Question Asus P9X79 - "No VGA Detected" happening more frequently & Oculus Rift started giving black display ?

[MarkyPea]

Hi,
I have a machine that I have been using solely for Oculus Rift gaming since mid 2018, a few hours a day, I got it used. Never had any issues with it until the last month or so. One day when I turned it on, it did the post beep, then a long beep and three short beeps, then another beep. I pressed the power button, it turned off, pressed it again and it came back on with a normal boot and was fine. After that it was fine and I thought nothing more of it, until it did it a couple of weeks later, and then a few days later and then often. I checked the beeps, meant no vga, I took the gpu card out and wiped down the contact with a tissue and a drop of isopropanol. Next day the same, so I did the same with the memory sticks. Fine for a few days, then the same again.

A couple of days ago I was playing Flight Sim in VR (this has been my game of choice since April of this year (it used to run at gpu at 86% and about 67c, recent update is a constant 98% and 70c), and the Rift display went black, I closed Oculus app, re-opened it, fine for ten minutes, and it went black again, and again. I stopped.

PC specs are:
Asus P9X79
PC Intel Core i7-4930K 3.40GHz -
16GB HyperX DDR3 RAM -
1TB HDD -
MSI Gaming X 1070
Fractal Define R5 (with the front panel removed for better airflow)
Cooler Master 212 Hyper Evo
Windows 10 Pro

The board has two pci-e slots, so I moved the card to the other slot, same (beeps sometimes, sometimes just turned on fine, more often beeps now). It has no onboard video, but came with a Quadro K600, so I put that in and tried that and same (sometimes boots fine, or wont boot), so not the card then, or the slot itself. That makes me think that either the motherboard has broken, or could it be the power supply?

I don't know what to do. I don't have much money to put into this. The original PC only cost me £360 and the GPU £400. I feel like Flight Sim has over worked it. I checked online and everybody was like, hey, it's fine to use 100% gpu, that's what it's for. I always monitored the temperature, and it never went over 72c (161f) in the Summer, and is mostly 70c. Other games in VR are a much lower GPU demand, 80% I guess, some a lot less, like Minecraft, it's 25% or something daft.

Any advice please. I've never had a pc break before, in the last thirty years of gaming, and I really don't know what to do. With this covid everything is crazy expensive now-a-days.

Edit. I should also say, usually the pc uses a dvi to hdmi to put video to the tv, and the hdmi is for the Oculus. I have tried using a known good hdmi cable for the display to the tv to test that the dvi adapter was okay, and I had the boot error in that case as well.

 

[Vic 40]

or could it be the power supply?

Maybe, but then you have to tell which one you use=maker+model+wattage and possibly age.

 

[MarkyPea]

Maybe, but then you have to tell which one you use=maker+model+wattage and possibly age.

It's a Corsair CX600M It was in the tower when I bought the pc on ebay 2018. I guess it could be original.

Could a failing power supply create symptoms like this? Would be great if a new psu just fixes it!

 

[MarkyPea]

So. I have purchased a Corsair RM750x, new, as if that is the problem and it fixes it great, but also if the board has died it is probably a good idea to have a psu that I trust in the machine anyway before I put a new board in. I'll report back in a few days as to the outcome.

 

[Vic 40]

The C600(M) series doesn't have a very good rep here so buying that new psu is imo a good idea.

Looked at the faultcode and might be this,

1 long, 3 short beeps.

Conventional/Extended memory failure.

So might be memory problem which in the end could be motherboard as well. You could up the voltage for the ram and see if it helps if the new psu doesn't fix things.

Is XMP enabled on the motherboard? If so might the ram depending on the speed already run 1.35V, if so could you try 1.4V as well. Maybe even up the voltage to the memory controller, but lets see what that new psu brings first.

 

[MarkyPea]

I downloaded the manual for my motherboard and it says that 1 long and 3 short is "No VGA detected". I feel confident that this is the issue as there is also an LED on the board with VGA_LED next to it, on the times when it does the error beeps this remains on, when it goes in fine this goes off.

 

[Vic 40]

Okay, i did look here,
Computer POST and beep codes
the AMI Codes.

anyway lets hope that the new psu fixes maybe structural problems and if not look at it again.

 

[MarkyPea]

Could a failing psu generate this type of symptom? A decade or so ago I remember changing a psu on a machine that kept blue screening and freezing, and it did fix that. It's so long ago I can't really recall the specifics, but I tried it as a guess. But that kind of makes sense, like if it's putting out a voltage that is inconsistent.

My machine now has never crashed or blue screened during play. I don't know, I really hope it fixes it, I'm missing my VR fix now, but also I'm not very optimistic.

 

[Vic 40]

Could a failing psu generate this type of symptom?

Sometimes a "failing" can manifest itself as small problems and sometimes it can be all big and just shutdown if the protections work well, but if that CX600M already was in the system for some time when you bought it it is probably about maybe 5 years old and would imo be good to upgrade anyway especially with the power the components use in your system.

