Red Cpu Light On. PC won't Boot. Please Help!!

polorsport · 25 Aug 2011

So I went to do a little upgrade today, that I thought I could handle.

I was adding two new sticks of ram. (G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL9D-8GBRL).

and

I opened a Western Digital Elements 3TB USB 2.0 External Hard Drive WDBAAU0030HBK-NESN to use it as an internal drive. It was this drive (Western Digital Caviar Green WD30EZRX 3TB 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive)

In addition the only thing I did was use some compressed air to clean my pc. Everything was working before I opened the case and installed the hd, and ram.

NOW I have a Red Cpu light on. My first boot smelled like something was burning. I immediately turned off the pc. Tried with and without new ram, with and without new hd. Now with all my original parts. Every time it's the same thing. Red cpu light on. I can't even get to bios. Just turns on and hangs. Nothing displayed.

Please help. I really don't want to have to drive 1hr and 30min each way to get my pc fixed.

My System info:

OS
windows 7 Pro x64 SP 1
CPU
I5 2500K
Motherboard
ASUS P8P67 Pro rev 3.0
Memory
G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DD
Graphics Card(s)
Evga 580 gtx Superclocked sli reference evga 580 gtx
Sound Card
N/A
Monitor(s) Displays
Acer HN274H 3D Vision-ready LCD Monitor
Screen Resolution
1920x1080p
Hard Drives
2 Western Digital Caviar Black WD2001FASS 2TB 7200 RPM 64MB
PSU
Corsair|CMPSU-850HX 850W RT
Case
COOLER MASTER HAF 922
Cooling
Cooler Master RR-B10-212P-G1 Hyper 212 Plus
Keyboard
Logitech K750 solar panel
Mouse
Logitech G400
Internet SpeedEdit Value
25mbps up/down

paulpicks21 · 25 Aug 2011

The only thing I can suggest if you have not tried it already is removing the cmos battery from the motherboard for a few mins to reset the bios and hope it works.

polorsport · 25 Aug 2011

How do I do that?

paulpicks21 · 25 Aug 2011

Ok make sure the pc is switched off, take the side off the case and somewhere on your motherboard (usually near the bottom) is a small round battery. Carefully remove it , it pops out and leave it out for a few minutes before putting it back in.

Then power the pc up again it may work again.

However the burning smell you described in the original post is not a good sign so, it may not solve your problem but it's certainly worth a shot for a few mins work.

paulpicks21 · 25 Aug 2011

I nicked this pic off the web which shows it.

polorsport · 25 Aug 2011

Thank you for replying and for adding the pictures. I'm going to give it a shot shortly. Fingers Crossed this works

jeepmann4x4 · 25 Aug 2011

Did you install your on-board speaker? If so are you getting any "bios beeps"?

polorsport · 25 Aug 2011

I can't seem to get the battery out. My manual was useless, and I watched some youtube videos but they didn't help. I tried using tweezers but it's really in there. I'm afraid of causing further damage to the mother board.

I actually had my speakers off. I didn't install speakers if you mean like a sound card. I do plug in the green and orange cable in the back to a cheap 2.0 logitech speaker setup.

I just can't understand if the system was working perfectly fine, how this could happen.

fseal · 25 Aug 2011

Well one possibility is if the new memory wasn;t the right type but you managed to force it into the slots anyway. Which is actually possible.

There are little notches on the connectors of the ram and they move around from one ram type to another to try to prevent that from happening but it is still possible to in some cases force ram into the wrong kind of socket and in that case it may be possible to have shorted out the power.

I'd unplug the power to the new HD and take out the new ram. See if it boots then. If not then I'd remove a sick of the old ram and compare the connectors to make sure they are identical looking...

There is a small possibility that the MB is fine but the power supply burned out because adding the drive and ram pushed it over it's limit (though it would have to have been RIGHT on the edge before). You would need to swap in another poswer supply if you have one handy or use a power supply tester to see though...

Oh one other thing that happens frequently. Make sure your video card especially, but all PCI cards are FULLY seated. They can easily get knocked around and if they are not completely level seated in the sockets, that will also short the PSU.

jeepmann4x4 · 25 Aug 2011

polorsport said:

I can't seem to get the battery out. My manual was useless, and I watched some youtube videos but they didn't help. I tried using tweezers but it's really in there. I'm afraid of causing further damage to the mother board.

I actually had my speakers off. I didn't install speakers if you mean like a sound card. I do plug in the green and orange cable in the back to a cheap 2.0 logitech speaker setup.

I just can't understand if the system was working perfectly fine, how this could happen.

Not your sound system speakers....It would be your MB speaker(looks like a small black thick button /w 2 wires to plug onto some MB pins) (Check Manual)

Also to clear cmos there should be a 3 pin jumper on your MB near the battery (check your manual) Link here for how to. See pic for where.

ASUS support for your board....HERE
Troubleshooting : No POST ...HERE

I have seen a lot of post talking about LED light issues(Google) And alot of RMA fixes......