K
Download k7s5a011121.exe Flash Utility aminfxxx.exe
Release Note 1. Support AMD Athlon XP 2000+ CPU

What revision is the bios on the board(s) you have? If it's an older one it doesn't understand what an xp2000 is!

ecs k7s5a bios page

You would have to flash the bios with a cpu in that the bios does understand.

**Bug Mekanic** · January 2nd, 2003, 11:13 AM

I'm not sure what bios revision I have, but both boards are revision 3.1 . The first board did work with the XP1900, then quit, but the second new board won't do jack. How would you flash the bios if nothing comes up and it won't boot?? I'm going to venture out today (foot of snow last night) and see if I can't find a Duron or Athalon that I can try in the board(s) to determine if it's a bad board or bad CPU(s).

**NooNoo** · January 2nd, 2003, 12:35 PM

That is my point, if you get a duron or an athlon it will boot... you then flash the bios to include the xp chips and away you go.

**Bug Mekanic** · January 2nd, 2003, 02:05 PM

Oh, I gotcha. I'll let you know how it goes.

**Raffaz** · January 3rd, 2003, 12:38 AM

Ive got a K7S5A, with an athlon 1800+ and mine worked straight out the box, ive had it nearly a year, i think they only supported upto an xp2000+ back then.

**Bug Mekanic** · January 3rd, 2003, 01:24 AM

Ok...bought a new stick of ram...didn't fix it. Did a search on the web on this board, and this problem seems to be very common! Exactly the same problems as I'm having. The only solution is the board is junk. I've got RMA's to send the seocond one back to newegg. BTW, took the xp1900 down to the local computer repair shop, he says it looks like it's cooked. He said the resitors on the underside of the cpu should all be the same light tan. Mine were tan/brown/tan and so on. The xp2000 looks good though...I'm thinking P4 for my next system. BTW, anyone have a phone number for ECS in the states? Thier e-mail supports sucks too.

**Raffaz** · January 3rd, 2003, 01:57 AM

Elitegroup Computer Systems, Inc. US Headquarter
45401 Research Ave,
Fremont CA 94539 ,
Tel 510-226-7333,
Fax 510-226-7350
Business Hours: Mon-Fri 9AM-6PM (PST)

**Bug Mekanic** · January 3rd, 2003, 11:14 AM

Thanks Raffaz!

**QPAVL** · January 4th, 2003, 12:09 AM

I too had nothing but problems with the K7AMA mb
I originally got around Jan 2002 . At the time , it was an Athalon 1700 with pc 133 ram ,ATI 2000 pro vid card . On the first boot , it ate the registry off the hdd. tried loading the os with different ram ,hdd's cdr's ; no luck . It created errors faster than any system I had seen before .
Sent it back to the supplier in BC [ an ex business partner ] . It was gone over 3 months , came back claiming to be fine . Installed it again , and it wouldn't post . After blowing a gasket , took the whole thing to a local company . They used one of the diagnostic boards , and it pointed to a bad mb. Groan , change it . Went back for it , and was told it was the cpu which was doa . They replaced it with an 1800 , and it seemed to run fine . I run 98 and XP Home at present , with 354 mb pc 133 ram , Ati 2000 pro , the onboard lan and sound , and a AOPen 56-SV modem . Under XP , it is rock solid . Under 98 , it will lock up constantly . At present I am stuck with it ,as I too refuse to replace the ram to get a new board . While this doesn't help , at least you know someone else has been down the same road . Good luck on your RMA's .

**jeradsyn** · January 5th, 2003, 11:49 AM

Does your mobo have the red LED mounted near the memory sockets? What is the current status of the LED when you turn the system up?

If it is now off, then the mobo is toast. Whenever you change any of the hardware out, you must unplug the power from the system, not just turn the power off. This includes adding RAM, or moving video cards.

When you started reseating and reconnecting things, if the LED was lit, you let the magic smoke out of all the chips!

Hope that this helped...

jeradsyn

**Major Kong** · January 6th, 2003, 03:17 AM

I'm late to this conversation, sorry. I've built three PC's with this board in the last several weeks. I've had excellent luck - one XP 2000 and two Durons (1.1 & 1.2 gig). The second build (the Duron 1.1) I had very similar problems. Come to find out it was the CMOS battery. A trip to Wal-Mart and a new battery solved the problem. Seems the KTS battery that comes in the board is a POS. ECS's latest BIOS release for the K7S5A was 10/29/2002. It was important you noted that you have revision 3.1 as the revision 1.x models ate used kitty litter. Also one other quirk to this board that I've seen is that the video card has to be seated securely with the AGP latch locked. On a couple of occasions I didn't have the Video Card seated correctly (didn't have the blasted back piece seated all the way for the latch to lock). This has has caused me a couple of minutes of head scratching, but I figured it out pretty fast. Good luck to you. I wish you the best.

**pochrist1** · January 7th, 2003, 04:26 PM

I'm thinking P4 for my next system.

If your low on money why waste it on a $P4$?
Your problem is a budget motherboard not a budget processor.
You'll have to spend more money on a P4 to compare to an AMD XP2000, then to top it off you'll have to buy a board that supports it. You know what they say "Penny wise, dollar foolish"

Right now all you have to do is get a "Decent" motherboard
Asus, Epox, MSI these boards are all popular because there Stable and Mature companies that have working with AMD Since the begining, ECS is a Budget Board (regardless if it runs) it's cheap for a reason.
I know what it's like to be on a tight budget, but save up and buy good quality and you won't have to spend money on Tech support phone calls and RMA shipping charges.
Peace of Mind - Priceless

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