Need Help, New Computer Build Problems [SOLVED]

[Nehkara]

Hey guys and gals!

Alright, so I built my new PC and without a video card installed I plugged it into a monitor to see if it would boot. Now, the first time I didn't have a drive installed either. I thought it would boot to bios but I got a weird error. You can view it here. I also had thick wavy green lines across the screen with a black background.

I plugged in my SSD and tried it again. This time it skipped everything else and booted straight to Windows 7 but still had the green lines all over the screen.

I figured I would just put my video card in there and we would be on our way.

Now I can't get any video signal on the video card or the on-board video. There is power to all the fans, the CPU cooler, the LEDs on the mainboard, the front panel lights, etc. Despite not getting any video I think it is still booting to windows as I have SSD activity and I have to hold down the power button to get it to power off (if it doesn't boot properly you just have to press the button to turn it off, not hold it). Any ideas?

I will keep a close eye on this thread and respond to any questions.

Thanks!

Relevant Specs:

i5 3570k CPU
16GB DDR3 RAM
MSI Z77A-G45 motherboard
120 GB SSD
750W PSU
Radeon HD 6950 2GB

[Jacks]

Have you checked the BIOS settings?

There may be an option to disable onboard video?

[Nehkara]

So! Now the green wavy lines are gone. No idea what that was about.

The on board video works fine now when I take the video card out of the system. I try to put it back in and neither the video card nor the on board works. I will try disabling on board video.

[PsYcNeT]

Did you reformat it? Because if you changed CPUs/Mobos you should definitely reformat.

An EFI error is in the hidden windows boot partition. Most modern PCs will boot via the EFI rather than the BIOS.

[Nehkara]

I was planning on it but hadn't yet. Can that cause the GPU to not show an image at all?

[PsYcNeT]

Does it show the BIOS/Splash screen or does the screen not even initialize?

If it works fine with the onboard, sometimes motherboards can be picky about PCI-E cards (or it needs a BIOS update).

My recommendation is to:

a) take out the video card

b) reformat it immediately with everything but the card in

c) once windows boots properly, update all your drivers/chipset/etc.

d) flash the BIOS to the latest version

e) verify it boots properly once the BIOS is flashed

f) power down, install the video card

g) turn off the on-board card in the BIOS

h) install the newest ATI drivers
I presume it should work fine after all these steps. If you hit a snag, let me know. I'm dicking around with my new laptop so I'll be online for a bit.

[Jacks]

Are you booting from a drive that has Windows installed from another computer?

Try booting from the Windows install disk.

[Nehkara]

I am going to follow PsYcNeT's instructions. Also there was a setting in the bios regarding pci-e gen3 which was set to auto. The manual says it may cause issues with pci-e 2.0 GPUs, so I disabled it. Maybe that will help too.

[Vulcan]

If you're using an SSD, don't forget to go into your bios and change your drive mode from IDE to ACHI. I think windows has a problem if you try to boot with the wrong mode than what mode your windows is tied to.

[PsYcNeT]

That too. And once Windows in installed, make sure TRIM is enabled and you have your defragger turned off.

[Nehkara]

Everything is working now. Thanks everyone, especially PsYcNeT!

[PsYcNeT]

Good to hear! Glad it's all good.