Hello. I want to preface this by stating that I am largely tech illiterate, but will do my best to describe the situation and the steps I've tried.
My system:
Crosshair VIII Hero (Wi-Fi)
AMD Ryzen 9 3900x
RX7800 XT
2x 16GB Corsair Vengeance DDR4 RAM
2x MP510 254GB M2 cards slotted in the motherboard
RM750x power supply
Two days ago I upgraded from a 3070 Ti to an RX7800 XT, which necessitated me moving into a new case because of the new GPU dimensions. The process went smoothly, by and large, with no issues powering everything up and purging the old drivers when making the transition to AMD. All seemed fine and the PC could be powered down normally the first night, but today (after a Windows update and shutdown) I had the following problem on startup:
Only one fan in the case began to spin. RGB lights on the RAM sticks and motherboard worked as normal. The board failed to boot, with the Q code 00 showing on the QLED.
After some googling for similar problems I tried the usual, including safe and slow modes, but was not able to reach BIOS. After some attempts at fixes, the fan would no longer spool and I noticed the red LED for CPU error was on. I attempted to reseat it with no issues, and the red LED has now gone away, but now I cannot power up the board at all.
I have tried the following steps:
- reseat CPU
- Clear CMOS
- Slow / Safe modes
- Disconnected all components except MB
- Cycled through single RAM sticks on the fourth slot (furthest from CPU)
- Removed MB from casing to check for grounding issues (no change)
Very crucially, a loose screw from the install did fall to the bottom of the case when removing the MB. I am somewhat terrified at the prospect of having short-circ'd either the board or the CPU, but the backlight on the power button and the various RGB element should suggest it is still getting power. I am vaguely certain the CPU has malfunctioned but I would like some opinions. As stated I am not a tech person, so any assistance would be beneficial before I attempt to try my next step, which would be finding a new CPU.
ADDENDUM:
I've reseated the CPU and tried to power up it and the MB with a single stick of RAM, and it does suffice to power all components (Except the GPU, whose fans do not spool up, but the lights do engage.) I instantly get Q-Code 00 with a yellow light (DRAM fault) and have since tried to cycle through six sticks of RAM, with no change. Also tried to reset CMOS.
Is the processor dead or is the motherboard messed up? Or am I missing something?