 

[MarkyPea]

Well, sadly the new power supply has not fixed it. Still did the no vga detected beeps and led. Also I noted that when I first powered it on and it was successful it just powered on, but the next time and it failed, it was silent for a few seconds, then the power supply clicked. So I am guessing that there is some short on the motherboard. I don't know, but I feel that the motherboard is the next thing to change. I'm looking at a few used ones on ebay of the same model. Not that I have much confidence in this model.

 

[Vic 40]

Can try another model. Make sure to bind your windows to a Microsoft account, if you have one and otherwise make one, and switching a motherboard to another from the same chipset won't be such a big problem.

 

[MarkyPea]

Can try another model. Make sure to bind your windows to a Microsoft account, if you have one and otherwise make one, and switching a motherboard to another from the same chipset won't be such a big problem.

I guess that it is bound maybe, it's signed into my account, if that counts.

I won a replacement used board today, same model, for £70. I guess if that fails to remedy my problems, I may abandon my 4930k and see if I can find an 8700K for sub £200 and then at least feel like I've had an upgrade in all of this. I really am happy with the performance of this machine though, so spending anything feels like a waste. Thank you for your help. I will update.

 

[Vic 40]

I guess that it is bound maybe, it's signed into my account, if that counts.

What i meant.

Hope the "new" board will fix your problems.

 

[MarkyPea]

Busy day - with not great ending.
Installed the "new" board.
No POST beep, solid red CPU_LED warning light on the board. Used the FlashBack to put on the CAP Converter. Turned it on, same. Tried and tried to put the latest CAP on for the board, the BIOS Flashback button was just solid instead of flashing.
Took BIOS chip from old board and swapped out. Booted up fine (with a warning about low CPU fan speed as it's set to warn at 600rpm by default, lowered that to 400rpm, rebooted, all fine). First thing it did was install 4801 BIOS - which wasn't even the version that I was trying to put on!
Took Dirt Rally out for a spin in the Oculus. After a few minutes the Rift display went black, but then came back on after a second or two. Not a great sign. Carried on playing, after half an hour, maybe longer but not much, display went black again, didn't come back on.
I was monitoring the temperatures an 1070 was at 67°C. Which actually I thought was perhaps a bit higher than I would have expected, but I didn't used to monitor them that much and have never checked it when playing Dirt Rally. GPU was at about 60-70% when playing judging from the graph.

I have no idea, but I am assuming that the 1070 is dying, and it probably took the previous board with it. I don't know. Sad times though!

 

[MarkyPea]

I updated the graphics drivers, as I was running really old ones that were supposed to be good with Oculus (457 I think) the latest is 496, so I was a good bit behind. I played for forty minutes about again, Euro Truck sim this time. The graphics temperatures are not right I think, it was showing high 60s again, with a spike well up to 76ish, whilst pretty low GPU usage. I think I will get some modern thermal paste that is non-electrically conductive and try and put some on the graphics card. It feels like all the hardware is on its way out anyway at this point.

 

[Vic 40]

Hope cleaning the gpu and repasting will help.

 

[MarkyPea]

So, I Googled and the Arctic Silver 5 I had seemed to be okay for the GPU, and the whole computer was winding me up and I didn't want to ruin Sunday on it as well, so I did it last night. It did help with the temperatures, I was getting a steady 62C playing American Truck sim. Although when I went downstairs to tidy to my tools after checking the card was okay, I came back up and the Rift display was black, but then I got a hour's America Truck Simulator, with just once going black and then coming back on by itself. I'm considering trying getting a new Rift cable. And to think, I used to play on the Rift to chill out and escape the world's stresses!

 

[Vic 40]

Did the new cable help? If you bought one that is ...

 

[MarkyPea]

Hi, I am still waiting on them shipping one out to me. Oculus do not sell, or even manufacture, the cable any more. So to get one I had to jump through some hoops to find that the cable was faulty. It certainly is faulty as if I wiggle it I can certainly get some tippy effects!

 

[Vic 40]

Okay, hope the new cable wil be the solution.

 

[MarkyPea]

I did wonder one thing, that was that perhaps humidity could have been a factor. The computer is at the foot on my bed, and in these wet winter mornings our room has a humidity level of up to 65% in the morning, and a temperature of 19°C (66°F). I had taken to having a quick play for an hour between 7am and 8am, after my wife was sorting the children out for school etc. I thought that perhaps the issues could have be associated with shorting on the board do to condensation.

I think that a combination of five people living in the house, three of them growing at an alarming rate, and the wetter winters we are getting here in the UK, I have seen our humidity readings go up. Especially in the bedrooms of course. In the study where I am now it's only 40%.

I only thought this as it was only since September, when schools started again, that I was having a quick play in Flight Sim in the mornings, and also not long after the problems started.

 

[Vic 40]

Not sure, but don't think so. Think that if humidity would be an isue it would already be one when starting the pc.

 

[MarkyPea]

A small update. I am STILL waiting on a new cable from Oculus. I thought I would turn the pc on so that Windows wouldn't get out of date, suddenly it won't POST again! This time it's the boot device LED that's illuminated! I'm not overly shocked, I feel like these boards are garbage and the replacement board was obviously a lot older as it was running a very old BIOS that didn't even support my cpu. I don't see how it's broken without even being turned on. At this point I'm at a loss of how to spend my money, so I'm just not gaming any more.