No video on monitors... Please help?

zerogravityx

Honorable
Feb 28, 2016
14
0
10,520
I know what you're thinking.. It must be the video card, but I already ruled that out. :/

All day today, I had been using my desktop like any other day. I left for a few hours.. Came back to black monitors.. Desktop power light was on, so I moved my mouse.. Nothing... Hit the keyboard a few times.. nothing.. I decided to power cycle the computer after a few failed attempts..

The computer powers on, but nothing on the monitors at all.. I wait.. nothing..
I power it off again.. try again a few times... Nothing.. I open the tower, remove the video card.. Try the onboard display port.. Nothing, back screen... I try the onboard HDMI port.. Nothing, black screen...

The motherboard showed an error code Ab.

I unplugged the power, held down the power button to discharge any caps.. no change.

I turned it off and on a few times.. and no change to the error code, or behavior. Except on one occasion, the system power cycled itself and stayed on the second time.

I removed the ram completely.. Powered on.. got the error code 55 on the board, then it power cycled itself, over and over again.. 55 on the board, power cycle, 55 on the board, power cycle..

I inserted one stick of ram, it tried to boot, again, but no video.

I inserted all memory again, tried to boot.. Now it shows the error b2..

I have tried removing the CMOS battery, and tried removing an SSD installed a few weeks ago... Neither helped.



My build: https://ca.pcpartpicker.com/list/md6fkd


Any help would be greatly appreciated.. I am at a loss here.. :(

edit 1:

I decided to reseat my video card, and the error code is different now.
Now I am getting bF, which is actually the error code that seems to be the normal state.. its been on my board since the day I bought it... Still no video. :(

edit 2:

I decided it would be best to troubleshoot with the onboard video until I rule out the MB as being the culprit.. I removed the video card, and connected a monitor via the onboard display port. I rebooted, and the error code flashed between E1 and 02..
I rebooted again, and it hung at AE for a long time.. So I rebooted it again.. Again, the system hung at AE, but as I was typing this, it switched out to bF (normal state). I still have no video at all, just black screens... and yes, the power to the monitors is on.. I have checked about a dozen times, hoping I was just being an idiot.
 
AO is the normal Q code for All Ok for pretty much all Gigabyte and Asus boards that have Q code displays. 30 is normal if you've put the system to sleep and then resumed from sleep, until the next time you shut down or restart. I've never seen the code bF, and I have that exact board along with a Hero VIII.

Per Gigabyte:

Our team had checked with the Post code manufacture and this code correspond to the thunderbolt. By default it is enable in the bios and if you are not using any thunderbolt device it will show bF. Once you disable the Thunderbolt option it will be A0 when the OS boots which correspond to IDE initialization and will stay here as the board does not have any IDE controller.

So that code was likely due to Thunderbolt being enabled in the BIOS, but no Thunderbolt device being attached. Not relevant to the current problem though.

I would tentatively say it sound like it's very much a motherboard issue, unless you've had the CPU out of the socket recently and there is any chance you may have bent one or more pins on the motherboard. Could even have happened a long time ago, and for whatever reason is only showing up now. We've seen this before where the bend wasn't bad, still made contact, but over time and the weight of the CPU cooler, or moving the unit around, it gets worse, and poof, no POST. So I'd check that, along with following the rest of the bench procedure that is outlined in my guide.

How to properly bench test your motherboard
 

zerogravityx

Honorable
Feb 28, 2016
14
0
10,520


Thanks for the reply darkbreeze.. The CPU hasn't moved since I built the system (February of 2016), but I plan on reseating it tomorrow, or the day after, depending on how work goes.. The other step I am going to try, is to swap out the PSU.. The motherboard replacement seems like it is going to be difficult to source, if pc part picker is any indication. :(
 
It's not, they are not good about keeping updated for outdated system hardware. Still, they are not plentiful, and usually the prices are not what you'd expect for a new board. People know that they have boards people want, because it is cheaper to replace a motherboard on a system that otherwise is still working fine, than to build a whole new platform, even if the board is more expensive than it was when it was new.

So both ways are options. FWIW, I just went through this myself not long ago when I got the Hero VIII. I still have a working Z170X-Gaming 7 just in case this happens, which is why I bought it NOW, instead of having to try and find one later. Even though I will upgrade in the next year or two, I'll still want to use the system as a secondary for testing, etc., and in my shop, so I'll want to be sure I have replacement hardware. Always a good idea to buy a second board if you plan to keep the system for a long time, because they are always more expensive once a new platform comes out an manufacturers stop making them.

You can however use a Z270 board with that CPU, and that actually comes with a few perks not on Z170, such as RGB controls onboard for some boards, better fan controls in the bios and a few other minor improvements. Some boards will have better audio codecs as well.

https://www.amazon.com/GIGABYTE-GA-Z270P-D3-LGA1151-Crossfire-Motherboard/dp/B01N2V0AHI/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1548913275&sr=8-3&keywords=Z170+motherboard

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIADZJ7RA2281&Description=Z170%20motherboard&cm_re=Z170_motherboard-_-13-157-635-_-Product


https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIADFR83H9556&Description=Z170%20motherboard&cm_re=Z170_motherboard-_-9SIADFR83H9556-_-Product

https://www.amazon.com/ASRock-Z270-KILLER-SLI-Motherboards-x/dp/B01N6NWA0L/ref=sr_1_1?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1548913530&sr=1-1&keywords=z270+motherboard

https://www.amazon.com/d/Computer-Motherboards/ASRock-Z270-LGA1151-CrossFireX-Motherboard/B01MU7LLGW/ref=sr_1_3?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1548913530&sr=1-3&keywords=z270+motherboard



 

zerogravityx

Honorable
Feb 28, 2016
14
0
10,520
I tried a new PSU, and the same thing happened...

The system then sat for 48 hours as I was busy elsewhere...

I decided to take apart every component out of the case, and rebuild it fresh. The only thing I didn't do was re-seat the CPU/heat sink & fan... Then I connected the PSU to the MB, and CPU only.. Installed the memory, and the system posted and entered the bios. In the bios there was an alert about the cmos battery and that the bios settings had been reset to default. I accepted the message and shut down the machine again. I began to attach components one at a time until everything was connected, booting into the bios or OS each time..

The system seems perfectly fine now.. I have no idea what went wrong.. or how it was corrected..

Any further thoughts @darkbreeze ? lol..
 
Something just wasn't sitting right would be my suspicion. It certainly isn't the first time. I see systems all the time where I put them together, something doesn't work, I take it all back apart and put it all back together EXACTLY the same, and it works. Could be anything from a "dust bunny" sitting in the wrong place, say, the PCI or memory slots, and not allowing a good connection from one of the gold teeth to the motherboard, to a plug that just wasn't "quite" fully seated. As long as it's working, I wouldn't worry about it.