Not getting any power on a first build

[Thengamer]

Hi everyone! This will be my first built computer if I can get it to work. My parts finally arrived today and I immediantly started to put it together. After some slight confusion with the power cables I think I finally got it all together. Unfortunatly when I plug in the computer and press the power button I don't get any response. None of my fans turn on (including the fan in the psu) and I don't get any beeps or visuals. The only indicator I get is the light on the motherboard lights up. Any ideas on what I could do or what could be the matter?

For referance, my specs:

• The Case - Thermaltake SHARK VA7000BWA Black Aluminum ATX Full Tower Computer Case
• The PSU - Antec TRUEPOWERII TPII-550 ATX12V 550W Power Supply
• The Motherboard - ASUS A8N5X Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 ATX AMD Motherboard
• The CPU - AMD Athlon 64 3700+ San Diego 1GHz HT Socket 939 Processor Model ADA3700BNBOX
• The Video Card - eVGA 256-P2-N516 Geforce 7800GT CO SE 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 Video Card
• The RAM - A-DATA Vitesta 2GB (2 x 1GB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM System Memory
• The HDD - Western Digital Caviar SE16 250GB 3.5" SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
• DVD Drive - LITE-ON Black IDE DVD Burner Model SHW160P6S05
• Floppy Drive - SONY Black 1.44MB 3.5" Internal Floppy Drive Windows 98SE/ ME/ 2000/ XP
• Operating System - Microsoft Windows XP Home With SP2

Thanks.

[bailey]

double check the connectors from the front of the case to the motherboard, sometimes its hard to get them on the correct pins.

[freakitchen]

After doing what bailey suggested, follow the steps in this thread

http://forum.pcmech.com/showthread.php?t=132409

Also make sure you connect the 4pin 12v Aux power connector to the motherboard, it's easily missed, and required in addition to the main 24 pin connector.

FK

[Thengamer]

Thanks for the replies. After further investigation I did miss a cable at the front of the case. Once it was plugged in I tried turning on the computer and got some success and some more problems.

The good news:
- The computer is starting, I'm getting a display, my cpu fan is spinning and the computer is picking up my hard drive and floppy drive.

The bad news:
- I am getting a warning on the startup screen saying my cpu fan is spinning to slowly, but that I can fix it in setup.
- The motherboard is not picking up my dvd drive, which as far as I can tell is all plugged in.
- None of the fans in my case are spinning. I'm not sure why, they have been plugged into the motherboard and power supply.

Some success and some failures. Any ideas?

[glc]

Plug all fans except the CPU fan directly into the power supply, do not connect them to the motherboard. The motherboard's ability to power fans is limited. Check the DVD drive's cabling and jumpering. Blue end of cable to the motherboard, black end to the drive, jumper CS.

[Thengamer]

Update. I've successfully gotten the cpu fan to work correctly. I had it in the wrong plug. My fans are kind of working, when I first turn on the computer they don't work however if I tap one of them it starts spining but it seems too slow. Any ideas?

I can't figure out the DVD drive. When I start up the floppy is being recognized as the secondary IDE Slave. My hard drive is being recognized. The problem is that my DVD drive still isn't being recognized. I've tried switching the cables with no luck.

Help would be very appreciated. Thanks.

[Thengamer]

You ever feel like you fix one thing and brake another. I'm not sure how I did it but in the process of fixing the DVD drive I somehow screwed up the floppy drive.

Here is how it stands:
-The hard drive is hooked up and working.
-The computer powers on and I get a display with one beep.
-The DVD drive is working and the Primary IDE Master.

-The floppy drive is not showing up on the screen.
-My case fans are still not working on there own.

Thanks for all the help. Any suggestions?

[Thengamer]

I think I've got everything working...except the fans in the case. For some reason they won't start spinning on their own when I power up. If I give the fan a little jump start it will spin, though it seems really slow.

I've plugged in the fan cords to the "Fan Only" power cord, I've also plugged in the fans to the motherboard via the "CHA2_FAN" and the "CHA1_FAN". The fans just won't seem to work correctly.

I'm out of ideas. Anyone else have any?

[Kareeser]

Try all the fans you have with the "Fan Only" cord. That might help us determine which component is at fault, fan, PSU, or motherboard.

[Thengamer]

I've tried each of the two fans seperatly and I can get the back fan to start spinning if I give it a nudge but I can't get the front fan to spin. When I first power up the back fan moves a little as if it is trying to start but it doesn't.

In case this might help, here is my case:


I can get the fan on the left side to spin but not the fan on the right.

[glc]

You need to use adapters if necessary to connect the fans to a standard 4 pin Molex from the power supply, not the little 2 or 3 pin connectors.

[freakitchen]

The Thermaltake Shark case has standard fans that connect directly to the power supply. The small 3 pin connector that they have in addition, simply connects to the motherboard to monitor the speed of the fans.

You're connecting the fans to the "fan only" power connector on your power supply, correct? Try connecting the fans to a standard molex connector and see if they fire up.

FK

[glc]

Then don't connect the 3 pin connectors to the motherboard - the motherboard may be controlling the speed thermostatically and they won't start till things warm up.

[Parker03GT]

Would this be an issue that he/she could call Thermaltake and ask when the fans should start spinning? Upon startup or after the cpu has been running for a few minutes?

[freakitchen]

If the fans are being controlled, then it's your motherboard that's causing the issue and not the fans themselves.

The only way to test this, is to start the system without the 3-pin connectors connected.

FK

[Thengamer]

Thanks to all of you I finally have my computer up and running! GLC, you were right about me using the wrong connectors. Upon trying the normal power cords I was successful.

Again, thanks for all the help! If I need further assistance with my computer I'll be sure to check with you guys. Thanks again!

[Thengamer]

Well I'm back with some more questions. Hopefully these are simple but maybe not. First off, I added both a dvd drive and another hard drive to the computer. Both of them were old and had been used in a previous Gateway computer. My new computer won't even pick up the second dvd drive and although the hard drive is detected it freezes the computer when trying to open windows.

A few things:
-The hard drive is a maxtor drive that requires a ribbon, whereas my new western digital required the sata cable.
-The old hard drive has not been formatted, do I need to do that and if so how?
-My second dvd drive is on cable select and the ribbon feeds from motherboard to old dvd drive to the new dvd drive. The ribbon is also going into the secondary IDE.

I'm not sure why this isn't working. If anyone has any ideas please let me know!