Question ASUS Z790-P is it dead?

[dtww]

Hi all
I got a new ASUS Prime Z790-P (WIFI CSM). I think it is dead. Appreciate second opinion and what else to try.

My PSU comes with the 24-pin power and an 8pin, but no 4-pin. Following the sticky: No Post System won't boot, I now have a new 4-pin along with the 24 and 8. The 4-pin might not be necessary - I have raised this with Asus online support and they also said it is not necessary.
Why I think the board is dead is that first I plugged in a few components and then powered it up. The components are CPU 14700K, CPU fan, 4070TI GPU and and m2 card, also plugged in system led, front panel stuff, and connected case fans. First powering up, nothing happens. No beep, no video, nothing.

I did the following (this is before I got the 4-pin power, but as above this might not be relevant):

1) Only motherboard, no components, power led plugged in
- 24 pin power plugged in, no other power pin
- Turn power on
- motherboard no light, case light comes up, solid, no flashing, stays on for at least 1 minute
- Turn power off

2) As (1)
- Add 8 pin power
- Turn power on
- motherboard no light, case light comes up as A) solid at least 1 minute
- Turn power off

3) As (2)
- Add CPU
- Turn power on
- motherboard no light, case light comes flashing rapidly, more than 30 seconds
- Turn power off

4) As (3)
- Add RAM Kingston Fury 8GB x2
- Turn power on
- motherboard no light, case light comes on solid for a fraction of a second, then flashing rapidly
- The Fury lights up too
- there is a click, seems to be from the PSU, then power cut off, PSU fan also stops
- Turn power off

5) 24 power, CPU, RAM
- Leaving the CPU, and RAM, on the motherboard
- Remove the 8 pin power cable
- Turn power on
- motherboard no light, case light comes up, solid, no flashing, stays on for at least 1 minute
- Turn power off

Is the problem with the PSU? No. PSU is Corsair RM850X. I got a spare PC. the 850x powered it up to BIOS and detected the m2.

An important aside is I bought the board at a computer shop in another country, with receipt. I know Asus UK warranty will not work for this case. If I want repair or return I have to go back to that country. I bought it July this year. I next visit the country early next year and should be ok to deal with it. Warranty is 3 years.

Is soaking the board in rubbing alcohol (99%) likely to get it back alive? But that will void warranty?

Also, at this moment I cannot test the CPU to be working. It's bought at the same shop

 

[Lutfij]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

When posting a thread of troubleshooting nature, it's customary to include your full system's specs. Please list the specs to your build like so:
CPU:
CPU cooler:
Motherboard:
Ram:
SSD/HDD:
GPU:
PSU:
Chassis:

Did you breadboard the system outside of the case to see if it works? Perhaps you're having a grounding issue? Inspect CPU's socket for any bent or broken pins. Loosen the CPU cooler mount until it's merely resting on the CPU's IHS.

 

[dtww]

ASUS Prime Z790-P WIFI CSM
CPU i7-14700k
CPU Cooler Noctua NH-D9L
RAM Kingston FURY Beast Black RGB XMP 8GB 6000MT/s DDR5 CL30 DIMM x2
M.2 SSD Ediloca EN206 512GB 3D NAND
ASUS ProArt 4070TI OC 16GB
Corsair RM805X
Fractal Design Define 7

(Edit) Yes I have connected PSU to the MB outside of the case. No difference in or out of case. I wondered if I shorted the MB. The Define 7 case has standoffs, or am I wrong

 

[dtww]

Update. I got a new motherboard. For clarity, my first one is PC-PRIME, the second one is PC-H

PC-Prime Asus PRIME Z790-P

• Motherboard Asus Prime Z790-P WIFI CSM

PC-H Asus Rog Strix Z790-H

• Motherboard Asus Rog Strix Z790-H Gaming WIFI
• CPU i7-14700k
• CPU Cooler Noctua NH-D9L
• RAM Kingston FURY Beast Black RGB XMP 8GB 6000MT/s DDR5 CL30 DIMM x2
• M.2 SSD Fikwot FN501 Pro Gen3x4 2TB
• ASUS ProArt 4060TI OC 16GB (my error above 4070)
• Corsair RM805X
• Fractal Design Define 7

PC-H has almost the same components I tried to build as PC-Prime, except (a) different motherboard, and (b) M.S SSD.

