- Mar 31, 2015
- 102
- 0
- 4,710
I have a (possibly defect) MSI 970A-G43 that has been working for almost 2 years. Up until yesterday, it was working just fine. But now it's not working at all.
I came back to the computer after leaving it on overnight, and the screen wouldn't turn on. It acted as though the display turned off automatically, but all of the lock lights on the keyboard were frozen and the computer wouldn't respond. Fair enough, I turned it off and did the 30 second power drain trick. It booted up fine, but then Windows couldn't load because somehow a few system files got corrupted. Not too big of a deal either, I can just reinstall Windows.
So I restarted the computer to boot into the BIOS and see if all of the HDDs were being recognized, but this is when the problems started. After turning it off, it would never POST. All of the fans were spinning, the keyboard's lock lights blinked, and I even heard all of the hard drives going.
So I assumed that it probably had something to do with the graphics card. I swapped out my GTX 770 with several different PCI-e graphics cards of which I know are functional, and still no video. I tried several different monitors and HDMI/DVI/VGA cables to no avail.
So I began troubleshooting the system by practically rebuilding it. Reseated the CPU, tried a few different heatsinks, tried different sticks of RAM, made sure I disconnected anything that would interrupt the booting cycle, resetting the CMOS, all that stuff. And it still wouldn't turn on.
At this point I was assuming that it had to be an issue within the motherboard. There aren't any blown capacitors, so the only thing that comes to the top of my mind is VRM failure. I attempted to prevent the VRMs from getting too hot by installing small heatsinks on top of them, but this doesn't necessarily guarantee that the VRMs won't overheat. Installing an older LGA775 motherboard confirms that it was definitely a fault in the MSI 970A-G43, as it had no problems with POST.
Any idea on what is causing this? Can it be fixed, and is the CPU fried? I can do fairly basic repair like recapping if needed, but chances are, it's probably done for. All of the other components including the GPU and PSU work fine with the other motherboard.
Specs:
CPU - AMD FX-6300
CPU Cooler: CM Storm Hyper T4
RAM: G.Skill Ares 8GB DDR3
Motherboard: MSI 970A-G43
GPU: EVGA GTX 770 SC 2GB
HDD: 1x250GB WD Black, 2x500GB WD Blue, 1x120GB Samsung SSD
PSU: Corsair CS550M
Case: DeepCool Dukase V2
I came back to the computer after leaving it on overnight, and the screen wouldn't turn on. It acted as though the display turned off automatically, but all of the lock lights on the keyboard were frozen and the computer wouldn't respond. Fair enough, I turned it off and did the 30 second power drain trick. It booted up fine, but then Windows couldn't load because somehow a few system files got corrupted. Not too big of a deal either, I can just reinstall Windows.
So I restarted the computer to boot into the BIOS and see if all of the HDDs were being recognized, but this is when the problems started. After turning it off, it would never POST. All of the fans were spinning, the keyboard's lock lights blinked, and I even heard all of the hard drives going.
So I assumed that it probably had something to do with the graphics card. I swapped out my GTX 770 with several different PCI-e graphics cards of which I know are functional, and still no video. I tried several different monitors and HDMI/DVI/VGA cables to no avail.
So I began troubleshooting the system by practically rebuilding it. Reseated the CPU, tried a few different heatsinks, tried different sticks of RAM, made sure I disconnected anything that would interrupt the booting cycle, resetting the CMOS, all that stuff. And it still wouldn't turn on.
At this point I was assuming that it had to be an issue within the motherboard. There aren't any blown capacitors, so the only thing that comes to the top of my mind is VRM failure. I attempted to prevent the VRMs from getting too hot by installing small heatsinks on top of them, but this doesn't necessarily guarantee that the VRMs won't overheat. Installing an older LGA775 motherboard confirms that it was definitely a fault in the MSI 970A-G43, as it had no problems with POST.
Any idea on what is causing this? Can it be fixed, and is the CPU fried? I can do fairly basic repair like recapping if needed, but chances are, it's probably done for. All of the other components including the GPU and PSU work fine with the other motherboard.
Specs:
CPU - AMD FX-6300
CPU Cooler: CM Storm Hyper T4
RAM: G.Skill Ares 8GB DDR3
Motherboard: MSI 970A-G43
GPU: EVGA GTX 770 SC 2GB
HDD: 1x250GB WD Black, 2x500GB WD Blue, 1x120GB Samsung SSD
PSU: Corsair CS550M
Case: DeepCool Dukase V2
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram