wont boot with 4 PCI cards

[fuzzweed]

things are never as simple as they should be........

just got another tuner card taking me to 3 + the sound card but now the PC wont boot into windows (BIOS is OK).
Ive tried different slot combinations, but it just doesnt like a 4th card, ie 3 x tuners is OK, 2 + soundcard is OK, just not 4 of anything.

I've tried greater PCI latency settings and underclocking the whole rig - all with no sucsess.

any ideas????:confused:

PS all the onboard ports except LAN are disabled, so it shouldnt be an IRQ problem...

[ShiningDragon]

Perhaps you should tell, which Mainboard (Brand, Modelname, Revision) and BIOS Version you are using?

[bgowland]

Possibly stating the obvious but it sounds like a resource conflict.

Try booting with the different combinations of 3 devices, go to Device Manager then 'View', 'Resources by connection'. Check the IRQs and I/O to see if that might give you any clues.

Cheers,
Brian

[fuzzweed]

thanks for the ideas - looks like my saturday morning is used up fault finding now anyway. not sure if thats a good thing or not....

its an asrock k7s8x BTW latest bios (2.6 i think)

[herbs]

What PSU do you have? a shitty no name 500w might not be enough, a decent 350-400w should do it.

[gEd]

yep, my first instinct was PSU. Try removing any usb devices and disconnect the cd drive if you have one to free up some juice.

the extra current drain could be pulling your vcore down too low. Try bumping it up to a healthy value.

what does happen exactly?

[andyd]

Does it actually boot into windows (ie windows xp boot screen) Can you boot into safe mode? Do you get a BSOD?

It could be faulty PCI slot or maybe an old bios. Do check the bios version. updated bios's can fix sometimes major issues.

[bgowland]

I initially thought PSU too but I'd be surprised if that was the case with just one extra PCI card (unless the PSU is seriously under powered).

It does suggest one test that can be done though...

fuzzweed - you said you can get as far as booting into the BIOS Setup...I see from your mobo manual that it has a voltage monitor. If you do have a low power PSU and the voltages don't look right then that is likely to be the answer. If the voltages look OK then it must be something else (in theory ).

What andyd says about going into safe mode would also be an indicator of resource conflicts. If the voltages are OK and you can get into Safe Mode (i.e., drivers don't get loaded) then that would suggest a resource conflict.

Cheers,
Brian

[andyd]

If there was any PSU issues, I would expect more stability problems then anything else, but it should it be noted that any PSU with a max load should still power on and boot.

Fuzzweed - have you tried swaping PCI cards around? To see if this produces the same result? Also reset the BIOS back to factory defaults and install that 4th card to see if that fixes your issues.

[fuzzweed]

wow - thanks for a huge number of tips!
*no it wont boot in safe mode, so I guess its not resources
*no its not the order of the cards or BIOS setup
*yes, i think the psu is on the way out - especially as now ive been sat right next to it i can hear the fan speed dipping when I click the mouse button (which is a bad sign, right? )

thanks again - I'll have a few more experiments unplugging the power from the hdds, and then I think next stop will be ebay.....