PC Building Thread

[Icemanbrfc]

You should look into that noise at startup. Commonly it's the PSU that's old and busted, but there could be other causes.

As for upgrades, you are limited. Given the GPU, it sounds like this is a Core i3-530 or thereabouts. There are cheap upgrades available to Core i5 and Core i7 chips, but the age of your motherboard will dictate if it's going to handle the increased power draw at this stage of its life. BIOS updates will also determine how well upgrading it will go.

The easier upgrades are RAM, to 8GB or 16GB (if compatible), as well as an SSD.

If you want better advice, download Speccy, and then click File > Save snapshot, and upload that file here.

Have an Asus LGA 1151 board. 4GB DDR4 ram, Nvidia GTX 660, and a 256GB SSD

Problem now is that the noise is gone, but getting no picture. Monitor is in Power saving mode, and no idea how to get it out of it.

I tried resetting the bios by removing the battery on the board, swapped the ram into different slots etc, but no dice with picture. Any idea what the issue might be?

 

[biometrics]

Have a Asus LGA 1151 board. 4GB DDR4 ram, Nvidia GTX 660, and a 256GB SSD

Problem now is that the noise is gone, but getting no picture. Monitor is in Power saving mode, and no idea how to get it out of it.

I tried resetting the bios by removing the battery on the board, swapped the ram into different slots etc, but no dice with picture. Any idea what the issue might be?

Does it have an onboard display? If so then remove the 660 and use that first.

 

[Icemanbrfc]

Does it have an onboard display? If so then remove the 660 and use that first.

Yes i tried both onboard and the gfx card.. monitor still shows me power saving or energy saving mode...

 

[CataclysmZA]

Unplug and remove the GTX 660, and unplug any hard drives and other peripherals from the motherboard, and plug the monitor into the onboard display out. Leave only the keyboard plugged in. If it boots, one of the things you've unplugged is the issue.

If that doesn't work, you have one of four problems:

1) You don't know where the sound came from (in which case you need to check all the fans to see if they are running)

2) You potentially have a suspect power supply (in which case you might have to use a spare to connect to the PC to test)

3) You might have a dead motherboard. It's LGA1151, which isn't too old, but Skylake chips are bound to start failing now.

4) You might have faulty RAM (in which case you need spare DDR3 to test with)

I would also pick up a torch and visually inspect the motherboard to see if things are fine and nothing has blown.

 

[BloodrayneZA]

evetech is actually more expensive than wootware on all the components i'm looking at

Did find these guys for the cpu:

AMD Ryzen 5 3600 processor 3.6 GHz 32 MB L3 Box (100-100000031BOX)

AMD Ryzen 5 3600 processor 3.6 GHz 32 MB L3 Box 100-100000031BOX - Our price (net): R 1,482.49. The best prices only at Senetic

www.senetic.co.za

R3545 AMD CPU Ryzen 5 3600

Make no mistake - I know the owner of Wootware and their support staff is amazing. I had to buy parts to fix a friend's laptop and I asked the support guy to help me out as it was rather urgent and I didn't have time to sit and research the best possible parts to replace in her laptop. Fantastic service and fast too. She needed a new hard drive and DVD drive as well. They were really helpful.

 

[BloodrayneZA]

Yes i tried both onboard and the gfx card.. monitor still shows me power saving or energy saving mode...

either the cable or the GFX card.

4) You might have faulty RAM (in which case you need spare DDR3 to test with)

You usually can hear a continous beep at regular intervals if the ram isn't working (that's if the onboard speaker is there) (I''m deaf so I have a led blinker for it instead of a speaker)

Not sure why its making some crappy sound at start up. Thinking either fans or something else causing the noise, dust or something..

What kind of noise is it? does it sound like a grinding noise or something tapping?

 

[CataclysmZA]

You usually can hearing a continous beep at regular intervals if the ram isn't working (that's if the onboard speaker is there) (I''m deaf so I have a led blinker for it instead of a speaker)

Most boards since the Ivy Bridge era have dropped the on-board speaker, so you wouldn't know how it was posting unless trial and error gives you a clue. OP has a Skylake platform, so in this case when there's a RAM issue the system will do nothing and the fans will continue to spin. That's the same behaviour for other issues like a dying CPU though, so it doesn't really help either way.

This is why post codes are nice, but no-one builds those displays into cheap boards anymore. MSI's EZ Debug helps a lot in that regard, even if it doesn't tell me at what stage it stopped.

 

[Y2K]

back in my day i worked for IBM in London for 3yrs
aaah those were the days
i Coined it as people thought the sky was gonna fall on their heads because of Y2K

came home after that all in May 2000 and bought a house in Gordons Bay cash in my twenties

But Im not into IT anymore because Im sick and tired of fixing other peoples problems because they are stupid people

What do you do now?

 

[BloodrayneZA]

What do you do now?

He drinks himself into a coma every night

 

[BloodrayneZA]

Most boards since the Ivy Bridge era have dropped the on-board speaker, so you wouldn't know how it was posting unless trial and error gives you a clue. OP has a Skylake platform, so in this case when there's a RAM issue the system will do nothing and the fans will continue to spin. That's the same behaviour for other issues like a dying CPU though, so it doesn't really help either way.

