NEW boot problems

[bc165]

I hooked up an additional monitor and now the boot up is twice as slow and I cant get the BIOS to display. I get a black screen. If i let it go through the boot sequence it will come up to the log in screen but is slow. Why the change??

[zburns]

I assume you finished your build and did all "checks", tests, etc. before hooking up the second monitor? If not I would take the second one out, and get completely finished before hooking up the second one.

With one monitor installed, everything works ok? You can get into BIOS with no problem with one monitor but cannot with two monitors?

If you are talking about the "momentary flash" of the BIOS on the monitor on cold start up, then you can have a black screen. With two video cards, maybe that situation is aggravated.

After the initial boot is finished, can you get into BIOS, thru the start menu by clicking "restart", then after the single POST beep, hold down CONTROL and click DELETE repetatively and you should enter your BIOS.

[zburns]

This is a two part Post. General comment. Because of the slow boot with two monitors, I would not run your system this way. Use only one monitor and one graphics card until more is known.

1st Part: Your Post from above: I hooked up an additional monitor and now the boot up is twice as slow and I cant get the BIOS to display. I get a black screen. If i let it go through the boot sequence it will come up to the log in screen but is slow. Why the change??

Your post above can be interpreted several ways. So some questions. Cannot get the BIOS to display. Does this mean that if you follow the procedure, to get into BIOS, spelled out in the last sentence of my Post above, that all you get is a "Black" screen? Is this what you mean by ".....I can't get the BIOS to display." Please clarify.

I understand your last sentence, it is clear enough. Eventually the log in screen appears. I assume you can log in, use the windows start menu, use google, etc. . If you are not this far yet, please advise.

2nd Part: This may be the "Houston, we have a problem part". Your build Posts says you purchased two EVGA graphic cards. Assuming you have two GPU cards installed, did you hook the second monitor to the unused card?

Last night, when doing the my first post to you, I looked of your final build; it says a Antec 900 case and antec 650 watt PSU. Assume this Antec PSU has an 80 or 85% efficiency rating. This means a maximum power output of 520 to 550 watts depending on whether 80 or 85 %.

On the EVGA product page, your card requires a 400 watt PSU. Does not say what happens when you run two cards. So I called them. Customer service "Pre Sales" person says that your card when in an "idle mode" will cause your whole system to require 525 watts; we, also covered the second card; he indicated same requirement for second card or something close to it!

At that point I broke the conversation off, because he was hard to understand, and a verbal conversation about this topic is not the way to find out precise information. So I will send them an email to their customer support to get as clear an answer as I can regards two cards like yours running with two and/or four monitors.

In the meantime, I suggest you operate with one monitor until we know factually the real PSU requirement. I would do this because the real problem is that with two monitors, your current (amps) requirement may be greater than your PSU will deliver. That being the case, your output voltage will sag to all components in your system. At a minimum you risk damage to your PSU; what happens to the other components is unknown; your fans may run slower -- no way to know for sure about the other components without spending a lot of time and that is not the right approach.

One thing you can do if you have a little experience with multimeters. If you have a multimeter and know how to take basic electrical measurements, you could measure the "unloaded dc output voltage of your PSU 12v rail or "no load output" as I would call it. You would then run both monitors, slow boot up, when you get to the start menu, we would call this an "idle mode", then I would measure the output voltage once more and see if it has dropped with both monitors in "operating mode". Depending on what this voltage does from "no load" to "full load" with two monitors on will tell you what is happening with your PSU. Too much voltage drop under these conditions would be the cause of "running too slow".

Summary: I suggest you proceed with one monitor; tell us if you are going to use a multimeter, not really that necessary; the correct information from EVGA is important and may take several days to get it.

Let me know any questions or misunderstanding about the above post. Sorry for the length. I will recheck what I said in the next hour, and do any edit necessary.

EDIT: My para on using the multimeter would be nice to know info; "it is support or verification info" but not absolutely germane to what we have to know right now. However, knowing whether you have two cards installed, and if a monitor was hooked to each card is important to know; also, hearing something back from EVGA about running two cards, two monitors, "idle" psu and "full out" psu requirements -- it matters that we know specifically about these items.

