computer won't turn on, motherboard doesn't respond to 'start' button being pressed

[sbeacher]

I came home Friday night to my computer off. I normally leave it on and let it hibernate or whatever. When I tried to turn it on the power button did nothing. Opened the case and my Maximus Hero VIII's LEDs are all on but the 'START' button (which is illuminated) does nothing. Other components in my system which have LEDs are lit (my Kraken X61 and my Grid+ V2) but the case fans don't work (and no case LEDs light up) and my GTX 980 lights don't illuminate (though I am not 100% sure if they would light up without the system being on anyhow)

My PSU (Seasonic X750) fans don't spin up at all but this PSU has like a hybrid mode where supposedly the fan only spins up when it needs it. But I would assume it would spin somewhat at start up?

So how do I troubleshoot this? Is this possibly a motherboard issue? I'd assume PSU but I'm confused because obviously some power is happening since the LEDs on stuff all light up.

This build is just over a year old with all new components except the 980 which was a few years older (and I've since removed it anyhow while testing) and had been running trouble free since I built it (nov 2015) I hadn't made any changes to anything lately. I've never had a build fail randomly like this so I'm not sure what to do or which components to suspect. I have an old alienware system that has a PSU in it but it's not modular and is connected to so many random things in that case that it would be quite a pain to get it out to check.

[sbeacher]

Alright, I have definitely cleared the CMOS and taken the memory out and tried one stick in each DIMM and nothing. Took the CMOS battery out for a while. When I hold the CMOS button down the LEDs turn off until I release it and then they light up again. I unplugged everything from the motherboard, all pcie and all usb2 and usb3 headers (my kraken no longer lights up as a result) The only thing I left plugged in was the CPU power and the 24 pin power and the fan header for the kraken on W_PUMP. And I did leave the m.2 SSD in the slot on the motherboard. My PSU fan does not spin when just plugged in to the motherboard. However, as I mentioned before if I short it with a paper clip it works and all the voltages are correct on my multimeter.


I live in Los Angeles. Lightning doesn't exist here. The computer is plugged into a Belkin surge protector (one of the more expensive ones)

Why do you guys think it's the PSU if the PSU passes all the other tests? I'm starting to suspect it's the motherboard.

I have a speaker on the way from amazon to plug into the motherboard to see if it beeps at all.

[JustinThyme]

Your best bet is to wait for the speaker to get the beep codes. Most of the time if you succeed with installing a jumper across the PSU power up pins and get volts out it's NOT the PSU. Nothing gets "Kick Started".*

There are actually a lot of causes that could stop your machine from posting, just have to narrow it down and sounds like you have a good start. *Could be ram, CPU or MOBO at this point. The beep codes are an invaluable tool. The newer boards with Qcodes are even better. You may not have lightning much in SoCal but having worked there in the Critical power industry there are plenty of grid issues! The grid wasn't planned out very well in its infancy and now there are just too many darn people there. I learned my lesson to stay off the freeway after getting stuck on the 405 and 5 more than once for hours on end and this was just congestion, no accidents. Only place I've been pulled over for going 75 in a 55 because I was going too slow and ticketed for "impeding the flow of traffic". Where I come from you go 20 over you are going to jail for wreck less driving. Not there! I was in the far right lane going 75 with cars blowing my doors off! Far left lane was approaching 100 mph. After all that I just stayed on local roads. No trouble and you actually get from A to B faster during peak traffic!

Good luck 🍀 *

[Alaxang]

JustinThyme wrote:
Your best bet is to wait for the speaker to get the beep codes. Most of the time if you succeed with installing a jumper across the PSU power up pins and get volts out it's NOT the PSU. Nothing gets "Kick Started".*

There are actually a lot of causes that could stop your machine from posting, just have to narrow it down and sounds like you have a good start. *Could be ram, CPU or MOBO at this point. The beep codes are an invaluable tool. The newer boards with Qcodes are even better. You may not have lightning much in SoCal but having worked there in the Critical power industry there are plenty of grid issues! The grid wasn't planned out very well in its infancy and now there are just too many darn people there. I learned my lesson to stay off the freeway after getting stuck on the 405 and 5 more than once for hours on end and this was just congestion, no accidents. Only place I've been pulled over for going 75 in a 55 because I was going too slow and ticketed for "impeding the flow of traffic". Where I come from you go 20 over you are going to jail for wreck less driving. Not there! I was in the far right lane going 75 with cars blowing my doors off! Far left lane was approaching 100 mph. After all that I just stayed on local roads. No trouble and you actually get from A to B faster during peak traffic!

Good luck �� *

Sorry for my poor English, maybe I shouldn't have use the word kick start on the motherboard. What I am sharing was my past experience with Seasonic X series PSU and the symptom TS is having is very similar that is why I am trying to show him the workaround. There is nothing wrong with his motherboard, it has something to do with the PSU capacitors.

The funny thing is when I brought the PSU to the distributor to RMA, they tested the PSU and there was no issue shown with their test kit but the moment I bring back the NEW PSU and plug in my system, I don't have the issue anymore haha. This issue had happened for 2 times (gaps between 6-8mth each) before the 3rd RMA PSU stop giving me this issue and lasted for 1yr and a half.


