Abit ip35 pro - bios inaccessible and no screen output of bios activity

I think I have a rare (but no less annoying) problem.

I can't access the bios. That's been shown before but there's more: there is no output of the bios post proces at all. No 'press del to enter setup', no system information, nothing - only a black screen until the system boots XP and the windows logo emerges.... Yes - the system boots 100% ok, but the whole post proces seems to have 'vanished'!

This board has a 2 digit display showing the boot proces with numerical codes. It completes all steps 100% ok, which I would expect as XP starts normally.

Things I tried to get into the bios (or even see any sign of bios posting)
- connect PS2 keyboard and hit del / esc / you name it (should be del with this board). Same with usb keyboard.
- clear cmos
- remove/replace battery AND clear cmos
- disconnect all drives and all cards
- change monitor/change video card (100% sure they're ok)
- various combinations of the above

Nothing seems to help, I didn't get ANY feedback on the monitor of the bios proces in any instance. I've run out of ideas, any help is greatly appreciated!

Some more info
- I didn't update the bios (well, maybe 2 years ago)
- there might be some connection with a change in the bios applied earlier this year. I disabled 'full screen LOGO show' in the Advanced Bios Features

I thought of flashing the bios with a new version, but alas... I can't access bios, so I can't change the boot sequence (this Abit board flashes from DOS OS on usb stick or floppy). With all HD and other drives disconnected, it doesn't find my DOS OS usb stick either.

Most boards will check the floppy drive first, so if you got one lying around and you can't change the boot order then you should try to flash it using a floppy. Are there any domed capacitors on your board? I am repairing an older P4 Dell that had several bad capacitors; it does everything fine except go into BIOS (it doesn't recognize keyboards until WinXP boots...). I am replacing the caps as we speak, we'll see if it alleviates the issues.

Dooms101 said:

Most boards will check the floppy drive first, so if you got one lying around and you can't change the boot order then you should try to flash it using a floppy.

Click to expand...

I could be lucky, but may well have disabled floppy boot altogether as there never was a floppy drive in the system. But I'll check if I still have one somewhere...

[/QUOTE]Are there any domed capacitors on your board? I am repairing an older P4 Dell that had several bad capacitors; it does everything fine except go into BIOS (it doesn't recognize keyboards until WinXP boots...). I am replacing the caps as we speak, we'll see if it alleviates the issues.[/QUOTE]
No domed ones, and it does take keyboard commands during post (eg, it bleeps when you overload it with too many keystokes).

It's probably your monitor. Bad caps would make the system unstable.

RJARRRPCGP said:

It's probably your monitor. Bad caps would make the system unstable.

Click to expand...

The monitor is a new HP 24 inch. I also tried an older Samsung 172T monitor. Tried another videocard with that one too...

RJARRRPCGP said:

It's probably your monitor. Bad caps would make the system unstable.

Click to expand...

Not always. This Dell with 7 bad caps near the CPU is Prime95 stable for an hour or so.

Solved!

Turned out to be related to videocard. Mine has 2 DVI out - only one of them gets BIOS feedback and of course mine was in the other one...
The other video card I tried was defective, so I falsely interpreted that I could not be a videocard issue.