Couple of hardware questions

[VanguardLH]

I still think by the way its acting that there must be something wrong
with the mobo to have just the sound and usb problems. To clarify ,
the usb ports mounted on the back of the system board work fine , its
the ones that are running off the board to the front of the case and
also a add on that fits in the floppy bay that has usb and sd card
readers.

Did you check that the BIOS has that USB controller enabled on the mobo?
There could be a setting to disable/enable them.

Have you tried a different cable to the USB mobo header? Or checked
that the cable is securely attached to the USB mobo header? Has anyone
been inside, including you, that has disconnected and reconnected any
cabling? Could be the connector is reversed and you have to spin it
around. Typically the connector has a plugged hole where a pin is
missing on the USB mobo header but that's not always the case. With the
plugged hole as polarization, you cannot connect the USB cable to the
mobo header in the wrong orientation (well, you could but you'd be off a
pair of pins that would remain exposed). The plugged hole in the
connector matches up with a missing pin on the mobo header. Without the
polarization, it's possible to reverse the connector.

If the USB mobo header has 10 pins, one should be alone in a row as the
polarizing pin. The blank spot matches up with the plugged hole in the
connector. If you reverse the connector, you'll have Vcc (5V) on the
ground line for the USB ports on the front panel and slot reader and
you'll have ground on the Vcc line of those USB ports. I've also seen
bent pins that didn't go into the connector.

I believe you said you have the following mobo:

http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/Intel_Socket_775/P5QLVM_DO/

From the online manual (couldn't find an English one but could see the
pics of the mobo), the onboard USB headers are at the bottom of the
mobo. They are 10-pin headers. Pin 9 is missing and the polarizing
position to match with the plugged hole in the USB connector. Pin 10 is
unconnected. The pinout is probably:

2 4 6 8 10
* * * * *
* * * *
1 3 5 7 9

where the pins are:

pin 1: Vcc (5V) pin 2: Vcc (5V)
3: data0- 4: data1-
5: data0+ 6: data1+
7: ground 8: ground
9: NC (missing) 10: NC

The mobo pics show pin 9 is missing. Check if the cable going to that
header has a plugged hole as that's what goes to the pin 9 position. If
the cable's connector doesn't have a plugged hole, maybe it has some
other indication as to which of its holes is pin 1 position. If you
look carefully at:

http://supcontent.gateway.com/support.gateway.com/s/Cases/shared/8010826R/8010826R_USB.JPG

you'll see there is a missing hole. That's pin position 9. Although
there is some polarization here, it doesn't preclude you from sliding
the whole connector to the right but they you'd see a couple of nude
pins on the mobo's header. If you have 2 separate connectors going to
the mobo's USB headers, as in:

http://ak.buy.com/PI/0/500/215379016.jpg

Then it's up to you to get them polarized correctly. Also check the
position of the USBPWR jumper. That determines if the USB ports wake up
or not, so it's possible that "working for time" means until they go to
sleep and then they won't wake up. You want the USBPWR jumper(s) set to
enable the wake-up function; else, you need to disable power management
of the appropriate USB root hubs in Device Manager. There may also be a
USB Resume setting in the BIOS to have the USB controller wake up from
the S3/S4 low-power modes. I'd also connect only one set of USB cables
at a time from the mobo header. That is, with the one 10-pin USB header
connector or two 5-pin USB header connectors on the mobo's USB header,
pull the USB cable off the slot card reader and check if the front case
USB ports start working.

Since you were inside the case to replace the CPU and remove memory
modules, go check the cable connections are okay. You didn't say if the
USB ports were working or not BEFORE you dug inside the case to replace
the CPU.

 

[LouisG]

The USB ports on the back are integrated directly with the motherboard.
The front USB ports, as well as the adapter in the floppy bay, are
connected with a cable to separate headers on the motherboard. Those
headers could be faulty, or the cables connecting them could be wired in
the wrong sequence.... the header pin-outs for USB are not universal.

You say the sound is intermittent also whether using onboard audio or an
add-in sound card. Are you connecting speakers to the speaker port on
the rear of the computer, or are you connecting to a speaker port on the
front, when you use onboard sound?

Can I assume that when you install a sound card, you are connecting
speakers to the lime green speaker port on the back of the sound card?

Nothing has changed in regards to the way the usb ports are wired to the
mobo , this system has been in use now for 3-4 years with no problems and
the connections haven't been disturbed.

The sound was intermittant with both on board and the soundcard, doesn't
matter which is used, after a short time of use the sound will just drop.

