Thanks for the suggestion. I didn't realise that and thought it would just lose the time and CMOS settings if the battery was dead. Anyway, I've tested it and it's OK so it's not that. EDIT: Just tested the DDR3 in my other board as well and that booted fine. In fact that board even powers-up OK without any RAM installed, so I don't think it can be a RAM problem causing the Biostar boards not to power-up.
don't let the lack of onboard IDE stop you from getting the board you want you can add a PCI IDE card pretty cheap to run legacy hardware on a modern board
I would just shy away from the Biostar boards I myself used to use them they were hard to beat features vs price compared to others but I started seeing a lot of issues with them and stopped using them I have been using Asrock boards now and loving them... why not switch to SATA drives?
Yeah, after this experience I'm not keen to try them again. I've ordered the Gigabyte GA-880GM-D2H from Amazon for £51 now.
Yeah, I flippin well hope so. I was hoping to get this finished for my brother for his birthday on 1 September but he's going to have to wait a bit longer now thanks to this setback.
OK, so I got the Asrock 880GMH/U3S3. I've just tested it with only the CPU and RAM and when pressing the power button (connected to the header, there's no on-board buttons) the PSU and CPU fans spin up for a couple of seconds but then spin down again. It seems like it's tripping out for some reason. I don't think there's any problem with the CPU or RAM as I've been using them on another board, so I wonder if there's an issue with the PSU but I tested that with another board a few weeks ago and that was fine, so I don't really know what's up.
It should be PSU... I haven't read whole thread.. but that it should be PSU was written in 3rd or 4th post. blown PSU without load or with small load works sometimes... also check if you assembled everything properly... is the board new?
Yeah, I kinda hope it's the PSU as I've had trouble finding a motherboard with the connectors and slots I need for this build and I'd be really unlucky to have three bad motherboards in a row! This board was unused, sealed box but bought on e-bay so I don't have a warranty unfortunately, so that's another reason why I hope it's the PSU!
Seems it is the PSU. With my Antec PSU, the CPU fan stays on, even without any RAM in the board, so it seems the OCZ PSU managed to die in between moving the system from the bench into the case. I'll have to double-check whether the original MB is actually faulty or not but I don't think the CPU fan was coming on even briefly with that, so it probably is.
Well to be fair, you said when you had a problem it was the PSU. I had no reason to suspect my PSU as it had been working fine the day before and it worked fine when I tested it on another board and I had some reason to suspect the motherboard, as it already had a fault in the onboard power button/front panel header area. Anyway, got there in the end (hopefully nothing else is wrong!). Just need to wait for the Seasonic G-360 to be available in the UK, as that looks like a far more reliable PSU than this OCZ (or anything else in the same price range).
old one should be easily repairable.. seems like just one or few capacitors are blown... thing is "short power on" comes when without load PSU thinks that everythings fine and when you turn on the machine it detects power surge(some components uses too much power) and electronics responsible for security(well, that it won't burn down the house) cuts off power. as it can power up it shouldn't be +12V and that means that the problem should be in +5 or +3.3V filtering capacitors(well, it still can be in +12V but not it standby ouptut). new capacitor costs about 30pence in UK. P.S. inner power button and case power button do the same thing in the same place(by schematics, at least they should do by my technical logic)... just mobo has output for case button connector... so that it was PSU it was known from the very start(I should've check this thread earlier haha ) and seems that it was alive. (mobo) I personally use 350W chinese PSU(took out from cheap case) it had blown caps, but changed them and it works for half year.. if not more, for some clients for whom changed repaired PSUs are working more than 2yrs already and none of repaired PSUs returned.. So don't waste money if you have minimal soldering experience.