New sys... need some advice on troubleshooting

First of all I have the EPoX 8K7A+ board, this is the first full system I have built from the ground up, I have put a lot of stuff into systems so I know my way around but I've never built a full sys.

Now, I have everything hooked up, I can power on, it goes to the boot screen and detects the CPU speed but stops there. I connot get into the BIOS. I am getting the code #50 on the led "Write all CMOS values currently in the BIOS stack area back into the CMOS."

Does this meen to clear the CMOS?? If so I tried setting the jumper to clear it and the sys would not power on. How do I re-write the defult CMOS values from the BIOS.

thx

p.s. the manual is a big pile of dog do-do. >(

fd

I have to BUMP this as I am currently a little lost. I still need to know what "Write all CMOS values currently in the BIOS stack area back into the CMOS" means exactly and how to do it.

system specs:

EP-8K7A+
T-Bird 1.2 266 AXIA
2x256 Crucial PC2100
VisionTek GeForce2 Ultra
TDK VeloCDRW 12-10-32
Maxtor Dimond Max Plus 60. 20gig
Gladiator HSF
360w PSU

thought id bump it for you.r u booting with a windows boot disc? is your drive new? is it partitioned?

I've never heard of this one before Fish...but heres my thoughts on it. The cmos is basically a ram chip that you use to store system configurations on..like the geometry of your hardrive...or the boot sequence of your drives. This is a "volatile" chip..meaning that if the battery wasnt there to keep a supply of electricity to it..the values you enter would disappear. The bios chip is a "non-volatile" chip so it doesnt need battery juice. One of the programs it contains is the cmos setup utility. When you access this program..you change the data stored on the cmos chip..not the bios chip. So...if you cant even get into the cmos setup program..I would suspect you have a bad bios chip. It is possible to reflash the bios..but you need to be running in dos to do it. I would say return the board. By the way..do you get any beep codes upon powering up?

Just another idea..have you checked the Epox website for any troubleshooting FAQs?

Well I got it going, no thanks to EPoX tec support, I asked them a question and said that the manual was not very descriptive so could they please give an explanation in fairly good detail... and I got an email back with a quote from the manual.

But it's all fixed now, something was wrong with the old vid card I was going to use to set up the sys with until I got my GF2U in the mail (stupid UPS), when I finally got it and put it in it started up normally. So all's good and thanks for yer help

fd