The other thing I discovered regards the boot sequence and disk. I got the basic components in and wondered why BIOS will not recognise the "SSD" as bootable. My first mistake is that the Ediloca EN206 is SATA not SSD. (Something I found out when it also didn't work for Raspberry PI 5, but that's a different topic.) My second "mistake" is thinking the BIOS boot sequence will list available devices to boot from - no. Or I didn't know how to! This is the first time I got a GPU that requires so "attention".

So I took a plunge, put the windows installs stuff on USB and boot from it. It worked, got into install sequence, and OS is now on the Fikwot FN501.

Next thing is the 4060TI. I tried adjusting BIOS settings, PCIE Gen, multiple monitor etc. No luck. Whenever the card is connected to the PSU, the board will not boot, not even getting to the first stage which is CPU check. The way I got it to work is to use a PSU cable labelled PCIe at one end. The one that came with the RM850x, the PCIe end is a 6-pin with 2-pin. I won't know if it works till I tried. It did.

Note that the first thing I did when Windows 11 was installed was to install all available drivers downloaded from ASUS. I won't know what would not work, or not work that well before those drivers and utilities were installed. One utility that showed an issue was GPU Tweak III, it kept saying VGA driver not installed - there were some version conflicts somewhere, I re-run the VGA Driver thing from ASUS and did a clean install (replacing whatever the newer version was), and GPU Tweak II worked.

In Task Manager, CPUID ROG, I can see the 4060TI listed. Geforce Experience installed - after it detected 4060TI.

--

So, it makes think perhaps PC-Prime might go into OS setup boot sequence in the way PC-H did. But I did use the PCIe (6pin + 2pin) power cable without success of powering up the motherboard. PC-Prime motherboard does not have Q-LEDs which would have been a great help.

I need a break from this "activity" having spent so much time. The next stage will be either add SSDs and HDDs on the PC-H, or re-seat the components back to the PC-Prime. My plan is that PC-H is a "workstation" running various editing and processing stuffs, and my current stable PC (PC3) will be for more "office" stuffs. Eventually PC3 will be upgraded to something - and will make use of the PRIME motherboard. That will be a few months' time.

Thanks for reading.

 

[dtww]

I got bad news and good news.

Both the two Asus motherboards failed. I got a third board, MSI MSI PRO Z790-A MAX Wifi, and this works. I don't think the way I set up the MSI was any different - if anything different, it was that I powered up the board each time I added a component or made a change. Well, I can't make the MSI to go wrong.

Components remain the same:

• CPU i7-14700k
• CPU Cooler Noctua NH-D9L
• RAM Kingston FURY Beast Black RGB XMP 8GB 6000MT/s DDR5 CL30 DIMM x2
• M.2 SSD Fikwot FN501 Pro Gen3x4 2TB
• ASUS ProArt 4060TI OC 16GB
• Corsair RM805X
• Fractal Design Define 7

My second board, Asus Rog Strix Z790-H did power up a few times, and I even got it to run Resolve Davinci to compare processing time with my current PC. I changed component after that, and it would never boot up again - the LED showed amber light for RAM. I did think problem could also be the CPU. No, cleaned it out, re-positioned it, same result. With supported RAM, the Strix wouldn't boot. Flashback the board, even CMOS, could not get it to go further than the amber light. So this board is going back.

What's lesson learned? I don't know. To avoid Asus MBs in the future? That can't be it. But it made me think that perhaps ASUS was overwhelming their boards with all possible use cases that they got themselves in a twist. My first board was bought overseas. My second board via Amazon. Was it down to manufacturing? Or design? And it got through quality control? Was there one? Or get them out and wait for customer return?