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well, this is the first system i built entirely from scratch. i thought i had everything hooked up in place and ready to go. i plugged the power cord in and hit the power button. nothing.

well, i checked the obvious. the switch on back of the power supply was on, the ATX 20- pin connector was secure on the mobo. here is what i have:

Antec 1040B SOHO file server case w/ 400 watt power supply
Gigabyte GA-7DXR+

for the case & mobo. I have an Athlon XP 1700+ in it, with the stock AMD fan and heatsink for now. the only dip swich i changed is to set it from 100Mhz FSB (default) to 133 Mhz.

the power supply has about four or five 4-pin connector bundles, each having an extra 4-pin connector "down the line" so to speak, and i have each bundle separate, one to the HDD, one to the CDRW(which for now is also CD-Rom) and another to the 2 fans on the back of the case, which i assume i run them together and connect to one 4-pin connector.

anyway, i think i have all those connectors plugged in where they're suposed to be. i am down to 3 things right now that may be the problem:

1.) the power supply is bad. this i seriously doubt. i bought this case brand new. and while it has been known to happen, for now i just don't believe this is the problem. if there is any way for me to be able to plug just my power supply in and know if it is working or not, please let me know.

2.) maybe i got my 2x11 connectors wrong. i very rarely get these wrong, but this is the first time i have dealt with Antec/Gigabyte configuration, so i see some discrepancies in where they say i should put the connectors. the one i am concerned about is the 2- pin "power SW", but on the mobo, there are 3 places i can put this. i think i tried all 3, but did not work for either polarities. it is the green & black-wired connector, which is separate from the rest( led's and speaker connectors).

the Gigabyte manual for those 3 places does not say "power SW" there is GN for "green switch"(which i am thinking is the power switch) , there is GD in the manual for "green LED"(but on the actual circuit board in its place there is G+ on pin 1, and G- on pin 2, which kinda makes me think this might be a power switch, but probably not), and there is PW, for "soft power connector"

there will be 2 spaces empty after i plug in everything, so i am sure the power SW goes in one of those 3 previously mentioned. so i wonder, is the power SW polarity specific? does anyone know where it is supposed to go? it is just my gut feeling that everything is there and ready to go, i just don't have the power switch hooked up properly.

3.) something stupid and obvious i probably overlooked. hey, it happens. i had a very long day and i am quite distraught. only other thing i can think of is there is a 4-pin AGP pro connector on the mobo. i have not heard a lot about AGP pro until i read the manuals for my mobo. but i got a radeon 7500 in it right now, i don't think it is AGP pro, and is not necessary to plug in the 4-pin connector there where it reads AGP Pro.

if someone out there knows, or has got some kind of idea what might be keeping it from powering up, i would very much appreciate your input.

I would unplug and reseat the connector from the power supply to the mobo several times. I have had many times when it seemed like it was seated and nothing happened until I redid it numerous times. Another possibilty is that you have the mobo shorted out to the case somplace. You might try taking it out of the case and setting it up on the desk on top of an anti static bag and see if it will boot

i pulled the power connector sevreal times, and still get nothing.

but what you said about shorting to the case makes me feel kinda dumb. the case included a bag of screws and standoffs, i just pulled out what i thought i needed, never bothered to look at everything that was in there.

just a dumb question, since i am at a different location right now...

does the mobo mount directly to the metal standoffs, or are there some rubber/insulated material type washers in that little bag that i should put between?

i have changed out mobos before in some other cases, but i have never taken too much notice to the standoffs.

It seems unlikely by now that the power connector is still the problem, but you can try starting up the computer by touching the two pins with a screwdriver. That has helped me in the past, because I've had problems with bad switches (actual physical switch on the case), and this helps isolate the problem.

JMan

ANYTHING labelled + and - is an LED connector.

Where's your fan hooked up? 7DXR's have a CPU Guardian, where they don't boot unless a 3pin fan is connected to the CPU_FAN 3pin slot. You can turn it off too, check in your manual.

well, thanks for all you folks' input. i got it up and running now. what had happened is on the 2x11 pins, the power SW is supposed to go to "soft power connector" and not "green switch"

now all my fans, drives and LED's are working just fine.

one more thing, though. i read somewhere that the Athlon XP processors would run a bit hotter than the Classic Athlons. Mine is running at around 114 F, and i got 2 clean HDD's( 40 GB Western Digital caviar 7200 RPM) with no OS installed yet. i got the warning alert set to 146 F, i believe that is the lowest setting i could have in BIOS, but it seems to run stable at 114 F, it does not rise any after that. (so far)

i am using the stock AMD fan/heatsink, but i messed up the phase-change thermal pad that was on it, so i meticulously removed it from the CPU core and the heatsink. i may have scratched the bottom of the Heatsink, but i applied some generic (CompUSA brand) silver compound to the HS and CPU core. i rubbed it in real good to the HS and wiped away the excess, so it would fill in the scratches.

like i said before, the only switch i changed is from 100Mhz FSB to 133Mhz, but i believe this is where it is supposed to be set to for the Athlon XP 1700+ vCore is supposedly default at 1.79V

i am not gonna try and OC this CPU till i get a better Heatsink/fan and some name brand silver compound, i was just wondering if i can expect temps around 114 F to be normal.

also, the fan speed seems kinda low at around 4500 RPM.

i have a classic Athlon 950 with a KWI fan/heatsink that runs around 5400 RPM and the 950 has never gotten over 100 F, i have it slightly OC'ed running at 953 Mhz, but just because i had to manually adjust the Vcore and CPU ratio, i think i posted here about it before.


but i guess i can't expect too much from stock fan/heatsinks...

XPs are supposed to run cooler....Mine is running at 38C/100F at an idle but that is with MBM and MBM screws up so much stuff for my current mobo.

XP's run cooler than the Thunderbirds do... Mine is at 104 right now... 1700+ overclocked to 11x151 for 1.66 Gig...

i think probably it has to do with the temp sensor on my mobo. it is like a "tougue" (wire w/ plastic coating) that apparently is designed to make contact w/ my CPU. i am assuming my temps will read a bit higher than sensors that do not make direct contact w/ the CPU.

i just loaded windows xp, and the temps have not gone out of control. CPU temp has risen to about 118 F, but stayed stable there. i think it will be ok, but we'll see what happens when i load up some videos...

thanks all for your input.

Yes, you are correct. All Gigabyte boards have sensors like that,