[Fixed] Threadripper PC does not POST

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1

Hi there,

I’m having a problem with my new PC using an AMD Threadripper 1950X with the ASUS Zenith Extreme motherboard + G.Skill TridentZ RGB RAM, I am not able to boot it, it does not POST so nothing is ever displayed to the screen that is plugged in via my EVGA FTW2 Nvidia 1080.

I have 4 16gb sticks (F4-3200C15Q-64GTZR, not on QVL), in slots A1, B1, C1, and D1 as per the manual.

When I power on, the CPU fan spins for a second then stops, and memory slots C1 and D1 lit up, but B1 and A1 do not. The code was “A0 Detect memory”.

I removed slots D1 and B1 as per the manual to try and only run 2 slots. This time only C1 lit up, so still the memory on the left of the CPU appears to be ok, A1 on the right of the CPU did not light up.

I removed C1, and tried only a single slot in A1 as per the instruction manual for running with 1 slot. This also did not work, but now the error code was “C0 Detect memory”.

At this point I tried every stick in A1 one at a time, but the same result with all of them. I never had any stick of memory light up in a slot to the right of the CPU.

After this I updated the BIOS to Version 0503 (current latest, not sure what version was before this) via USB. Now when I power on I get a boot loop issue, the system powers on, then powers off, and repeats this indefinitely. No message is output to the display screen other than it’s trying to detect memory. After maybe 10 or so attempts at this, I’m back to the C0 error message, even with all 4 sticks plugged in I no longer get the 2 on the left lighting up.

The 24 pin and 2x 8 pin CPU power cables from my Corsair HX1000i are in and fully plugged in properly. I have tried unplugging anything non essential from the board (eg usb headers / GPU). The only other thing plugged into the board is a Samsung 960 PRO 512gb SSD in the M.2 slot built into the board (not using the dimm expansion slot).

I am aware that this exact memory isn’t on the QVL list, however I am not sure if that is the problem, I did grab an 8gb stick of Kingston Hyper-X HX421C14FB2K2 memory from another PC and put it into slot A1, but exact same issue (that memory is also not on QVL, the 4 stick kit version is though so not sure if that matters?).

At this point not sure if I need to buy different RAM (have tested sticks from 2 kits now and same problem) or RMA the board? I’ve heard of others having half RAM slots just not working. Could it be a CPU issue? With Threadripper the memory controller is on the CPU right? Would it make more sense to first RMA the CPU rather than the motherboard based on this problem?

Cheers.

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Remove all power cables to your MB, ALL, including GPU. Wait 30 minutes, press and hold clear CMOS button for 5 seconds. Then hook all power back up and try to boot. That is step one, then report back.

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Forgot to mention that I did try a CMOS clear before updating the BIOS, I didn’t unplug everything and leave it for ages though, I can give that a go later today.

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When I say GPU I just mean the cables. Try this first, many have had success clearing CMOS and waiting overnight and clearing CMOS again before adding power cables back.

You will not like step two so hope this works.

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Looks like you have a faulty CPU. Did all the RAM slots stop working after the UEFI update?
Doesen’t really matter if the RAM is not in the QLV because any DDR4 DIMM must respect some basic specification that your CPU is able to handle no problem.
Try to boot the system with one stick of RAM and test all the slots. Usually if half of the slots are not working it’s something to do with the CPU more than the motherboard.
Maybe inspect the socket; a bent pin in the socket may cause severe issues like this one.

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Alright so I’ve got it all working after doing the CMOS thing, I am so relieved as I too was concerned the issue was with the CPU as that’s where the memory controller is, and I did have some difficulty getting the socket to close - looks like plenty of others with my board have had the same issue.

Anyway all good now, weird that clearing CMOS worked after BIOS update, but not when I tried prior to that, just happy to have it working :slight_smile:

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That was step two that he would not like.

Excellent news.

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Hi jardeath so the solution was to update the bios via usb? And then clear the CMOS? I’m having the same issues that you had, I’m afraid if it’s the cpu, hope it’s not. Please tell me if updating the bios and clearing the CMOS is the solution so I could try to do It

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Yeah that was what I did, and it fixed it for me. The only other things I tried were reseating the memory but that didn’t seem to help me, I didn’t get to trying to reseat the CPU but could also be worth a go.

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