re: Building my first PC - Technical Issue UPDATE page 2

Start by listing the exact model of every part you bought.

No video is such a common symptom that there's no way it can be diagnosed accurately with such little information. I highly doubt it's an issue with your card requiring more power than your PSU is offering unless the PSU is faulty. You generally wouldn't see symptoms of that until you start playing a game or running a benchmark that will max out the card's thermal design power (TDP). Most high end cards these days have around 200-250w TDP, with the exception of a few outliers such as the 6990.

Here's a few things that can cause a computer to power on but not display video. They are in no particular order, and some of them are rare:

Bad motherboard
Bad power supply
Bad CPU
Bent socket pins
Incompatible RAM
Bad RAM
Bad DIMM slot being occupied by working RAM
Bad video card
Bad video card port
Forgot to connect PSU 8-pin connector to board
Incompatible RAM
No RAM
Incorrectly seated RAM
Incorrectly seated video card
Motherboard limitations between memory controller and SATA ports (e.g., cheaper motherboards might disable 1 SATA port if all 4 DIMM slots are occupied)
Bad Monitor
clear CMOS jumper missing
Bad CMOS battery
Memory profile needs to be set in bios before occupying all four DIMM slots
Incompatible CPU (for example, an ivy bridge installed in a Z68 that needs a bios update)

Just to name a few.

You didn't mention if you have an internal speaker in your case, which would provide beep codes to help you diagnose the problem. I know you're still working outside the case but I recommend connecting that speaker anyway. If you do have the speaker connected and are not getting beeps, any of the above can still be true. Modern motherboards have LEDs that light up in a series during post to indicate which controllers/hardware is initializing. The LEDs will hang at a certain point and the mobo won't post, and you'll be able to see where it's gone wrong.

quote:

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I don't have one of those tiny speakers that hook up on the mobo pin like they do in the tutorial I've been following.

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Mobo or case doesnt have a built in one? Or perhaps a debug LED on the Mobo?

We really need to know if we are booting before further diagnosis is possible. All the fans spinning doesnt mean much right now. Lets look into getting a speaker before we start a wholesale switching of expensive parts.

ill be honest, im not super excited about putting a $180 vid card and $200 cpu in a $40 board.

other than that - see if you can find a store thats open and will have a speaker - it will cost you nearly nothing. that vid card needs at least a 500w PSU so you should be fine there, however you may have received a defective unit with a weak rail, in which case you'll have to exchange it.

yeah, i would take the opposite approach. its much easier to upgrade peripherals and processors than switching out boards. and a cheap board can fry everything attached to it.

if this board happens to be bad and you need to RMA it, i would encourage you to spend an extra few dollars and upgrade it.

if this one isnt the problem then i wouldnt worry about it. first things first though - go get that speaker.

I had a similar problem on my first build. First things first, triple check that your 24pin and 8pin connectors are securely connected. Next, reseat your RAM and read your mobo manual to make sure they are in the correct dimms. Reseat your GPU. Make sure your mobo is secure to the standoffs.
This thread is a livesaver

Had two HDMI cables go bad on me. Both worked on other computers, used on new build, all was going great until video card driver install. Then I got what you got, powering up, then "no input signal". Swapped in another cable, same thing. Brand new HDMI cable worked.

If tl;dr

Try new HDMI cable/s.

Update

I've had to go out of town for work the last 2 months so i just now got around to tinkering with my build some more and testing everyone's theories and helpful links.

I tried starting up the components I've put together with the mobo speaker I've purchased based on you guys' suggestion but I don't get any beeps/sounds from it. I am pretty sure all my cables are connected properly. I honestly think I bit off more than I can chew trying to build this myself.

Does anyone from the greater Nola area would know of somebody that could help me physically figure out my issues. I'm not very computer savvy, so it would be easier for someone to test it rather trying to explain my issues.

Thanks in advance guys.

Wish I could help, but I'm in BR. I think quite a few of us are in BR, so if you get a free weekend to yourself, might be worth the trip.

all the fans spin but no boot or beeps?
Take all the ram out, light it up and if you get no beeps again its probably the psu