Motherboard or AMD APU issue?

[zarksy]

Hi all
I have an issue with my PC, two months ago my PC suddenly stopped working as I was playing Fallout 3 with 63 Mods installed, it just stopped working all the sudden, and then I couldn't turn it on. The power button was not able to turn the PC on, so what I did was to remove the jumper and battery, then the PC turned on, but now it won't post at all, no picture, just the fan of APU and GPU is turning on and the HDD/DVD, but no picture on the screen. The power led and HDD led are on though. Also I bought twice a new motherboard, and they both give me the same problem, so the next thing I think is the APU, cuz a day before my computer stopped working I had it overclocked to 4.50Ghz and the Voltage was set to 1.52V. The same day as I was using the overclocked PC, something smelled burning, but I ignored it and continued using my PC, but the next day the PC stopped working out of nowhere as I was gaming. Also I tested one ram stick at a time and still PC won't post, so it is not the Ram. The APU doesn't seem to have burning marks on the outside, it looks as brand new, and the pins are looking good too. Also I tested with a different PSU, and the problem is still not fixed.

PC specs:
AMD A8-6600K
Old motherboard: Asrock FM2A55M-VG3
New Mobo: Gigabyte f2a68hm-ds2
Ram: Geil 4gb 1600Mhz + Geil 2GB 1600Mhz
HDD: 500Gb 7200RPM Seagate
DVD: LG
OS: Windows 10 x64
GPU: Palit GT 730 2GB GDDR5 64-bit
PSU: Zalman ZM500-LE 500W

 

[cookiemania66]

How is you Monitor connected to you PC? Via the APU or GPU?
The APU does have an interaded Graphics processor so you can take the GPU out and try using your Pc with the IGPU via Mainboard Display output.
If you do get a signal then your gpu (gt 730) is probably dead.

 

[zarksy]

I tested with both, with integrated GPU and with NVidia gt 730, I even removed the Nvidia GPU so I can test it with the A8-6600K iGPU, and the problem is the same.

 

[drea.drechsler]

Hi all
I have an issue with my PC, two months ago my PC suddenly stopped working as I was playing Fallout 3 with 63 Mods installed, it just stopped working all the sudden, and then I couldn't turn it on. The power button was not able to turn the PC on, so what I did was to remove the jumper and battery, then the PC turned on, but now it won't post at all, no picture, just the fan of APU and GPU is turning on and the HDD/DVD, but no picture on the screen. The power led and HDD led are on though. Also I bought twice a new motherboard, and they both give me the same problem, so the next thing I think is the APU, cuz a day before my computer stopped working I had it overclocked to 4.50Ghz and the Voltage was set to 1.52V. The same day as I was using the overclocked PC, something smelled burning, but I ignored it and continued using my PC, but the next day the PC stopped working out of nowhere as I was gaming. Also I tested one ram stick at a time and still PC won't post, so it is not the Ram. The APU doesn't seem to have burning marks on the outside, it looks as brand new, and the pins are looking good too. Also I tested with a different PSU, and the problem is still not fixed.

PC specs:
AMD A8-6600K
Old motherboard: Asrock FM2A55M-VG3
New Mobo: Gigabyte f2a68hm-ds2
Ram: Geil 4gb 1600Mhz + Geil 2GB 1600Mhz
HDD: 500Gb 7200RPM Seagate
DVD: LG
OS: Windows 10 x64
GPU: Palit GT 730 2GB GDDR5 64-bit
PSU: Zalman ZM500-LE 500W

My guess is the APU is indeed bad. 1.52 volts is very high and you don't state which cooler, so if a stock cooler (wraith?) is used that would just make it worse.

But in the sequence of events: the burning smell was probably something in the original motherboard's VRM failing as it couldn't handle the overclocked/overvolted load. Once it failed it took the APU, so now both are bad. It's quite possible putting the bad APU in new motherboards can cause them to fail too so you should be careful.

 

[zarksy]

Yea, it's with stock cooler. Will try and replace my APU with a new one, hopefully it's going to work then. Also I plan on buying a second hand (used) AMD APU, cuz I am low on cash.

 

[drea.drechsler]

Yea, it's with stock cooler. Will try and replace my APU with a new one, hopefully it's going to work then. Also I plan on buying a second hand (used) AMD APU, cuz I am low on cash.

OK...as I said BE CAREFUL. If you've used a bad APU, with a VCore short-to-ground, in a new motherboard it could have damaged something in the new board.

The effect is you put bad APU in new motherboard, it ruins it. Put a new APU in the newly-ruined motherboard: it ruins the new APU. It goes on and on, destroying hardware. The only way to know is to take some meter readings on a suspect motherboard to determine if VCore (or other voltages) is/are the correct (safe) value. If you don't have the means to do that, it may be best to replace the pair just to be safe.

 

[zarksy]

Well, I found someone who has a fm2 APU, and we tested it with his on the new Mobo, and it turned on, everything worked fine. So at least now I know the new Mobo works and my old APU has not done any damage to the new Motherboard. Thanks for all the help!!