I've been posting on another forum but really then haven't been able to help not sure if anyone can here.

Ok I'll try the short version.

I got a quadcore CPU AMD 965BE needed to do a bios update to mobo to get it running and that went ok installed CPU and picked it up fine.

So I ordered a new PSU xenta or as on the PSU CCIVO 900watt (80bronze plus) had a million cables on it and they stretched a mile which was perfect for my new darkfleet case as its HUGE x2 bigger than a standard case.

So I installed new mobo, with new psu and new CPU....went to do a fresh install of windows and everytime it stopped at 20% on quick format same with full format....after an hour of messing about swapping parts I mamaged to get windows XP installed but it took about an 1.5 hours....so I then went to wipe it and install 7 but that locks up at 12% everytime.

So I took 2 HD's and used them on my sons AM2 board not problems formatting them with XP and installing went well.

So I thought perhaps because I had flashed teh bios in some way I messed the board up but it has duel bios incase you mess the main on up so I though um strange.

So I ordered a new board wich is AM3 and DDR 3 they came on saturday so I installed them today and the fecking board is shit....put in my AM3 cpu all the bits etc powered the board it reset 3 secs after then again and again kept reseting one after another.

So I tried the 2x2gig DDR 3 sticks in different slots and didn't work all the board did was power up the CPU fan but wouldn't post the screen stayed blank. I had all the PSU power bits in the correct place the main one and this board also uses 2x 4 pin which were in as well.

So I left that and tried my old PSU on the new board and it did the same with that....so I tried the old PSU after all this on my old board and tried to install windows and it formatted the HD's and installed XP no problems at all.

So well I have asked the companyI got the parts from to RMA them and asked for a refund on the PSU and a replacement of the same board...I just need to contact them now to get a RMA number but that wont be while tomorrow.

Just wondering if someone could throw some advice to me about what could be wrong with the new mobo and PSU.

I didn't have any other DDR 3 ram to try other than what came with it and I did think that maybe the board did't like that but would it still post boot at least to get into the bios?

I didn't get any ram that was rec'd on the Gigabyte site as its was expensive.

As for the PSU being like it is the only reference I could find on Google was that it maybe faulty as the guy reporting another PSU not mine said that the persons had brought it into his shop and windows was on a go slow not reponding right etc etc had a problem installing a new op etc....PSU they had in it was 700watt and brandnew....the guy tried a different PSU and everything was great he put it down to a faulty PSU so they went out and got another one antec or something and he installed that and there were no problems.

So I can think of only 2 things PSU hates my mobo or PSU is faulty.

I'm a bit worried because they send them away for testing and I dont want them saying they are working ok making me look a fool. because they are no good to me they dont work tried and tested.

I have had a lot of problems with DDR3 and mainboards not working properly without fucking around with the voltages and speeds. At the moment I'm running an Asus board that is supposed to take 1600 speed ram but I can only run it at 1333 with a lot of tuning and fucking about with the voltages. Took me the better part of 2 nights to get it stable. At first I thought the bridge that runs your sata controller sounds fubared but after trying a second board it definitely sounds similar to a lot of the speed and voltage problems I had with the DDR3. Even at the boards defaults I had trouble so I would star there.

A good indicator actually if you can get windows in, is to keep an eye on the logs in administrative tools. It'll tell you if an ATA controller is fucking up which is hard to diagnose outside of the logs. If you see a lot of just weird random screwups and you know the hard drive is good then it usually points to ram or a controller on the board being the cause.

Make sure to run memtest and hdat or the hard drive manufacturers test to verify all is well with your individual bytes.


I'm sure harryb will chime in with his comp sci version but I hope you get the jist and this helps.

with it hanging it could he bios setings for the sata, depnding in which mode you have it you may need to load the drivers for the sata controller. (f6 to load driver)
if you have a seperate graphics card and it's faulty, that would do it also. my billing pc graphics card was going and this morning it was off so when I booted it it would hand in bios. when I used the onboard graphics it wouldn't boot at all, when I put in a new graphics card all was fine.

hat's not to exclude the boards having a bug.
there was a period when a whole batch of msi gm boards had a problem which is why I stopped using msi.

if all parts excluding the mobo,work fine in another pc, then I'd have to say it's the mobo. or a bios setting in the mobo.
what was the sata settings? native? compatiability? achi?

