PCTech Forums

Hi there.

Today i installed a MB upgrade in my fathers PC as it it was pushing on a bit and couldnt handle some applications without trouble. I took out the standard Dell Dimension 3000 MB and replaced it with an AMD phenom X3/gigabyte kit with 2Gb RAM.

I studied the book that came with the MB and connected up the PSU, drives, front panel etc.

The problem in having is that the when I switch it on, CPU fan is coming on but the Hard Drive isnt spinning up.
The PSU is not the original Dell 250W but an ATX500W replacement i did last yr. ( i read there was compatibility issues here with Dell's PSU pinouts). I have the 20pin + 4pin power connectors going into the MB's 24pin connector as illustrated in the MB instruction manual.the only thing i havent connected back up ( because i need to get an adapter) is the FR-panel audio.

I have the 2 IDE drives (HD and dvdRW) on the one ribbon cable ( connected as master & slave and Drive0/Drive1 on the ribbon cable).

Im stumped. ANy ideas?

check the clear cmos jumper, sometimes a new board comes with the jumper in the clear position and it wont boot. hopefully thats all it is, i've had it happen to me personally.

Hi Jim

Theres no jumper present on the clr cmos header. I checked this already.
The HD worked fine yestarday. i just checked it now using a USB-IDE adapter and it spun up.

SO what ive connected so far:

1.PSU: 12V ATX for cpu, 20+4 pin for system board.
2.CPU fan.
3. RAM and CPU of course (just checked everything is in right)
4. IDE: Drive 0 (HD) - Drive 1 (DVD RW) - System board. ( HD set to Master and DVD set to Cable Set & also tried Slave)
5. Front panel - USB i/p's to "USB 2.0" on MB.
6. Front panel - Switch to "FR-Panel on MB. Checked pinouts too just in case there was a difference from the Dell MB.
7. Left Fr-panel audio disconnected cause ive no adapter yet to fit on the MB.

have i missed anything ?

The old Dell MB was about 2 inches shorter but i managed to pick up on 4 chassis mountings so it should be fine.
All that happens is i get the cpu fan working and the power led on the fr-panel.

Reminds me of a time I took my PC to be upgraded by a shop (long time ago :P).
After they were done my PC was really unstable.
I took it back for them to undo, but it back to how it was.
They did, but it wouldn't load to windows. No-one in the shop could work it out.
Took it to another shop (not happy at this point) and they found the PSU wasn't connected to the HDD.

:flame:

no post is indeed "normally" a cpu problem when theres no beep codes involved. It shouldnt have damaged anything by powering up without the xtra 4 pin power plug.

I think i'm going to have to send the mobo/cpu back and hope they send me a replacement.

Ok turns out the kit is ok.

I had a 1394 connctor in a USB slot and thats the reason it wouldnt boot.
Boots up fine now but keeps going back to the windows start-up mode screen.I'm guesssing i neeed to do the repair installation now. How does this differ to a fresh install and will i lose whats on the HD?