4-pin 12v Connector on Biostar NF 4X-A7

[6roseds]

Hi everybody, I just bought a Biostar NF 4X-A7 motherboard as part of
a major system upgrade that included a new video card, more RAM, and a
new wifi card. Ever since installing the new hardware (I kept my old
processor, an Athlon 64 3700+ on S754) I'd been experiencing stability
issues. My new Radeon X1800XT did not overclock to nearly the specs
that I'd seen when the same card was installed in my friend's system,
and my processor would crash after an FSB overclock of just 5 mHz. I
spent forever trying to make it stable and, long story short, until the
system didn't recognize my hard drive this morning I thought I was in
the clear. Figuring a bad cable, I opened up the case and replaced
the aging ATA 133 ribbon cable I had been using with a newer one. As I
did this, I noticed that I am quite stupid...

When building the system, I neglected to connect the 4-Pin +12v power
cable to the motherboard. I'm surprised that it booted at all, but
this does explain the problems I was running into. My question is
this: Did I in any way permanently damage my CPU, Motherboard, or
Graphics card through my stupidity? I checked for bulging caps and the
like, there were none. Any insight would be appreciated very much.

Thank you,
-Hukuis

 

[Paul]

Hi everybody, I just bought a Biostar NF 4X-A7 motherboard as part of
a major system upgrade that included a new video card, more RAM, and a
new wifi card. Ever since installing the new hardware (I kept my old
processor, an Athlon 64 3700+ on S754) I'd been experiencing stability
issues. My new Radeon X1800XT did not overclock to nearly the specs
that I'd seen when the same card was installed in my friend's system,
and my processor would crash after an FSB overclock of just 5 mHz. I
spent forever trying to make it stable and, long story short, until the
system didn't recognize my hard drive this morning I thought I was in
the clear. Figuring a bad cable, I opened up the case and replaced
the aging ATA 133 ribbon cable I had been using with a newer one. As I
did this, I noticed that I am quite stupid...

When building the system, I neglected to connect the 4-Pin +12v power
cable to the motherboard. I'm surprised that it booted at all, but
this does explain the problems I was running into. My question is
this: Did I in any way permanently damage my CPU, Motherboard, or
Graphics card through my stupidity? I checked for bulging caps and the
like, there were none. Any insight would be appreciated very much.

Thank you,
-Hukuis

Disconnect the 24 pin power connector. Examine the +12V pins on
the connector. Check both the motherboard connector, and check
the connector on the end of the power supply cable. If there are
no burn marks or melted plastic, you are OK.

A 3700+ is an 89W max processor. That is about 8.24A from the
+12V supply (if the Vcore conversion is 90% efficient). If Biostar
made the mistake of connecting the 12V on the main connector,
with the 12V on the 2x2 connector, then the 8.24A max would flow
through the main connector. The pins are rated for 6A each.

If you used a 20 pin power supply, then the 8.24A max would have
flowed through the one 12V pin on the connector. Which is a bit
too much. So, it depends on whether you used a 20 pin or a 24
pin power supply, as to how much damage there could be.

The X1800XT could be drawing some of its +12V through the
PCI Express slot and some through a separate power connector.
The PCI Express slot current, would be in addition to the
processor current, so that could make matters a little bit
worse.

Pulling the main power connector, and checking the pins for
damage, is all i can suggest. In your user manual, there is
a pinout given for the main power connector, and you can find
the location of the two 12V pins on there.

Biostar should not have connected the 2x2 12V power, to the
24 pin main power connector. They are supposed to be kept
separate. That spreads the load over 4 pins, two 12V pins
on the 2x2 power connector, and the motherboard/video card
currents flowing through the two 12V pins on the main
24 pin connector. When the 2x2 connector is not connected,
the motherboard should fail to POST, and there should be
no damage to anything, as the Power_good would be deasserted
and nothing would try to run.

Paul

 

[Ed Medlin]

Hi everybody, I just bought a Biostar NF 4X-A7 motherboard as part of
a major system upgrade that included a new video card, more RAM, and a
new wifi card. Ever since installing the new hardware (I kept my old
processor, an Athlon 64 3700+ on S754) I'd been experiencing stability
issues. My new Radeon X1800XT did not overclock to nearly the specs
that I'd seen when the same card was installed in my friend's system,
and my processor would crash after an FSB overclock of just 5 mHz. I
spent forever trying to make it stable and, long story short, until the
system didn't recognize my hard drive this morning I thought I was in
the clear. Figuring a bad cable, I opened up the case and replaced
the aging ATA 133 ribbon cable I had been using with a newer one. As I
did this, I noticed that I am quite stupid...

When building the system, I neglected to connect the 4-Pin +12v power
cable to the motherboard. I'm surprised that it booted at all, but
this does explain the problems I was running into. My question is
this: Did I in any way permanently damage my CPU, Motherboard, or
Graphics card through my stupidity? I checked for bulging caps and the
like, there were none. Any insight would be appreciated very much.

Thank you,
-Hukuis

It is very doubtful that you damaged anything. Seeing that it did boot up,
the most you would get would be some instability. This could show up in
various ways as you have seen.... Now that you have it connected it
should operate a bit more normally. Good luck.

Ed