Change the subject slightly, most all users who communicate on this forum use one monitor and one video card; most do games that cause a higher PSU "loading" factor. So PSU recommendations are made in the context of "one card, one monitor". In this case the cards you selected may be "real power hungry" hogs, ie. 400 watt PSU recommendation. Because of the two cards and their power requirements, some precise info from EVGA will go a long way in answering your questions and addressing the problem.

[zburns]

Another comment made by EVGA this morning was whether you had the two cards in SLI mode. If so, the EVGA rep strongly suggested it be taken out of SLI mode. He told me how to do that but I do not remember. Sorry I left this out earlier!! Call them if you need to know that.

I would not worry about any "damage" done so far as long as the two monitors and the slow mode have not been "on air" for any period of time. Important point is do not run two monitors or two cards right now.

[zburns]

bc165.
Update on what I have found that may be helpful. First, I stated in my long Post above that efficiency of the PSU mattered. In my calculations above, I assummed, incorrectly, that your PSU had a stated output of 650 watts at some efficiency value, say 80 %, which would make your available output only 80% of 650 watts or 520 watts. Your specific PSU puts out 650 watts total on multiple rails, but in the process of "delivering" 650 watts pulls approx 800 watts, plus some, from the power line. If 812 watts is drawn from the power line and your PSU is 80 % efficient, it will "output" 650 watts, but again on multiple rails or separate outputs.

All the Antec Power Supplies output the advertised amount but draw more from the power line.

Your PSU has three 12 volt dc rails, two of them each have a max amp output of 22 amps, and one has a max output of 25 amps.

The EVGA spec on your card calls for 400 watts minimum, 26 amps at 12 volts, per card. I point out that this is an incomplete specification because it does not say enough.

The EVGA folks I talked with (two of them) both agreed with me that a too small PSU could be the cause of your slow down. You have very powerful GPU cards. For example if you did 3D images on two monitors at the same time, (No SLI mode), each card would each require 264 watts of power. Assume the rest of your computer (CPU, HDs, DVD, Burner, Mobo, RAM) will require 252 watts. This is a total PSU output requirement of 780 watts. (264 +264+252=780)

Let us assume 2D images, not 3D images. Wattage per card is 109 watts plus 252 watts for the computer for a total of 470 watts, well within the limits of your current PSU; however, the 3D requirement is beyond the limits of your PSU.

Neither of the above examples assumes SLI, which would only increase the wattage required -- we are not considering SLI and I am dropping it as a subject.

So I assume the way you were operating when the slow down occurred with two monitors was the 2D low wattage operation, and your PSU was not being overloaded from a simple point of view. Clearly, you could run the two cards in a 3D mode and go beyond your PSU output limits.

Possible Problem If there is a problem with the present PSU, it has to be the following: the EA 650 has three +12 volt rails, two with amp outputs of 22 amps, one rail with output of 25 amps.

Each graphics card has a max amp requirement of 26 amps at 12volts and this has to come from only one rail and one graphics card connector. Your psu has two rails output limited to 22 amps and one at 25 amps -- both rails below the single card max amp requirement. (This in itself is a problem)

Each graphic card has an eight pin power connector (I think). If both power connectors to each card are coming from the same 12 volt rail, then you may be overloading that rail with two monitors, two cards powered from the same rail, hence the "slowdown".

OR One or both cards could be powered each by a power connector coming from a separate 12 volt, 22 amp rail. For some reason the amp requirement on one or both rails is being exceeded by a "moderate" amount -- not a "computer crashing amount" and therefore, the "slowdown".

To find out, you must figure out what +12 volt rail each graphic card power connector is coming from and they should not be the same rail. Also, very important, the mobo +12 volt connection has to be on its own separate rail from the graphics card. You have three +12 volt rails, mobo is already on one of them. Make sure each of the two graphic cards go to their own separate +12 volt rails -- ie. one card to one of the remaining +12volt rails, the other card to the last +12volt rail --mobo not on either of the rails that have a graphics card on them.

Hopefully, the Antec manual will identify what I am tallking about by way of a diagram.

If you have any questions, please ask before doing anything. I hope all this helps find the problem.