GigaByte GA-EP45-DS3R Endless Reboot No Post

[bigbeark]

My brother gifted me this. It uses the 24 + 8-pin power supply, and came with a Core 2 Duo CPU.

I have verified that the CPU, Ram and power supply are good using an Intel board.

This board starts up, gets to CE or CF Bios code, then shuts down and immediately restarts in an endless loop. I have reset the CMOS, but no difference. I am testing the board outside the case, with nothing connected.

I have seen reference to this problem elsewhere, wondered if anyone had experience, successful or not, with this problem. This was an expensive board when new so it would be nice to solve this problem.

[dmill89]

What type of memory are you using? Brand, size, speed, etc. Those board were known to be picky with ram.

[RJARRRPCGP]

Maybe tin whiskers.

I always suspect a short or bad connection with something acting as possessed as that.

Sounds more like the motherboard version of "two seconds to black", to me.

The only other possible cause I can think of is not having the FSB-to-DRAM ratio set to 1:1.

[bigbeark]

Originally Posted by dmill89

What type of memory are you using? Brand, size, speed, etc. Those board were known to be picky with ram.

Crucial Ballistix CL1117Y.CK is what it came with, so I assume this worked at some point. I tried a 1GB stick of OCZ PC2 6400 Platinum Rev 2 4-4-4 which works on all my other boards.

Doesn't matter which ram slot(s) are used, result is always the same.

[bigbeark]

Originally Posted by RJARRRPCGP

Maybe tin whiskers.

I always suspect a short or bad connection with something acting as possessed as that.

Sounds more like the motherboard version of "two seconds to black", to me.

The only other possible cause I can think of is not having the FSB-to-DRAM ratio set to 1:1.

I'm thinking a short as well. I tried disconnecting the 8-pin connector. The board does not shut down, but of course it does not post at all, and nothing shows on the BIOS card.

This Ultra-Durable board has two BIOS chips on the board. One must surely be a fail-safe. Since it does not post, I can't see the BIOS settings. Even with no video card installed, I get the CE or CF Bios code, which suggests that the BIOS is not being started up.

[bigbeark]

Originally Posted by RJARRRPCGP

Maybe tin whiskers.

I always suspect a short or bad connection with something acting as possessed as that.

Sounds more like the motherboard version of "two seconds to black", to me.

The only other possible cause I can think of is not having the FSB-to-DRAM ratio set to 1:1.

I'm thinking a short as well. I tried disconnecting the 8-pin connector. The board does not shut down, but of course it does not post at all, and nothing shows on the BIOS card.

This Ultra-Durable board has two BIOS chips on the board. One must surely be a fail-safe. Since it does not post, I can't see the BIOS settings. Even with no video card installed, I get the CE or CF Bios code, which suggests that the BIOS is not being started up.

[dmill89]

I'm leaning toward a short or other internal damage (internal crack{not very likely since these boards are extra thick}, bga failure{again not that likely the P45 chipset is not known for bga failures}, etc.) to the board as well. Both types of ram you used are brands known to work with this board so that isn't likely your problem.

I have virtually the same board in my desktop except mine is the EP45C-UD3R, a higher end model that has better heatsinks and supports DDR2 and DDR3. The Dual-bios as you believed acts as a fail-safe if the primary chip is corrupted the board can boot from the secondary chip and the primary chip is then re-flashed from the good image on the secondary chip. The secondary chip holds the factory bios image and is never updated to allow recovery from a bad update. This system only protects against a corrupted bios and will not help a board with physical/electrical damage.

Note: With a Dual-core CPU you can use a 4-pin connector from the PSU (Half-of the 8-pin on the motherboard) but connecting an 8-pin should not cause any problems, a dual-core just doesn't draw enough power to require an 8-pin connector to be used on this board.

[gg1978]

make sure your DIMM's are all the way seated down into the DIMM slots.. Since LGA 775 uses the shitty board bending clips, it can warp the DIMM slots enough that the DIMMs don't seat at the middle.. It's harder to notice with RAM with heatspreaders, but obvious on DIMMs without them.. I had this issue once, and i ended up putting the DIMMs in before the CPU heatsink, and double checking they were all the way seated before i screwed the motherboard into the case..