Potentially fried motherboard - weird screen distortions

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Arachan

85 posts

Master Geek

#282736 8-Mar-2021 18:11

Hi folks

I have an old mini-ITX linux box I've used as a HTPC for something like 10 years. Recently it started throwing some weird errors which I didn't think too much of, but decided I'd reboot it (uptime was a few months).

Upon boot I got this super weird screen distortion as shown in this video here. It appears to land on the BIOS screen but it's not super clear. I also managed to briefly make out something to the effect of "checksum error, default CMOS settings used"

Things I've tried with no change:

I figured it might a loose VGA cable so wiggled it a bit and swapped the cable
The same monitor on another machine (no issues with monitor)
Different PSU
Reseating the single DIMM, as well as other slot
Removing power and data from the one SATA drive
Pulling the CMOS battery for 1+ hour
The first two methods of booting to backup BIOS shown here - unsure if successful as no change in behaviour

So I'm looking for suggestions. Is my mobo done or is there anything I can try to fix this? Given the age of the box if the mobo is done then I'd end up having to replace the whole thing which I'd rather avoid.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

ara

fe31nz

1229 posts

Uber Geek

#2670325 9-Mar-2021 00:47

Does it have an Nvidia chip for its video? At that age, it could have one of their chips that had bad solder balls on the BGA package. The solder connections eventually start to go and do all sorts of things like what you are seeing. I had an Asus laptop around then that did that, and they were unable to fix it so I had to get the retailer to refund under the CGA. The problem generally happened faster on things that had lots of temperature cycles, like laptops that get turned on and off all the time. If your motherboard was normally on 24x7, it might just have lasted this long before getting the problem.

SpartanVXL

1307 posts

Uber Geek

#2670380 9-Mar-2021 09:28

Is the cmos battery still okay after 10 years? I think the longest one I’ve replaced was about 7 years old.

Otherwise if it’s vga related you could test with another gpu if you have a spare.

Arachan

85 posts

Master Geek

#2670413 9-Mar-2021 10:37

Mobo is here https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/GA-D525TUD-rev-1x#ov

Cmos battery could be dead but shouldn't cause the visual issues right?

No pcie slot so not sure what I can do in terms of testing alternate graphics.

Cheers
Ara

SpartanVXL

1307 posts

Uber Geek

#2670431 9-Mar-2021 12:20

Ah, you would need to have a older gpu or something like a gt430 or gt520 which were the last modernish gpus made with pci.

I only mentioned the cmos because of that error you noted with it loading default, but given it’s age not sure if it’s worth it to bother much trying to resurrect it if it does have a hardware fault.

Only thing I’d do if you haven’t already is give it a good clean under heatsinks, maybe a flick/whack for percussive maintenance and try one last time. If you really wanted to repair it you’d need to find a specialist who will be more expensive than what that kit is worth.