HELP - ASRock K7S41GX

[skripter]

The title mobo was recapped by a friend of mine about a year ago (it had vented KZG's). He recapped it with Hitano's EXR series, they are big.
One month ago i got a video card for this machine, a XFX GeForce 5200 and it wouldn't fit because of the Hitano's that were besides the AGP slot, so I replaced them with Panasonic FM's and as I was at it and had some more FM's I replaced some Hitano's more jus to be sure.

The system worked fine for about a month and yesterday it sudenly turned off, all leds stayed on, fans on, monitor of. I turned it off holding power button and let it sits for half a hooçur or so. Turned it of again, fans go full speed and the system shuts itself down.

So, i disassembled it, took off vid card and began testing with a known good PSU, i got the same symptoms, it shuts down inmediatly.

The suspecting mobo with two different processors (same semprons 1500+) produced same symptoms.

The suspecting CPU (the one that was in the mobo when it failed) produced the same symptoms in three different mobos, two same ASRock's K7S41GX and a MSI KM4M-V, the MSI was tested with another known good PSU.

I let the system untouched all this evening and accidentally i turned it on without RAM nor CPU and it keeped on.

It also has a odd cap soldered below memory slots, i attached the diagram of it, is this cap soldered correctly with bot legs to the same trace?
i will it check this with the other ASRock's later.

I suspect i have a dead mobo and cpu.

Tomorrow i will upload good quality datailed pictures of it.

Thank you all for your great help, reading this forum is very instructable.

[skripter]

Re: HELP - ASRock K7S41GX

As promised, here are the pics.

[linuxguru]

Re: HELP - ASRock K7S41GX

The soldering work is highly messy - I'd be surprised if there wasn't a short between traces. But if it was working for a while before it went kaput, then that probably wasn't the problem.

The Sempron CPU is dead, for sure. If that was a Thoroughbred-B or Barton with a heatsink that wasn't making flat contact, that's par for the course. Look for traces of blistering on the organic PGA packaging of the CPU - it's most visible on the underside, just below the die. If you notice blistering, the CPU is cooked for good. If it took the mobo with it (happens frequently), then there's every possibility that it will take a succession of CPUs out with it, so it's best you abandon it.

The other issue is that I've never been happy with SiS chipsets - they tend to be entry-level products for entry-level mobos, and they tend to be used in designs with a lot of corner-cutting (ECS, PCChips, Jetway, etc.). These kind of mobos will have higher failure rates, other things being equal.

[skripter]

Re: HELP - ASRock K7S41GX

Thx for the feedback, linuxguru, and yes the job is very messy to my taste, the wire i used to solder was too tick, althought i did it with a japanese 60w iron, its one of my firsts recaps.

The cpu is a Thoroughbred-B, i've run cpuz on it many time (never oc). Luckily the others cpus i tried in this mobo are working fine, they are in production right now, as are the other mobos in wich i tried the failed cpu.

Could the excess of thermal grease had caused a short circuit in the cpu? im using titan nano grease.

What do you mean with "Look for traces of blistering on the organic PGA packaging of the CPU"? In the underside the cpu is just normal, no burned marks, no falling painting, and the paper sticker is like brand new.

I will remove all of the grease, also i will keep the mobo runing without cpu nor ram for a while to see if something gets abnormally hot.

I will keep you posted.

[skripter]

Re: HELP - ASRock K7S41GX

bump!

[Yatti420]

Re: HELP - ASRock K7S41GX

Mine never came back to life.. A guy sold me one that had every cap blown pretty much.. Same symptoms pretty much..