 

[LouisG]

Did you check that the BIOS has that USB controller enabled on the
mobo? There could be a setting to disable/enable them.

Have you tried a different cable to the USB mobo header? Or checked
that the cable is securely attached to the USB mobo header? Has
anyone been inside, including you, that has disconnected and
reconnected any cabling? Could be the connector is reversed and you
have to spin it around. Typically the connector has a plugged hole
where a pin is missing on the USB mobo header but that's not always
the case. With the plugged hole as polarization, you cannot connect
the USB cable to the mobo header in the wrong orientation (well, you
could but you'd be off a pair of pins that would remain exposed). The
plugged hole in the connector matches up with a missing pin on the
mobo header. Without the polarization, it's possible to reverse the
connector.

If the USB mobo header has 10 pins, one should be alone in a row as
the polarizing pin. The blank spot matches up with the plugged hole
in the connector. If you reverse the connector, you'll have Vcc (5V)
on the ground line for the USB ports on the front panel and slot
reader and you'll have ground on the Vcc line of those USB ports.
I've also seen bent pins that didn't go into the connector.

I believe you said you have the following mobo:

http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/Intel_Socket_775/P5QLVM_DO/

From the online manual (couldn't find an English one but could see the
pics of the mobo), the onboard USB headers are at the bottom of the
mobo. They are 10-pin headers. Pin 9 is missing and the polarizing
position to match with the plugged hole in the USB connector. Pin 10
is unconnected. The pinout is probably:

2 4 6 8 10
* * * * *
* * * *
1 3 5 7 9

where the pins are:

pin 1: Vcc (5V) pin 2: Vcc (5V)
3: data0- 4: data1-
5: data0+ 6: data1+
7: ground 8: ground
9: NC (missing) 10: NC

The mobo pics show pin 9 is missing. Check if the cable going to that
header has a plugged hole as that's what goes to the pin 9 position.
If the cable's connector doesn't have a plugged hole, maybe it has
some other indication as to which of its holes is pin 1 position. If
you look carefully at:

http://supcontent.gateway.com/support.gateway.com/s/Cases/shared/801082
6R/8010826R_USB.JPG

you'll see there is a missing hole. That's pin position 9. Although
there is some polarization here, it doesn't preclude you from sliding
the whole connector to the right but they you'd see a couple of nude
pins on the mobo's header. If you have 2 separate connectors going to
the mobo's USB headers, as in:

http://ak.buy.com/PI/0/500/215379016.jpg

Then it's up to you to get them polarized correctly. Also check the
position of the USBPWR jumper. That determines if the USB ports wake
up or not, so it's possible that "working for time" means until they
go to sleep and then they won't wake up. You want the USBPWR
jumper(s) set to enable the wake-up function; else, you need to
disable power management of the appropriate USB root hubs in Device
Manager. There may also be a USB Resume setting in the BIOS to have
the USB controller wake up from the S3/S4 low-power modes. I'd also
connect only one set of USB cables at a time from the mobo header.
That is, with the one 10-pin USB header connector or two 5-pin USB
header connectors on the mobo's USB header, pull the USB cable off the
slot card reader and check if the front case USB ports start working.

Since you were inside the case to replace the CPU and remove memory
modules, go check the cable connections are okay. You didn't say if
the USB ports were working or not BEFORE you dug inside the case to
replace the CPU.

I didn't replace the cpu ,, i did replace the power supply , but all this
was happening before i replaced the power supply.
I was careful when i uninstalled and reinstalled the power supply, taking
great care not to disturb any of the connections. I built this computer
myself, so i made sure that everything was in the right place before
running it back up after the replacement.

 

[VanguardLH]

Nothing has changed in regards to the way the usb ports are wired to the
mobo , this system has been in use now for 3-4 years with no problems and
the connections haven't been disturbed.

The sound was intermittant with both on board and the soundcard, doesn't
matter which is used, after a short time of use the sound will just drop.

So have you yet downloaded an ISO image of memtest, booted using it (so
NOTHING of your OS and its current configuration and its pollution of
software and drivers gets in the way), and then tested your memory? If
you have a bad memory module, who knows how the code corrupted stored in
and executed from bad memory will behave.

After verifying your memory tests okay, see if booting into Windows'
safe mode make the sound and USB behave properly. Could be you are
loading startup programs or services that are interferring with the use
of these hardware components.

 

[Char Jackson]

The sound was intermittant with both on board and the soundcard, doesn't
matter which is used, after a short time of use the sound will just drop.

Like someone else mentioned previously, I'd be suspicious of the
speakers by now, more so than the computer. Plug something else in,
like headphones, and see if they work.