To TS: one simple test to try out if it is indeed the PSU that is the main culprit. - try to remove the power cord from the PSU and leave it unconnected for say 10-20min (objective is to drain any residue charges from the PSU capacitors). After that connect back the pwr cord and on the psu and try to press start on your casing ON button or start button from the motherboard - your system should be able to run but the same problem will still comes back after you shut down you system.

[XYchromosone]

JustinThyme wrote:
Your best bet is to wait for the speaker to get the beep codes. Most of the time if you succeed with installing a jumper across the PSU power up pins and get volts out it's NOT the PSU. Nothing gets "Kick Started".

The psu may still be the culprit even if the voltages are correct, it may be not able to put out enough current. And the kick start method mentioned does work under certain situations as explained by Alaxang. I actually have a maximus viii ranger with the same symptoms and the "kick start" method is the only way to start the system.

[karlkimpton87]

JustinThyme wrote:
Your best bet is to wait for the speaker to get the beep codes. Most of the time if you succeed with installing a jumper across the PSU power up pins and get volts out it's NOT the PSU. Nothing gets "Kick Started".*

There are actually a lot of causes that could stop your machine from posting, just have to narrow it down and sounds like you have a good start. *Could be ram, CPU or MOBO at this point. The beep codes are an invaluable tool. The newer boards with Qcodes are even better. You may not have lightning much in SoCal but having worked there in the Critical power industry there are plenty of grid issues! The grid wasn't planned out very well in its infancy and now there are just too many darn people there. I learned my lesson to stay off the freeway after getting stuck on the 405 and 5 more than once for hours on end and this was just congestion, no accidents. Only place I've been pulled over for going 75 in a 55 because I was going too slow and ticketed for "impeding the flow of traffic". Where I come from you go 20 over you are going to jail for wreck less driving. Not there! I was in the far right lane going 75 with cars blowing my doors off! Far left lane was approaching 100 mph. After all that I just stayed on local roads. No trouble and you actually get from A to B faster during peak traffic!

Good luck �� *

I just have same problem rgb come no fans no boot nothing check chip ie cpu pins etc my problem was cooler on to tight thats all i can say i took my chip out twice also left every unplugged for about 3 hrs as i was not happy at by this point but all is good apart from a error code i am now getting 9E

[sbeacher]

I have a Maximus VIII Hero, it is a newer board. Nothing shows up on the QCode LED. The lights that come on are the LEDs on back of the motherboard, the "START" and "RESET" buttons, and that animated LED on the heat sink that gets covered by the GPU (and that light does animate)

[sbeacher]

I tested the PSU under load (pluged the x61 directly into the PSU, the fans spun up and then I took readings on the 24 pin with the multimeter) Values are all within range.

Thinking it's the motherboard. If so this will be the 2nd Asus product I've had that's failed if (I had a router die) Now to wait another damn day for this motherboard speaker to show up.

[sbeacher]

Alright I tried a working PSU and still nothing. Took the entire motherboard out of the case in case something was shorting it somehow and put it on the box and same thing. Attached the cpu speaker I got and there are no beeps at all. I wasn't 100% sure which way to attach the speaker if the red wire goes to the thing marked "speaker" or the 5v line or what but I tried it both ways and still nothing.

HOWEVER, after I removed my cooler and my m.2 SSD and my processor I was trying to put the CPU cover back on I could not figure out how to get it to close with that stupid plastic cover that the motherboard came with which says on it "Save this if you need to return the board". I fiddled with it for 5 minutes or so and then gave up and took it off and realized trying to get that thing on that a bunch of the pins are now bent on the damn motherboard! Is ASUS going to deny my RMA because of the bent pins? I'm gonna be so mad if they do. I"ve spent a week without my computer cause of this crap. There is no instructions for how to put it back on and I couldn't figure out if it's supposed to be on top of it or underneath (I kept trying underneath)

I was pretty chill about this until now and if my RMA is denied as a result I am gonna be pissed.

[sbeacher]

Just contacted ASUS and they are telling me they'll repair the board for $153.30. It will cost me over $20 to ship it in. I think I paid $185 for this new. What a joke.

I am so mad, mostly at myself but also that there are no instructions on how to put that stupid socket cover back on. I now see you're supposed to just close the CPU lock and push it ON TOP but the thing is indented in such a way I just assumed you put it in as a placebo for the CPU and locked it into place.

And on top of that I wasted a whole week ordering a multimeter and a dumb motherboard speaker, neither of which helped really other than to confirm it was my motherboard which just died for no reason.

[sbeacher]

An update if anyone cares. I got a brand new motherboard and rebuilt my system and it works fine so it was definitely the motherboard. I didn't even have to reinstall windows (though I probably will at some point just to be safe) as it booted up fine. I was thinking I was going to have to boot into safe mode and try to remove drivers but everything worked. I had to reactivate windows, that was about it.

What do I do with the bad motherboard? Recycle it?