A real doozy here for the boffins of CHF. First a small introduction, I work in a national electronics company, let's just call it maplans (although i've had customers call it that anyway) for now to avoid getting myself fired. As some of you may know, generally speaking at 'maplans' we know our tech, only very rarely does one of our guys let down the reputation.
Of the team in the local branch I am the chief computer guy, the one the others come to if they have a computer problem they're not sure of. I'm self-taught over a period of 10+ years, and am pretty well-versed on the majority of computer related issues.
So here's what had me stumped, aswell as my customer today, and his brother (a Microsoft employee). He purchased a motherboard bundle, the Phenom 630 on an ECS board with 2GB 800MHz memory. Upon discovering he had no video output, the customer returned it and exchanged for another, exactly the same. Same problem.
It was at this point after speaking to the customer on the phone that I volunteered to have a look at the system if he were to bring it in (and herein lies the reason behind my keeping some details vague; it is breaching the terms of my contract to tinker as 'maplan' does not account for experience or qualification due to insurance reasons).
I'll cut to the chase; the customer had done nothing wrong, and yet two subsequent boards had yielded the exact same failure; no video output, but even more unusual, no BIOS beeps to indicate a fault, even with monitor and keyboard unplugged.
I suggested another bundle, and so the customer opted for the triple-core 9350, again on an ECS board and with 2GB 800MHz memory.
Same fault.
To verify the issue I even chose another PSU out of stock (again breaking the terms of my contract), the 700W modular unit from iCute, to rule out the possibility of the fault lying with the customers 570W PSU (also sold by us, brand must go unnamed as only we stock it).
Same fault.
So to conclude, and also to add in some extra detail, there was no video output on three motherboards; two of the same model with the same CPU, and one different mobo with again a different CPU.
This fault was replicated across all three boards, with both PSUs on both types of board/CPU combo, and every single time without a beep from the board to indicate a fault.
All other normal signs of life in the board were there, and the only constant in the setup was the case (a possible earthing problem? Though the customer had no prior problem with his previous board).
No other boards of these types have been returned.
So ruling out the extremely unlikely event of a localised EMP (though we have the technology!), what on earth could possibly have caused this?
If any answers can help me to help the customer (I pride myself on my own after-market support, even if the company doesn't), then absoluely brilliant, but I'd also just like to know what the bleep was happening.
