Question HARDWARE FAILURE - Issue with system not booting if graphics card requiring power is installed

[TimR95]

Hi everyone --

Working on a PREVIOUSLY WORKING gaming system here, and trying to figure out whether or not I'm doing something wrong, or have additional damage to system.

First, the specs
Specs:
Motherboard: ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC. PRIME A320M-K
AMD Radeon(TM) R7 360 Series [Display adapter]
Processor: 3.10 gigahertz AMD Ryzen 3 1200 Quad-Core
Memory: 8GB DDR4 DRAM
600 watt Ultra ULT-V600DR power supply (has died)
A couple of SSD drives for OS and Steam game storage.
No multimedia - no extreme soundcards, just onboard audio.

This is NOT a new build -- this system ran fine for a number of years.

The Problem:
The system blew the power supply, possibly from the GPU going down. Very dusty system, now cleaned out.
I suspect something overheated.

Now for the details and steps so far:
I obtained a Corsair 750 watt power supply, and hooked it up to the EXISTING hardware -- the motherboard,
existing Radeon R9 390 GPU, etc.

Nothing but an orange LED glow from around the board - No boot, power switch wouldn't even start the CPU fan, etc.
No BIOS splash, etc

Removed the Radeon R9, swapped for a NON-powered Radeon 5450 non-powered low-end video card.
The power switch worked, CPU fan started, SINGLE BEEP, and got to BIOS.
The system will also boot an Ubuntu Live USB and provide normal HDMI video to a display.

The system will NOT boot with no video card-- does not switch to it's local onboard video. That might require a jumper setting or CMOS reset, etc.

Memory and CPU tests appear to pass on MemTest86.

Here's where it gets weird

On the NEW power supply, with a known good Nvidia MSI GTX 1060 card...
Same problem - no fans start, no boot. I have the EVGA 6+2 power cable connected.
The GTX1060 only requires one connector, the R9 required 6+2 and another 6.

I'm trying to figure out if this means something ELSE is blown on the MB, such that it will use "simple" video cards like that old 5450,
but cannot use video cards with a full GPU and PCI-E/EVGA power?

Thanks, Tim

 

[SkyNetRising]

The system will NOT boot with no video card-- does not switch to it's local onboard video. That might require a jumper setting or CMOS reset, etc.

CPU (Ryzen 3 1200) doesn't have integrated GPU.
Motherboard video outputs will not work with this cpu.

Same problem - no fans start, no boot. I have the EVGA 6+2 power cable connected.

Modular PSU cables are not compatible between different PSU models.
If you have Corsair PSU model, you can not use some random cable from EVGA PSU.
You have to use modular cables specific to your PSU model.

With wrong modular PSU cables you can kill/damage hardware connected.

 

[TimR95]

Thanks for that detail!

The modular cables came with the loaner Corsair power supply from a friend --
This is my first-ever experience with a modular power supply.
Good to know there is NOT a standard for those cables. Thanks, PC industry...

I will check and see which ones go with which ports (on the power supply) for powering a video card.
There were some marked PCI-E and some marked EVGA-3. The owner of the supply told me I could use either one ... appears he may be wrong... I'll have to try to figure out which of the modular cables he had in the box work with the Corsair power supply -- and HOPE I didn't kill either his supply or the GPU.

 

[TimR95]

So it seems like everything survived.... even the Radeon R9 390 I thought was cooked, is not.
Swapped to a non-modular supply I found I had, and everything works.

Going to order a new Corsair supply.

Thanks for the assist!

By the way -- for those finding this question later on -
This is a good intro (history of) all the power supply connectors.
It may not be exhaustive for today, but it's got a lot of info.

https://www.playtool.com/pages/psuconnectors/connectors.html