This newbie computer builder needs help!

A newbie in trouble…

For this coming Christmas, my parents and I decided that my brothers wish for a new computer was to be fulfilled…and I get to be the lucky guy to build it. Because Compaq, Dell, or any other computer company don’t sell any computers with the title as “1337 gaming h4x b0x”, as my brother would put it, the computer would need to be built from scratch so to say. So this is what I went out and bought for him:

- Chenming Punisher tower
- SAYO SY-P4S645D Dragon Motherboard
- CompUSA 400 watt ATX Power Supply
- CompUSA 256 DDR RAM Sticks (x2)
- Pentium 4 Processor, 1.8
- Western Digital Hard drive, 7200RPM 40GB
- TDK CD-RW
- And finally a Verto GeForce4Ti4600 128MB DDR RAM, AGP…oh yeah
- No A: drive

Now, I got all the parts and started to put this thing together. I got everything in place and all the cords were hooked up right (I think, check the pictures to look for any obvious mistakes), and everything looked ok (except for the clutter of wires). I plugged the power in and the light came on, on the motherboard signaling power. Now when I push the power button on the tower, the three fans flicker on for half a second or so, and then they die out. After that, nothing happens when I push the power button again. I have to take out the plug, wait couple of seconds, then put it in and the same flickering of fans happen along with the dying out part when the power button is pressed. Also, I forgot to mention above that I have a black light installed in there too, if that makes a difference.

My question is…why wont the darn thing turn on? Is there some sort of control like a fuse that, if too much electricity comes in it shuts down, or is there not enough electricity (I doubt it)? Also, there are some extra plugs that are coming from the power supply that I can't seem to find a place for.

Thank you in return for any helpful feedback!

You might wanna check this page on PCMechanic.

i think it's with the CompUSA 400 watt ATX Power Supply .
Did ya check every component , oh i dont think you can check at the shop,
but you might go to a hardware vendor and get stuff checked, because this looks like a case of faulty equipment at the most, if you havent, of course, made a silly mistake

Although your post is pretty descriptive, it's still hard to trouble-shoot something based on so little information...

Here are some tips:

- Cables going from your box to your motherboard: make sure you connected them correctly (your motherboard should come with a diagram) - polarity DOES matter!
- the powerbutton
- hdd led
- resetbutton
- speaker...

- Try booting your box with just the motherboard, processor, ram and graphics card - forget about the hdd and the cd untill your box properly boots. Definitely take out the blacklight! I tried installing a blacklight once - I screwed up polarity and was left with a burnt black-light.

- It's normal to have some plugs from the power supply left: for example you mentioned that you don't have an A-drive, which explains at least one plug left. Most powersupplies (if not all) have plugs for two hdd's and two cd-drives.

My friend had that problem when he was building his box... His was that the RPM of the pan's was to low for the BIOS to pick up.....I think He fixed it by changin out one of the fan's.....though That might not be wot's needed in this case.

first thing i wuold look at is to make sure your heatsink is on the CPU properly, my new AMD system would run for 10 secs and then die coz the heatsink was not installed properly, sounds like the exact same problem i had except your is an intel system, by the way, do you have a fan in the case or just on your board / GPU and CPU?

if you ahvnt got one in the case i would strongly recommend it, also as neg said about power supply plugs, i have the p-4 ones left in my AMD system as well as some others, you probly should have the largest of the 3 left over i think, since you only get such a short amount of uptime with it, make sure you double check polarities, connections and everything, when youre absolutely sure everything is set up spot on, then you should start taking out components one by one to try and track down a faulty part or something you may have missed

My suspicion is RAM.. but it is multi choice exam at the moment..

Quote:

---

Now when I push the power button on the tower, the three fans flicker on for half a second or so, and then they die out. After that, nothing happens when I push the power button again. I have to take out the plug, wait couple of seconds, then put it in and the same flickering of fans happen along with the dying out part when the power button is pressed

---

Disconnect ALL attached Items.. HDDS, CD-rw, all other cards (except for Video..for now).

Now try a restart....
a/ System boots .. re-attach disconnected Items until things die again..
b/ No Boot.. You commented in your list 2 sticks of ram.. remove One and reboot if that fails reinstall it and remove the other.. reboot.. now if that fails try another RAM stick from an operational System - I take it that the RAM is DDR..

ooops gotta go bad storm .. Ups alarm

cheers

here are a few things to look at:

Loose componets: check to make sure the CPU is in the socket ALL THE WAY and that the RAM and Vid card is in all the way....this is PRABABLY the problem.

Power: You are using a PIV board which usually requires 2 extra power feeds IN ADDITION to the 20-pin connector (one 4 pin and one 6 pin). If your board uses these feeds make sure they are plugged in too

Hey everyone, thanks for the feedback

Mr leachy, I have two fans in the back of the case, one mounted on the window on the side, one on the P4, and a little one next to the P4.

