Question Flashed BIOS, CPU Red light and no display

[askem]

Hello.

MOBO: Tomahawk MAX II B450
CPU: Ryzen 9 3900X
GFX Card: EVGA GeForce RTX 2080 Super Hybrid
RAM: Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro 32GB (2x16GB) DDR4 3600 (PC4-28800)
PSU: Corsair RM850x (850 Watt)
Storage: Samsung 980 PRO m.2 1TB
Cooler: NZXT Kraken X53

I have had this PC up and running for almost 1 year now with no problems. Over the last 3 days, it has blue screened multiple times a day. After researching here, I discovered my m.2 might have an issue and need it's firmware updated, but I couldn't update it to the most recent version. More googling told me to update my BIOS, so I tried to flash it.

Flash completed, and PC restarted, but screen is black and CPU Red Light is lit.

A friend told me the Flash wasn't successful and I needed to no CPU Flash it, so I flashed it again using a USB (and the same version of BIOS). That also completed, I assume correctly, but the red CPU light is still on and I have no display.

Display is plugged directly into the MOBO. One stick of RAM left in.

Not sure if my MOBO is fried or if there's anything left to do here?

 

[BlaUno]

1. If you don't have a graphic card, how the heck was your system running?
2. If you DO have a graphic card, why the heck is your display plugged into the motherboard?

 

[askem]

1. If you don't have a graphic card, how the heck was your system running?
2. If you DO have a graphic card, why the heck is your display plugged into the motherboard?

I do have a graphics card. Sorry, I forgot to list it on the original post. It's a EVGA GeForce RTX 2080 Super Hybrid.

I plugged it into the MOBO AFTER the flash, as it was one of the suggested solutions, stating maybe the GFX Card wasn't working due to BIOS Update. I just wanted to express that I DID do that, so that people didn't SUGGEST doing it.

 

[BlaUno]

Maybe i should've been more clear: Your cpu does not have an integrated gpu. The only way you can get a display is through a graphic card. Did you try plugging the display into your graphic card after the SECOND (and hopefully successful) bios flashback? Cause the way you put it, it sounds like you are trying to get a display through your mobo, and it's not gonna happen with that cpu.

 

[askem]

Maybe i should've been more clear: Your cpu does not have an integrated gpu. The only way you can get a display is through a graphic card. Did you try plugging the display into your graphic card after the SECOND (and hopefully successful) bios flashback? Cause the way you put it, it sounds like you are trying to get a display through your mobo, and it's not gonna happen with that cpu.

Ah OK, I see. I didn't know that.

Yes, the display was plugged into the graphics card and still no display with CPU Red Light on on MOBO. I then plugged it into the MOBO instead, since that was on one of the many guides on the internet.

I'll be honest, this entire thing is frustrating ahah. I don't know enough about computers, and my friends who all claimed they'd help before I did this never did, so I tried it alone and it went poorly clearly.

 

[BlaUno]

Yes, the display was plugged into the graphics card and still no display with CPU Red Light on on MOBO. I then plugged it into the MOBO instead, since that was on one of the many guides on the internet.

Ah, too bad, i was hoping that would be the problem (well, for now). At least now we're clear on where the display cable should go.

The only other thing i can think of in terms of getting it to post; The USB stick you used for flashing the BIOS, was it formatted as FAT32? As far as i know, it must be formatted as FAT32 so the bios update could work (assuming you followed all the other directions from the mobo manual, like renaming the rom file etc). You can even find youtubers who made the mistake of flashing the bios with a NTFS formatted usb and wondered what went wrong, even tho the comments are screaming FAT32. So yeah, try that if you haven't already.

I'll be honest, this entire thing is frustrating ahah. I don't know enough about computers, and my friends who all claimed they'd help before I did this never did, so I tried it alone and it went poorly clearly.

Im on a 13 old machine and the outlandish issues and solutions i've had through the years have convinced me PC's are actually alive and each has its own personality. "Frustrating" is putting it mildly.