Or by only putting one stick of memory in, or changing the slot you’re using.

I was assembling a computer and everything seemed to be correct, the fan would spin up, I’d get some lights, but there was no image on the screen, not even the BIOS. I saw someone else make this suggestion and didn’t think it was likely to work, but it did. First I just tried one stick, and it booted. Then I tried both sticks and it didn’t work, but I reseated and then it did.

(Also worth pointing out that your motherboard should have diagnostic lights which if you check the documentation may point out which component has an issue)

Thinking about Lemmy’s demographics many here may have heard of something like this, or have more helpful suggestions about troubleshooting which would be welcome. But thought I’d write out a little post about my experience to contribute to Lemmy SEO supremacy.

  • Beamrunner_Ka-tet
    7•8 months ago

    Indeed. Every motherboard has a small speaker that will beep if a error is found. Usually you can find the beep error codes for a particular board online or in its manual. I think for mine its 4 fast beeps to let me know my ram is not seated properly.

    • @[email protected]
      9•8 months ago

      Every board does not have this feature, some newer ones do and for older ones you can buy a post beeper that inserts into a speaker slot. Your manual will tell you if you have one

        • TipponEnglish
          3•8 months ago

          Nope. A lot of them back then either had a small speaker in the box that you had to connect, or relied on the case speaker, and they just had the motherboard headers.

          I used to have a small collection of the speakers, because you could guarantee that the friend’s computer that you were repairing didn’t have a way for you to listen to the BIOS beeps :)

          • @[email protected]
            4•8 months ago

            Stand corrected, every motherboard I’d had experience with had it connected to a post buzzer.
            Never thought there be a case where it wouldn’t be included, as it was essential back then (I’m of the mind they still should, as well as power and activity leds, which seem to have disappeared from laptops)

            • TipponEnglish
              2•8 months ago

              Yeah, it’s one of those stupid things that hardly any manufacturers thought of. It probably saved them a few pennies per board though 🙄

              Considering how the BIOS beeps were the only way to know what had gone wrong, short of pulling components and testing, it was very shortsighted.

    • Ada
      8•8 months ago

      Unless you haven’t attached the CPU power cables, only the motherboard ones. In which case it will boot, the fans will spin up, the SSD will activate, but it won’t boot and it won’t beep.

      That was a fun one to diagnose :)