Well, here is my "epert" opinion. As negative said, it most likly has to do with your Power button/resetbutton/speaker/etc cords going to the motherboard. The way it works is this. The powersupply turns on and gives juice to the motherboard, just long enough to find out that the powerbutton is in the "off" mode. (prolly due to a connection mistake). Recheck all you power button/reset button speaker/ LED light connections, and then check em again. On the actual wire side conectors you will see a little down arrow pointint to one side of the connection. This arrow side conects to the positive side of the terminal (ithink) Now messing with these wires won't really mess anything up. (except neg's blacklight, but that sounds like user error :D) so if it doesn't work with one polarity, switch it around. I'm almost 100% positive this is where your problem lies. Good luck

That's what I did, it wasn't working at all when I had the arrow pointed at the negative side, so I switched all of them and it turned on but then it dies like I explained above. I've tried taking everything out but the motherboard, RAM, and Fans. Still does the same thing, I've also checked and rechecked the power button cords.

Is there anything else that I'm missing?

Make SURE the CPU and RAM sticks are in all the way then:)

It sounds like a connection problem..... if you have a power supply tester you could do that or have it tested by someone...... also make sure you fan in the power supply box is comming on...

Here is one more thing to check out. Most ATX power supplies have a switch on the back that that will select 115V or 230V (sometimes 120V and 240V). Look at your powersupply and see if you have this switch. I looked at two different 400 watt ATX power supplies available at CompUsa one had this switch visible in the picture the other did not.

If you have one with this switch check and make sure it is in the proper position. ATX power supplies have overcurrent and undercurrent protection built into them. In either an over or under current situation exists when the power supply is turned on it will begin to operate, sense the improper Voltage and shut down. If you have the switch and it appears to be in the correct postion toggle it back and forth anyway to make sure it is all the way in postion.

I once spent a couple of hours troubleshooting a system with these symptoms and it was that dang little switch.

Good luck.

It had a 115 and 230 setting, tried it on both, and still did the same thing. The light on the motherboard is on so it is getting power. And I have checked and rechecked the POWERLED and such cords. Bah, I'm about to kick the box in.

Forgive me if you have already checked this... From my experience working in a computer shop, the problem you have described most commonly occured due to either bad ram, or ram installed wrong (i.e. backwards, not in all the way, etc). The other person I worked with wasn't all there, and wouldn't install the ram right every once in a while.

Yeah it could be the RAM, I had quite are hard time getting it in there. I had to use almost my entire body weight to get it to click in, and in the process bending one of the sticks slightly. Could this be my problem that has haunted me for 2 days now?

Quote:

---

Yeah it could be the RAM, I had quite are hard time getting it in there. I had to use almost my entire body weight to get it to click in, and in the process bending one of the sticks slightly. Could this be my problem that has haunted me for 2 days now?

---

mmmme thinks you may have a bit more that a faulty ram stick.. if you had to use that much force.. mmmmmmmm... also how much force did you use cliping the CPU heatsink/fan on with...
I have seen good Motherboards - CPU's and RAM die because of a little too much force in the wrong place.. in the words of old.. "If it don't fit.. don't force it..just relax............" and have a think about what is happening..

Cheers..

Hi FamStars&Straps ,

The reason could be

a) short circuit
b) loose connection
c) Not enough power for cpu


Get back to basic .

1) Unplug

- Western Digital Hard drive, 7200RPM 40GB
- TDK CD-RW
-keyboard
- mouse

if you have two memory stick (just use one)

all you fan should be running and you should see something on your screen

if you dont see anything

2)get your mother board manual and read it !

if you've got software enabled settings for your motherboard, use your bios and reduce the speed or set to auto detect the cpu speed.

if its manual, use the settings shown on your motherboard manual.Always try using lower settings and get it working first.

only add

- Western Digital Hard drive, 7200RPM 40GB
- TDK CD-RW


after you can see -bios load up on your screen.

The other reason could be your memory stick is not pushed in properly !

I dont think it is a faulty memory stick because , the cpu will normally work and and you'll get lots of crap on your screen and the system tends to jam up.

when building a computer, you got to build it step by step and test it as you go along.

If you put everything together expect it to work, you,ll need a miracle to fault find it.I learnt it the hard way.


good luck

paladin

I had a very similar problem in two systems I built, and both were due to a short circuit (What can i say, i'm a slow learner =). The way to test this is to pull the motherboard out of the case and stick it on a non-conductive surface (If the motherboard came in an anti-static bag, this is handy) and plug only the power supply and the power button in.

Then trying powering it up, and see if the fan spins properly. If it does, then you probably have a short somewhere. Check the mounting of the motherboard in the case (screws or metal spacers in the wrong places) and try again.

Hope that helped
-Onager

Onager....I love you...

I had the top right corner screwed in so it was touching the case because I..well...rushed( over excited). Thanks everyone for all your help. This has been quite a learned experience. Again thanks everyone for the feedback.

A mixed bag of advice.. You solved it.. Good onya..

It is good to hear that it was as simple...

Great that you learnt some thing ... but better that many others also learned from your problem..

Cheers..

hey kid. check the battery jumper in the motherboard ;)