I only use gigabyte boards not saying there are better ones out there just that I haven't really come across problems with mine over the years.

The AM2+/AM3 Ready board I am using now is MA770-UD3 version 1.

Since I put the old PSU back in the board seems to like it and its always worked fine with it. infact I am installing win7 on it as we speak and its going well. it was working great before hand so doesn't seem to me a problem now its as 47% expanding windows so hope it goes well.

As you said harryb all my parts are working ok I'm lucky enough to have a few other desktops to play around with to test other stuff out.

As for this new Mobo I got on saturday the AM3 one it is DDR 3 and I ordered some cheap shit ram £30 for 4 gig of DDR3 so it could be that my brother has a gig of corsair ram I'm going to borrow tomorrow I'm sure he has some other ram as well I might borrow a stick of that and try.

As said though this new mobo I can't get any farther than the mobo powering up and starting the CPU fan other than that its a blank screen on the monitor I tried the ram I had in different slots not difference.

Just wondering if there is no ram in the mobo or the mobo doesn't like the ram should it still post boot into bios? or will it stay as I said blank screen?

The other thing was does my PSU sound faulty ot might it be that my old mobo doesn't like it? because as said it powers it up no problem but when it comes to installing windows it locks any hardrive up at 20% format?

It sounds either faulty to me or can PSU be incompatable with certain makes of board?

even with bad memory it should post unless it's really bad then no post.
if it works wih other memory (better brand) then it could just be the ram. I tried to use some shit avant ram and it wouldn't post at all, put in kingston, corsair, yada yada and it booted fine.have you tried wih only one stick of the cheapo ram?
it could be a mem stick with a bad module or register.

Yeah I did try that 1 stick on all 4 slots and then the other. I'll get the other ram from my brother tomorrow and test that see if it works.

I did read some reviews about the ram and people were buying said it was great but no mention of what boards they had tried it in.

I did read out of 6 reviews of this board that 1 person posted that he had 3 bad batches in a row 4th one was working great so maybe they sent a bad batch. I'll post back here once I have had the chance to check.

I apologies for the really bad typo's I'm typing on a laptop and used to my ergonomic keyboard plus the keys are a bit smaller on this.

What is the model of the motherboard that is not working (new board)? Did you clear the CMOS after updating BIOS? What are the specs for the cheap DDR3 RAM (what brand is it also)? Some RAM will not be running at correct speed, timings or volts when the computer is first started. You will have to make changes manually in BIOS (get RAM specs). Does the motherboard have any diagnostic LEDs or the two-digit diagnostic display to help you out?

Hook up the PC speaker for the beep codes. Sounds like RAM to me..

Ok there seems to be some confusion here let me explain

My old board is a Gigabyte MA770-UD3 its a AM2+ board but AM3 ready. I have version one and found out after getting a quadcore 965BE that it needed a bios update which I did and that went ok CPU run great.

So I decided to order a new tower something a bit fancy so I got the antec dark fleet DF-85 its a massive case - here ----> http://www.ebuyer.com/product/227150

I also ordered a xenta PSU 900watt to go with the fancy case as my old PSU was some cheap crap no make. http://www.ebuyer.com/product/219542.

So let me get to the point.....Installed my old motherboard into the new tower case with new power supply ordered and my quadcore CPU I decided to install a fresh copy of windows (XP) however when I went to format the HD it stalled at 20% quick format and it did this with 3 other HD's. I did eventually get it past the 20% to the point of installing XP but it took 1.5 hours to install XP. I tried to install windows 7 64bit after and that just locked up at 12% install and stayed like that.