This is why post codes are nice, but no-one builds those displays into cheap boards anymore. MSI's EZ Debug helps a lot in that regard, even if it doesn't tell me at what stage it stopped.

Yeah but I had the same issue with my GPU and turned out I forgot to plug the power into the card. Lol. It does that as well

 

[Icemanbrfc]

Sigh, thanks guys. Will unplug everything and see. This is my boys machine, and he is one pretty sad lad. I dont have the cash to get a new one, so im hoping its just something small

Wasnt going to ask, but any good spare sparts you might have laying around, not being used, please pm. I can see what i can salvage or do to make the kid happy again

 

[Icemanbrfc]

Looks like it might be motherboard or PSU. Had a Burning smell.

 

[Papa Smurf]

What do you do now?

Retired Porn Star

 

[slayer]

Retired Porn Star

And transitioned to fluffer..

Last Post Wins, winner

 

[Y2K]

Evetech and titan-ice.. Just hope you don't run into issues that require after sales support from evetech.. very much hit and miss on after sales support..

Last Post Wins, winner

Do not buy from Evetech, they do not honour warranties. Rather stick to Wootware/Takealot etc. I've had several clients burned by them already.

 

[Prom]

AMD's stock thermal paste is actually of a high quality. You'd have to be spending serious money to get better performance out of an aftermarket paste, and at that point you might as well be buying a tower cooler instead.

It's not the paste but the application. It's more like a blanket and I always have to remove it sooner rather than later. I've never seen a review that can prove which paste is best. Really it's not about spending money. Just get some Unick rather than all these expensive brands that only come in a single gram and it will last a lifetime.

 

[CataclysmZA]

I've never seen a review that can prove which paste is best.

It becomes nebulous when you're reviewing high-end pastes on a Noctua D14 or a 240mm AIO, but there is a big difference between cheap and expensive pasts. Higher quality thermal paste doesn't trap heat and transfers it very efficiently. Cheaper paste can increase temperatures on the order of 5-10 degrees.

The chemical composition is also a concern with cheaper pastes. At high heat loads the silicon in most cheaper pastes breaks down, trapping more heat over time. More expensive pastes have a longer lifetime, and most stock pastes are designed for a useable lifespan of 10 years.

Just get some Unick rather than all these expensive brands

Unick

Temperature range: -200°C to 130°C
Thermal conductivity: 0.9W⁄mK

Yikes, that is weak stuff for CPU applications. My tube of Cooler Master IC Value had a rating of 1.89W/mK, and only cost me R40. Better stuff like a 40G tub of Ice Fusion V2 is 5.0W/mK (which AMD uses on their stock coolers), and that's still on the cheap end of pastes (and more expensive than Intel's stuff, which is around 2.5W/mK). Unick would definitely be a bad choice for high-end applications like on a 9900K or 3950X.

 

[Prom]

It becomes nebulous when you're reviewing high-end pastes on a Noctua D14 or a 240mm AIO, but there is a big difference between cheap and expensive pasts. Higher quality thermal paste doesn't trap heat and transfers it very efficiently. Cheaper paste can increase temperatures on the order of 5-10 degrees.

The chemical composition is also a concern with cheaper pastes. At high heat loads the silicon in most cheaper pastes breaks down, trapping more heat over time. More expensive pastes have a longer lifetime, and most stock pastes are designed for a useable lifespan of 10 years.


Unick

Temperature range: -200°C to 130°C
Thermal conductivity: 0.9W⁄mK

Yikes, that is weak stuff for CPU applications. My tube of Cooler Master IC Value had a rating of 1.89W/mK, and only cost me R40. Better stuff like a 40G tub of Ice Fusion V2 is 5.0W/mK (which AMD uses on their stock coolers), and that's still on the cheap end of pastes (and more expensive than Intel's stuff, which is around 2.5W/mK). Unick would definitely be a bad choice for high-end applications like on a 9900K or 3950X.

And that is where I am skeptical. When a "high end" paste claims to be 11W/mK but doesn't function any better than the weak stuff. I have seen it amongst tests with no discernible difference and having used it myself for over 20 years can say there is none and it is just as good. I do not believe these tests and claims to be in any way scientifically done. I have found dust to have a far bigger impact and simply cleaning fans breathes new life into a cooler, but I replace the paste in any case as it's easier to do.

Btw this is used where no fans are present in almost every piece of electronics you can find. If it was really worse than the high end stuff things like power regulators would not survive.

 

[BloodrayneZA]

I have found dust to have a far bigger impact and simply cleaning fans breathes new life into a cooler, but I replace the paste in any case as it's easier to do.

Bingo, you hit the nail on the head.

Dust is the biggest killer of electronics as the shit piles on and acts like a blanket to retain heat. People need to have their PC's cleaned out at least once or twice a year. I do that to mine and I've had my PC for 11 years now (Sandybridge, never felt the need to upgrade).

 

[satanboy]