Endless Reboot Cycle, non-stop short beeps - ga-g41mt-s2pt

[johndossier]

Hi guys. I try not to post questions to forums and can usually find an answer by searching but I've looked high and low and have also already done the checklist sticky on this forum.

CM Scout 2 Advanced case
Gigabyte ga-g41mt-s2pt MOBO
e8400 3.0ghz
Thermaltake tr2 600w PSU
Patriot 4GB 1600 DDR3 - 1 stick

That is what's hooked up. I've disconnected HDDs, GPU (using onboard for testing), DVD-R drive, Wireless card etc. to just try and get this thing to post.

MOBO is brand new, RAM is brand new, case is brand new. CPU and PSU are tested and true in my old system.

As I said in the subject line the system will come on, all lights on, all fans running, when I DID have the HDD and/or DVD hooked up they would start to spin as well, then the crazy fast beeping and then reboot, back to the same.

Did the checklist and thought i'd found it when I realized there was one
standoff not being used that might be bumping the bottom of the board but it's now removed as well.

Just for fun (ha, so fun) took the one stick of ram out completely and didn't get the beeps but maybe it wouldn't get that far without ram? Same thing with disconnecting the 12V 4 Pin and in both situations the reboots didnt happen OR the beeps, but obviously its not going to post without ram or power to the cpu.

Also I can't find a good definitive list of beep codes from Gigabyte so I'm not really sure what I'm dealing with.

Really don't want to have to go buy another mobo and don't have any other DDR3 ram to test with at this time as I work in a rural area and can't get to a decent shop for another week.

Please help!

Thanks.

 

[alexoiu]

Hi, With the board outside the case, start it with only CPU and CPU fan installed.
You should get the error beeps signaling that no RAMs are installed.
Check if the CPU fan is spinning.
If still no beeps, then that standoff might have damaged the board.
Beep codes: http://www.gigabyte.com/support-downloads/faq-page.aspx?fid=816

 

[johndossier]

Okay, tried that and no beeping / no reboot, same result as no ram attempt in the case. Put the ram back in, still outside case, and back to same behavior.
Thanks for the beep list. I don't know if this is technically continous short beeps or one long continous beep. It's kind of broken up but with no space in between at all. Like right before a bad trance song brings the beat back in. 😛

 

[alexoiu]

Hard to say. I suggest testing the board and CPU at a local shop (if not too expensive).

 

[johndossier]

I will have to do that if I can't get this figured. Unfortunately I won't be back in civilization for a couple weeks and was counting on my system to keep me sane. Lol
I did find this video http://youtu.be/QMvy403xMyQ
Which is pretty interesting as that's the exact same board I'm using
And someone in the comments section mentions having the same board / same problem and fixing it by going from 1600 to 1333 ram with less latency. With the wolfdale chips being 1333 FSB and of the DDR2 era is this a possible culprit?

 

[alexoiu]

These are the RAMs recommended by Patriot for the board:
PSD34G1333K
PSD34G1333KH
PSD34G1333K
PSD34G1333KH
PSD34G13332
PSD34G13332H
PSD34G133381
PSD34G133381H
PSD32G13332
PSD32G133381
PSD32G133381H
PSD31G133381
So a memory issue? It could be.

 

[johndossier]

Booya! It was the RAM. Managed to find some Kingston 1333 and it booted right away. So for all those experience this with this board, NO 1600 won't down lock automatically in a new build, despite what your local comp store clerk tries to tell you.

Now I guess I need to make a new thread about the BSOD and trying to use my old HDD without having to reinstall Win7. Sigh.

Lol Thanks guys!

 

[Tradesman1]

Old drive with new mobo, no problem if its Win7, Update the BIOS is BIOS update available, then you can normally just put the Win7 Drive in and it will boot, look at hardware, load the drivers it can and should be running, if any problems, try booting into safe mode and update all the mobo drivers (with those from the web site, the ones on disk that came with mobo may be outdated already....then if any problems give a shout, here it might be the DRAM, need to have FSB at 400/1600 to run the stick at 1600

 

[johndossier]

K I'm pretty much a super noob with bios settings.
Where do I update the bios from if I haven't put the drive in yet?

I'm not using that 1600 ram anymore, though if there's a way to get it to work with the 1333 I might keep it.

Ill try the safe mode boot but will wait to hear back about updating the bios. Just a bit confused about the order of things.

UPDATE: Safe Mode won't work, get the same BSOD flashing quickly and then reboot. Found this link: http://www.dowdandassociates.com/content/howto-repair-windows-7-install-after-replacing-motherboard/
and got hopeful but I'm stuck at the Command Prompt step after booting from the install disk. It won't LET me select any other drives and just has me at X:\ so I don't know if that's a partition or what but I can't get to the drivers on my external.

Grr.

 

[alexoiu]

What is the setting for SATA in BIOS, IDE or AHCI?

 

[johndossier]

Thats the other bizarre thing, I can't find that setting anywhere in the BIOS. I had that same though but I just can't see it.
ftp://download.gigabyte.ru/manual/mb_manual_ga-g41mt-s2pt_v1.1_e.pdf

The manual there has screen shots of every menu in the BIOS, if you can see it anywhere tell me because I must be blind. 🙁

 

[alexoiu]

No, No AHCI option.
Try the Repair option from the Windows installation DVD.

 

[johndossier]

Tried that too early on and no dice. I think if I'd been smarter I could have made this work but I didn't get rid of any of the old drivers before I tried to move this. Oh well, I decided to just reinstall about an hour ago. Win7 saves all the Steam data anyway so I won't have to full DL everything, just verify all the files and all my documents and pictures are there too so really not that bad. Spend 5 hours trying to make the old install work or spend 4 hours doing this. lol

Thanks for all the help!