Another HD3870 X2 Problem!

[orionbg]

Hello

I was given an AMD Radeon HD3870x2 to play with it for a while. At work on a really cheap nForce 520 mobo the card works fine! Slow but works without problems! On a AMD 780 Mobo everything is fine but on my PC it woun't boot!!!!
On an ASUS P5N32E-SLI nForce 680i mobo the card don't want to boot at all! The system beeps as everything is ok but no Picture on the screen! The monitor stays in stand-by mode. I updated the BIOS to the newest one (and lost all overclocking capabilities but this is normal for this mobo) but no change. My 8800GTS 320MB works fine with the system but the 3870X2 don't! 700W Fortron Epsilon is powering the system and I have had no problems till now.

Any Ideas?

 

[erocker]

Do you have both power plugs in the card, and all your chipset and video drivers up to par? Btw, the 680i can and should run it.

 

[orionbg]

Yes both power conectors are in there places! the PC woun't even boot! No bios no nothing!

 

[Azazel]

have you tryed it another pci-e slot...

 

[orionbg]

I'm using the first one! the second is only 8x and southbridge cooling is preventing me from using it for this 27cm long beast! the third tne is 16x but the HDDs wount allow the card to fit! I have tried qtleast five VGA Cards on this mobo and all of them work fine! Only this ....thing... doesn't!

Excuse my English!

 

[Sh00t1st]

well i wouldnt say its your power supply, seems you have a fairly good one from what i read about it. you should list everything you have down to the t tho, it helps to determine what could be wrong. did you try it in another computer after using it in yours, it could be broken.

 

[Sh00t1st]

have you tried Allowing the bios to reset to default, thats usualy what you try in a case like that first thing.

 

[orionbg]

My Config is in the left under "system specs" and yes the card is working normally in another machine with nForce 520 chipset!

Yes I have reset the BIOS several times!

 

[Namslas90]

My Config is in the left under "system specs" and yes the card is working normally in another machine with nForce 520 chipset!

Yes I have reset the BIOS several times!

Open the case and watch the onboard power indicator led's while booting, if the lights filcker or go out then it may be a PSU issue(not enough power on 12v rail for card). Can you boot to BIOS, if so check the Primary Display Adapter settings to ensure they are set to PCI-E(the default is PCI so when you reset the BIOS it should have went back to the wrong setting).

 

[Sh00t1st]

well how am i supposed to guess what else you might have !!! not telepathic here . try it in another computer

 

[Scrizz]

Open the case and watch the onboard power indicator led's while booting, if the lights filcker or go out then it may be a PSU issue(not enough power on 12v rail for card). Can you boot to BIOS, if so check the Primary Display Adapter settings to ensure they are set to PCI-E(the default is PCI so when you reset the BIOS it should have went back to the wrong setting).

took the words right out of my mouth.
does the board have onboard GFX?

 

[Sh00t1st]

the board doesnt have onboard gfx

 

[Sh00t1st]

and just from my experience the function it provides is to tell it what to "try" and use first
as in it defaults to pci express if pci gfx is not available.

 

[Sh00t1st]

bring your computer to austin texas i will fix it/steal it from you for a nominal fee.

 

[Sh00t1st]

it does sound like a psu problem though, but to be honest, i think the x2 has power management that prevents it from using insane amounts of juice when not in a game or something else that requires alot of juice for your gpu so it should be able to boot atleast up till you play a game.

 

[Fitseries3]

no need for the quadruple post man. there's an edit button.

does the fan on the X2 spin at full speed or drop to 10% after a few seconds?

 

[Sh00t1st]

i think i can post 4 times if i want to but yeah it was excessive, im tired tho so i get slack ?

 

[orionbg]

Let me answear all the questions!
The leds lights up for a second and after the mobo initialise itself and power is online to everything they go out then the mobo beeps as it normaly should beep at boot up but no picture, then no OS boot ( I mean no HDD activity or anything)! Tried bouth DVI Connectors!

Yes the Fan goes to 100% for 2 sec and then it lowers the rpm significantly.

The PSU is powering the 8800GTS with no problems! The same PSU powered 2x 2900TX a while ago!

<<< Click the "system Specs" to see my configuration!!!

 

[Fitseries3]

well it sounds like the board is trying to boot. when the fan speed of the x2 drops, that tells you that the video cards bios was successfully loaded into ram.

clear you cmos so the bios is set to defaults, if you haven't already tried it. unplug everything but the board, video card and cpu power. unplug the sata/ide cables from the board as well. make sure nothing is in any pci/pci-e slots other than the x2. also, use 1 stick of ram and try it in each slot until it boots.

if that doesn't work..... you must have a dodgy MB or x2.

 

[Dr. Spankenstein]

I hear this problem more than I care to....

The computer IS booting, you just can;t get the monitor to "wake-up".

If you have access to a DVI>VGA converter it will work, then set the rez to your panel's native rez. It should be fine after that.

Otherwise, try a different cable. (Read: better quality).
This used to happen to me alot, but I found the solution to be in my BIOS. I had an extra choice for Primary Display Adapter: External PCI device. (Don't ask, because I don't know what that could possibly be...)

Anyhoo, I aslo might be helpful to plug your old card back in and check a few settings in the BIOS. Since it seem you were running a NVIDIA card before, so check the Extreme Tweaker section and make sure that NVIDIA GPU Ex is disabled. Check that under Spread Spectrum Control PCIE + MCP PCIE are set to default (Down Spread). Under Advanced: Primary Display Adapter is PCI-E. and potentialy under Power>APM Configuration check the Wake from PCIe device.

That's all I got...

 

[orionbg]

Yes the system tries to boo but it doesn't! No HDD Activity!! NO OS LOAD At All! It seams az the mobo initialise itself and wait for something to happen.

I'll try to get out everything out of the system and see whats happening!

BTW This 3870X2 is an Engineering Sample directly send to us from AMD. It BIOS is older than th ones in the database of TechPowerUp. Does someone knows hot to flash this thing? Maybe the VGA BIOS is the problem!

EDIT!
I have tried with disconecting everything but the mobo and VGA. No GO. Tried with DVI ot VGA Dongle and No GO. Clered the CMOS again and No GO...??? I just put my 8800GTS in place and everything works fine! Very strange!

 

[Scrizz]

dead card

 

[Fitseries3]

dead card

+1

RMA time.

 

[Dr. Spankenstein]

But he said it worked fine on the NVIDIA board at work, slow but working!

Unless some static frizzed it between there and home...

but whay would a dead card keep a system from booting without error beeps.

BTW, how are you verifying that there is no HDD activity. Can you physically feel or hear that they are not spinning up?

Just on a lark, set the Primary Display adapter to PCI and try that...

@ fitseries,

He said it was an ES direct from AMD.

 

[orionbg]

The HDD Led is not blinking and I don't hear my Drives! You know the sound that an HDD makes when it seeks, reads, writes data to the plates!

The card is working on another mobo!