I tried different ram and different slots and a different cd drive no luck so I thought I had messed up the bios. so I tried to install older ones no luck either.

Anyway I gave up and got a new AM3 board with DDR 3 memory thinking that would solve the problems. I took the old board out and installed this new one with all parts except for the DDR 3 ram that was installed in this one as old board was DDR 2

The board powered up but no post boot at all the screen stayed blank and the board kept reset as could hear the cd drive keep reseting as if the pc was constantly re-booting. checked the CPU that was mounted ok and checked the 2 sticks of ram in different slots still the same no post boot.

So I thought perhaps its the power supply so I changed the new PSU to my old PSU and it still did the same no post boot.

I dont know what made me do it but I installed the old mobo and parts back in teh old tower unit with the old PSU and windows formatted and installed no problem at all infact I have my old system back to how it was in the new tower powering the quadcore.

So this leaves me with a new AM3 board with no post booting just powering the CPU fan, a new PSU that acts up with my old board makes it go real slow for some reason when installing things?? why would a PSU do that??

2x2 gig of cheapo DDR3 Ram that might not work with the AM3 board or is faulty or the board is DOA??? might be a case of RMA all 3 because at the moment none of them are any good to me.


So here is the make of the new board http://www.ebuyer.com/product/218937

My new PSU http://www.ebuyer.com/product/219542.

AND DDR3 Ram http://www.ebuyer.com/product/192049 I'm not sure what make of ram it is but this is the code - HYUK31312884GBOE

So as said the old mobo with old parts is fine the new parts I can't say which one of the 3 it could be but have a stick of Corsair dominator to try in the board tomorrow see if it will boot with that.

Did you install the DDR3 memory properly on the Gigabyte GA-870A-UD3? The memory slots are labeled DDR3_1 - DDR3_2 - DDR3_3 - DDR3_4 (starting closest to CPU). So two chips would be installed with one in DDR3_1 and DDR3_2 (or DDR3_3 and DDR3_4).

I've never heard of Xenta PSUs before. Will the Xenta power your currently working system?

Always clear CMOS after updating BIOS!!!

Clearing the Cmos do you mean remove the battery? I usually go into bios after a flash and reset it to all defaults?

As for the power supply I've never heard of it either but it wasn't cheap £65 which is more than what I have paid in the past. I'm not sure what make of supply this cheap0 one is that I am using now supposed to be 850watt but its more like 600watt I am guessing with is being cheap.

Its not letting me down thats for sure....I'm guessing that there might be something wrong with the new PSU I've never come across a PC that doesn't like a psu in all the years of building pc's unless its faulty.

Which I am guessing it might be as my motherboard hates it and the new one doesn't seem to post boot with it I'll try my other DDR 3 ram and post back.

As for the other slots yeah I tried them all in different orders and no luck either.

All sorted now it must be the cheapo ram that I got. I tried the corsair dominator installed xp and win 7 no problem and the new power supply works ok with this board.

That was my first instinct when I saw the 20% transfer happen on 3 drives
a bad ram stick.

It only takes one to screw up a couple days of yer life

Actually the 20% transfer rate was on my old motherboard. it only started doing that when I hooked up this new power supply. soon as I put the old one back the board worked fine again.


It was this new AM3 board I got on saturday it wouldn't post boot and I wasn't sure what was wrong with it, I assumed it was the new PSU as it played up on my old board, but then I tried my old PSU and the AM3 board wouldn't post boot with that either.

So I could only go on 3 things either the ram was faulty/wont work with mobo, PSU was fucked or mobo was fucked.

But once I tried the corsair ram in it the damn thing booted up. so sent the ram back to ebuyer and got some corsair. I didn't see this ram listed in the gigabyte site as supporting the board but some reviews mentioned it working ok with AMD boards.

So its getting delivered tomorrow so here we go again.

Not sure why the new PSU didn't like my old board though it loves the new one.

As for my old board its DDR2 ram 4x2 gig sticks but I checked them all and they are fine no bad ram there.