A2 Ide Detect Q-code and Boot device LED lit solid maximus VII

[awesome14]

I have a Maximus VII Ranger, i7-4790K, 32 GB Kingston Fury DDR3 PC-12800, EVO 212 air, (2) Crucial P5 1.0 TB on dual NVME PCIe 3.0 at 8x bifurcation board by Startech, Quadro K4200, Segotep 650W Gold, Pioneer CD/DVD, cpu fan on motherboard header and Linux Debian 11 Bullseye.

The system worked for years. Then, I had to pull the dual NVME PCIe card to install (4) USB2 off mobo to rear panel. I accidentally forgot to reinstall the dual NVME card, started the system, and it has had no video since then, even after reinstalling NVME board. Worrisome is that trying to reinstall BIOS with BIOS Flashback yields less than 1 minute of blinking green flashback LED, and then perpetual solid green.

I believe the mobo LED is supposed to turn off when the BIOS Flashback is complete, and this requires several minutes. I have also heard that the BIOS Flashback should be done only without the cpu installed. I know it will work without a cpu installed, but I've used BIOS Flashback on other boards, with an installed cpu, and it works. I also was not able to confirm it in any documentation.

I'm thinking, after reading about this problem, and several other Q-codes, and having reset the bios, that the BIOS cannot recognize the bifurcation card as a boot device from a fresh reset. Although it has in the past without adjusting settings, it wasn't from a reset. I'm reticent to start randomly applying fixes others have found useful, because my lifetime is finite, and I have some other things I might want to do during the next 50-60 years.

The guys on this board have seen so much more than I ever will, I humbly submit my problem to them. I need video back to do anything. I can try to connect to hdmi, using DP presently. Or, a more likely solution would be to pull the boot drive off the dual NVME board, and stick it on a single NVME board. But I have a bootable installation DVD in the optical drive, and the system obviously can't find that.

Based on your experience, what would be my next move? I really appreciate the help. I'm open to any ideas. Thanks.

Update: 01/30/2022 The dual NVMe bifurcation PCIe card (basically a dual NVMe adapter with a very fast switch (4000Mhz)), https://www.startech.com/en-us/hdd/pex8m2e2 had nothing to do with the problem, nor did practically anything else I mentioned before.

The Q-Codes were all red herring! But, when I nudged the HSF up a tiny bit, the Q-codes changed, telling me there was a problem with the CPU socket. Careful inspection revealed a bent pin, which I bent back with a USB microscope and a dental tool. After reassembly, the system came right up into the BIOS setup.

I was using onboard HDMI video, so I had changed the video cable. Then I put everything back the way it was originally, before the problem occurred, with the Quadro K4200 board. No video! So I tried the board in a different PC. It worked! The problem was not the video board. But the monitor at the other machine used DVI-D.

So I ran a 15' DP cable from the other machine to the monitor for the broken machine, so I could check the DP ports on the card under test. They were good. Then, the shorter DP cable I had been doing the testing with could be bad, or it could be something else! So I installed the the Quadro K4200 in the machine under test, swapped the cable with another one I had, and the problem vanished.!

I do not relish PC problems. But I am used to them, because, for me, it's always easier, less time consuming and less expensive to do a repair, if it's an easy one. Same with everything. If I lose a power supply in my HDTV, I look online for info, and do the repair, if there is one. Otherwise, I'll just take a LOOK around and see if there's anything obvious going wrong, like bulged/leaky caps!

I don't do electronics repair for a living, but it's still worthwhile to know, especially with PCs. I was just soldering on a Z97 board a few weeks ago. It's worth it to test the caps, which is generally the problem with dead boards showing no physical trauma.

So, the main problem was a bad video cable. No glory for me on this one.

[STARRAIN_ROG]

Hi awesome14,
Please refer to the following link for boot qled.
https://www.asus.com/support/FAQ/1042678/
If you remove all SSD or HDD, does it show bios utility on the monitor?
Thank you.

[awesome14]

I removed the motherboard, removed the CPU, and found a bent pin. After delicately bending it back, and putting everything back together, minus the video card (using onboard video) it fired right up. I also replaced the bios chip. But I think now the other one was OK. I purchased the MOBO off eBay, with the CPU installed.

As I was testing I pushed up gently on the HSF, and the q-codes changed. That clued me in to the CPU socket. But, sometimes disconnecting the MOBO and reseating the memory and CPU takes care of problems like mine. I also blessed the board with Holy Water, and said a short prayer. Desperate times call for desperate measures! Now I'll put it all back in the case and see what happens.

I'll probably make one more update. BTW, for bending pins, a USB microscope and dental tool work great. I've heard the pins are easy to break.

[xeromist]

Thanks for reporting back! I bet the Ebay seller was having problems and decided to pawn the system off on someone else. Good for you finding the problem and fixing it. Turn a scam into a working system.

[awesome14]

Thanks for the vote of confidence. The whole ball of wax was a bent cpu-socket pin, and a bad video cable. Don't forget the small stuff. Any time the video is out, it could be the cable. So, I'm a bit embarrassed, because I overthought the whole thing. With a a PC it can be literally anything.