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From: Bill Anderson on 20 Feb 2010 20:43
What is required to make a beep?

Processor (and fan unless you're living dangerously)
Power supply
Stick of memory

Anything else? Is a video card required?

I'm still having my crazy problem in which my P5K Deluxe system won't
post. It's getting worse. I cannot believe the problem is my power
supply as I have two power supplies and when I switch them out the
problem continues unchanged. I even RMA'd one of them and it came back
untouched -- they could find no problem.

I want to strip the system down to the barest essentials and add things
one at a time to figure out what makes it fail. Problem is, failure is
intermittent so this problem is a tough one to pin down.

--
Bill Anderson

I am the Mighty Favog
From: TJ on 21 Feb 2010 05:42
I dont know much about them, but on dealextreme are pci boards testers
with a numeric panel that shows you the error number wich (?) can tell
you what is failing

http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.33305

Hope it helps.
From: Barry Watzman on 21 Feb 2010 10:08
A video card is not required to "make it beep"; indeed, the lack of a
video card will actually cause a beep code error. As a practical
matter, however, a video card is normally considered to be part of the
minimum system.

I have seen instances in which a motherboard would not post because the
ps/2 mouse and keyboard were plugged in backwards (mouse in ps/2 KB port
and vice versa).

The wrong kind of memory can cause failure; some motherboards may
require a full bank of memory (not one module, but a set of multiple
modules).

You seem to be in denial that the most likely problem other than a user
error IS a bad motherboard.

Bill Anderson wrote:
> What is required to make a beep?
>
> Processor (and fan unless you're living dangerously)
> Power supply
> Stick of memory
>
> Anything else? Is a video card required?
>
> I'm still having my crazy problem in which my P5K Deluxe system won't
> post. It's getting worse. I cannot believe the problem is my power
> supply as I have two power supplies and when I switch them out the
> problem continues unchanged. I even RMA'd one of them and it came back
> untouched -- they could find no problem.
>
> I want to strip the system down to the barest essentials and add things
> one at a time to figure out what makes it fail. Problem is, failure is
> intermittent so this problem is a tough one to pin down.
>
From: Bill Anderson on 21 Feb 2010 10:47
Barry Watzman wrote:
> A video card is not required to "make it beep"; indeed, the lack of a
> video card will actually cause a beep code error. As a practical
> matter, however, a video card is normally considered to be part of the
> minimum system.
>
> I have seen instances in which a motherboard would not post because the
> ps/2 mouse and keyboard were plugged in backwards (mouse in ps/2 KB port
> and vice versa).
>
> The wrong kind of memory can cause failure; some motherboards may
> require a full bank of memory (not one module, but a set of multiple
> modules).
>
> You seem to be in denial that the most likely problem other than a user
> error IS a bad motherboard.
>

I bought a new motherboard -- a P5Q Pro Turbo -- and removed all parts
from the P5K Deluxe and installed them on the P5Q. Guess what: it
wouldn't post.

So I began removing parts from the P5Q and discovered that one of my
four 1G sticks of memory seemed to be the problem. When it was
installed, no post. When it was removed, the P5Q worked. Install it;
no post. Remove it; beep.

OK, I figured I had isolated the problem. And if the trouble has been
bad memory, why torture myself reinstalling Windows on a new motherboard
when the old one seemed not to be the culprit?

So out came the P5Q and back went the P5K. And with just the three
sticks of memory installed, it was working fine. For a few days. Then
it was up to its old tricks.

So there's the reason I'm in denial about the motherboard being the culprit.

As for being in denial about user error, here's what happened this
morning when I turned on the computer.

1) I pressed the spacebar and the computer began powering up. Fans were
running for maybe 3-4 seconds. Then everything shut down. I watched
and waited for about 2-3 seconds. Then the fans powered up again all
by themselves, the hard drives began running, the optical drive light
came on, but no post. The blue light on the power button of my monitor
was blinking, which is the normal indication that it's powered up but
getting no video signal.

2) I held the case power button for about four seconds and the system
shut down. I wanted a few seconds and pressed it again. The fans came
on for no more than a second, maybe less, and then everything shut down.
I watched for 2-3 seconds and the fans came back on all by themselves,
the hard drives began running, the optical drive light came on, but no
post. Again, the monitor was receiving no video signal.

3) I held the case power button for about four seconds and the system
shut down. I wanted a few seconds and pressed it again. The fans cam
on, the hard drives began running, the optical drive light came on, but
no post, no video signal.

4) I held the case power button for about four seconds and the system
shut down. I wanted a few seconds and pressed it again. The fans came
on, I heard a beep, and I was in business.

The system has been running fine this morning for the past three hours
and I am confident it will continue to run normally for the rest of the
day. It always does. I won't have a problem until I shut it down
tonight and try to restart it tomorrow, when I'm pretty sure I'll
experience the same behavior.

Where in all that is there room for user error? Seriously, what do you
think I could be doing wrong? I'll be delighted to take the blame if
only I can figure out what's going wrong.

--
Bill Anderson

I am the Mighty Favog
From: Paul on 21 Feb 2010 15:19
Barry Watzman wrote:
> Some memory is normally required. Without memory (RAM) the CPU cannot
> establish a stack and cannot execute subroutine calls (or, more
> correctly, the returns from those calls). This will usually prevent
> even the POST single beep.
>

The code is register based, until memory is commissioned. The
memory is not running, at startup. There is setup to be done
first. And it can beep, with the memory missing.

Paul
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