EDIT: Wow, to clarify, by saying the BIOS won't post, I mean that when I press the power button the screen stays black. The little bios screen (where it says press <tab> to enter bios setup) or whatever, doesnt show up. I just now learned after posting this thread that post means "power on self test." Sorry for any confusion.


Hello,
I just finished building this computer after much delay due to an RMAd hard drive which had a bad boot sector. The computer was randomly reseting and I used ASUS's probe utility which came on my motherboard to find that my CPU was running very hot. After reading up on users having the same problem, I took out, and re-seated the heatsink/fan and the CPU's temps were in normal ranges. I was able to fully update windows (vista 64bit) and everything was working fine. I ran my benchmark test and installed my anti spyware/virus. Well, I had to restart the computer after windows finished updating and thats where the problems started...

When the system rebooted, only some of the fans started up right away and nothing showed up on display. After waiting a brief (maybe 30 seconds) the other fans started to work and the bios posted and windows started to load. As windows started to load I got a BSOD. This is my first time building a computer and I am having a friend help me out with it, and he told me not to worry about writting down the error code, since it was the first time it had happened. Well, we hard rebooted the system and the same situation happened again, and again he told me not to worry about the error code.

Now, however, the bios screen wont even post. A variable number of fans will work and it's something my friend has never seen before. I have tried reseating the CPU and all cables are secured. One thing I saw on here was where one user said his reset switch was flipped, but I cant find that on my motherboard. Also according to ASUS's website, I should "Cleasr CMOS" but I cant find that/don't know what that means. My friend called it a day and headed home, so I decided I would post my problem here and see if any of you all had any suggestions.

I know its a very vauge problem, but anything you can suggest would be welcome. One thing my friend had said is that we "might have ruined the motherboard because of all the times the computer restarted earlier when the CPU was overheating, it might have flooded the motherboard wattage"..or something like that. Dont know if that can happen or not though, we're both stumped and just looking for reasons.

Again, thanks for any help you can give on this issue. My motherboard is: ASUS P5N32-E SLI

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16813131073

Also, this is the tech support site that mentioned th CMOS: http://support.asus.com/troubleshooting/tr...SLanguage=en-us

I'm really hoping that the motherboard isn't dead, as I am past my 30 day policy from NewEgg due to the first hard drive being RMAd.

Thanks for your time,
-A

There is a round battery about the size of a US quarter on the motherboard, next to it there should be a jumper. This jumper has to settings, normal and clear. To clear the CMOS turn off the computer and move the jumper over to the other pin, wait a couple second and then return it to the normal position.

If you heated the CPU too much you could have damaged it, from what you have said I would be looking at that for your problem. Try resetting the CMOS, it won't hurt anything. If you are using a USB mouse and keyboard you may need to enable the in the BIOS afterward.

Well...that seems like an awful lot (hard drive, CPU, fans, heatsink) to be going wrong on a new build, within a 30-day or so period.

Me being the novice that I am...I think I would have taken a look at the PS before doing anything with other hardware elements.

Louis

Louis,
I am pretty sure that the power supply is working. Earlier we RMAd one because we thought it was the problem for the shut downs also, turns out the CPU was just too hot. (lots of users have said that they had problems with this cpu being hot due to poor heatsink/fan mountings)

dc3,
I looked next to the battery and still found no CMOS reset jumper. The manual that came with the motherboard also makes no mention of it anywhere.

Thanks again everyone, I just hope I'm not out another 300 dollars to buy a new motherboard :/

If you found the CMOS battery, just remove it (with power off, of course). It results in same effect as shorting the CMOS jumper.

CMOS Battery. - http://www.geocities.com/micksmix2000/cmosbatt.html and http://www.duxcw.com/faq/cmos/clear.htm

Louis

Still no luck after taking out the battery and putting it back in. Im on the phone waiting for asus tech support as I type.

Thanks again, any other suggestions anyone can put forward would be great.
-A

Try this link for troubleshooting via system stripdown: http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/topic70216.html

I downloaded that manual and found the clear cmos jumper in less than a minute

When you are that inexperienced you must read everything and doublecheck every thing you do

You have to be methodical.

Your whole problem might be not knowing how to set bios up

you must pull the power plug and wait before clearing cmos(the led will go off)

section 2.6 gives a very good detailed view of clearing cmos(RTC RAM)

now if it still won't post then give the specs of your build, cpu/ram/ and exact detailed spec on the power supply

I don't think you can assume the mobo is bad

You might even want to call in more experienced help, your friend doesn't seem to know what he's doing

Oh? the stupid manual neglects to tell you to return the cmos jumper to the normal position after leaving it in the clear position for a minute or so