A7V333-X Not posting after installing RAM

[todd]

Yet another strange and hopefully simple A7V problem, at least for me.

The system's about 18 months old and very reliable:

A7V333-X (no raid), Athlon XP2100, 256mb PC2700 RAM
BIOS current up to beta releases (about 4-months old)
128mb PCI video card
Win XP

I bought 512 megs of ram (PNY), came home, opened the box and added the
RAM in the second ram slot, went to boot up and nothing...green light
on the mboard was on, hard-drives didn't spin up, no voice message, no
display, etc. Pulled the new ram out and put the system back to it's
original config and get the same: nothing.

The part that's odd for me is that 1.) I've never had a problem with
this computer, period. This thing has been bullet-proof, and 2.) when I
unplug the ribbon cable to the hard-drive, the drive spins up fine.

I obviously am no genius and am hoping this is something at least
relatively simple. I've been reading quite a bit about other's similar
experiences, but it seems to me that this is directly related to my
adding ram. I'm planning on stripping everything down to a basic
benchtest later this evening.

Any ideas?

Thank you.

 

[Roger Hamlett]

Yet another strange and hopefully simple A7V problem, at least for me.

The system's about 18 months old and very reliable:

A7V333-X (no raid), Athlon XP2100, 256mb PC2700 RAM
BIOS current up to beta releases (about 4-months old)
128mb PCI video card
Win XP

I bought 512 megs of ram (PNY), came home, opened the box and added the
RAM in the second ram slot, went to boot up and nothing...green light
on the mboard was on, hard-drives didn't spin up, no voice message, no
display, etc. Pulled the new ram out and put the system back to it's
original config and get the same: nothing.

I'm hoping to hell, that the 'green light', was _not_ on when you inserted
the RAM?. ATX PC's, are _not_ switched off, when they have been turned off
by the OS, but require the machine is switched off at the wall, or
unplugged when working inside...

The part that's odd for me is that 1.) I've never had a problem with
this computer, period. This thing has been bullet-proof, and 2.) when I
unplug the ribbon cable to the hard-drive, the drive spins up fine.

I obviously am no genius and am hoping this is something at least
relatively simple. I've been reading quite a bit about other's similar
experiences, but it seems to me that this is directly related to my
adding ram. I'm planning on stripping everything down to a basic
benchtest later this evening.

Any ideas?

Thank you.

Hopefully, if the green light was off, what has happened, is that the
board has 'bent' when inserting the RAM. The force needed on some RAM
sockets is enough to bend the PCB, and may cause other modules to come
loose. If the green light was on, then the machine may have been killed.
The first situation, is why I often take boards out of the casing to add
RAM. It depends on how tight the sockets are, but on some boards it is the
only way to get the modules to properly make contact.

Best Wishes

 

[tod]

I'm hoping to hell, that the 'green light', was _not_ on when you inserted
the RAM?. ATX PC's, are _not_ switched off, when they have been turned off
by the OS, but require the machine is switched off at the wall, or
unplugged when working inside...

Hopefully, if the green light was off, what has happened, is that the

board has 'bent' when inserting the RAM. The force needed on some RAM

sockets is enough to bend the PCB, and may cause other modules to come
loose. If the green light was on, then the machine may have been killed.
The first situation, is why I often take boards out of the casing to add
RAM. It depends on how tight the sockets are, but on some boards it is the
only way to get the modules to properly make contact.

Best Wishes

Hey Roger, thanks for responding. I recall having had to use some force
to get the ram in because the socket was pretty tight which surprised
me. As far as the green light being "on", I'm afraid that in all
likelihood it was when I added the ram. I thought with the machine
off...I must have been awful lucky in the past: I've added cards-even
ram-and whatnot with no problem by just powering down the box. Looks
like I'm due for an upgrade then?

Thanks once again.