Multiple ASRock Extreme4 Z77 problems.

[Bluj162]

About a month and a half ago my old rig broke so I bought a new mobo and cpu. The mobo I bought was an ASRock but it wasn't compatiable with the Ivy CPU I have (an i-5 3550). So I RMAed it though newegg and got a Extreme4 Z77.

When I connected everything to my rig my Sapphire Radeon HD 6870 wasn't being detected my my motherboard at all. I thought I was fried from being left in a box for a few weeks so I RMAed it though Sapphire and got a replacement. Now I have the new replacement card and it is detected most of the time by my motherboard, but whenever I try to switch the BIOS settings from onboard graphics to the PCI-E I get a black screen and no output to my monitors. I've tried everything. I've updated my BIOS, installed drivers, cleared my CMOS, even prayed and nothing seems to be working.

I'm also getting random BSOD crashes that are related to a change in hardware. These may or may not be related to my motherboard, but they're annoying.

And last but not least, my system won't sleep. I've messed around with the BIOS settings and nothings seems to work. The system monitor also isn't working. The temperatures that are being displayed aren't accurate (-.5C) and the clock speeds are wrong.

The motherboard is out of the 30 day period of return and if I could return it I would and get another motherboard, probably not an ASRock, but I can't, so I'm wondering if I RMAed back to ASRock would I run into these issues? Is my motherboard broken or is something else wrong? Also is it possible that I have some compatibility issues between my motherboard and my Sapphire Radeon HD 6870?

I have created a ticket and emailed ASRock support but it's a Satuday and they're closed. I really just want to be able to play some video games again since it's been a month and a half and I haven't been able to game with my rig.
Any help would be appreciated.

[Justin Rennex]

Re: Multiple ASRock Extreme4 Z77 problems.

Hello Make sure that your memory modules are supported. Borrow a gen 3 gpu card. Your processor is supported and supports gen 3 pcie gpu's maybe the gpu requires nvidea as most of them support gen 3 graphics cards. Try the the on board graphics and see if that works and see if it boots without errors. Have you tried the onboard graphics? Is that a black screen with a flashing curser?

[Justin Rennex]

Re: Multiple ASRock Extreme4 Z77 problems.

Forgot one more thing when you bought the new board did you replace the hard drive and install an operating system 64 or 32 bit?

[Bluj162]

Re: Multiple ASRock Extreme4 Z77 problems.

I reinstalled the OS but it was an old HDD. Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit. I read that maybe reinstalling again may resolve the problem that that will be a last resort.

I'm going to try to reseat my ram stick by stick and see of that works.

[Justin Rennex]

Re: Multiple ASRock Extreme4 Z77 problems.

Yep that might do the job. But the bios may be limited due to hdd gig size. The limitations may be 360gig min or at a minimum of 500gig sata 6 or 3 gpm. Thats important to not.

[parsec]

Re: Multiple ASRock Extreme4 Z77 problems.

I have the same board as you do, and don't have any of the issues you do, but I'm using the onboard video.

You wrote "no output to my monitors", are you trying to use more than one monitor when you try to use the video card the first time? If so, try only one monitor, on the DVI connector. Are you using any adapters on the video cables, or straight in?

From the description of your problems, it sounds like you might not have the Intel Management Engine software installed. You should see that listed in the list of installed programs in Windows. It should be on the software disk that came with the board, or download from ASR's site, or even Intel's.

Next, if you have the Lucid Virtu MVP software installed, remove it, uninstall it, and banish it from your PC. If you want to try it after getting your video card working, be my guest, but for now, uninstall it as fast as possible!

Have you tried different PCI-E slots for your card? Check the manual about the correct location. Don't worry about PCI-E 3.0, most if not all video cards are not compatible with that. Build a PC in simple steps, putting everything in at once at maximum settings and expecting it to all work is asking for trouble.

You must install the driver for your specific video card, and check the manufactures web site for the latest version to download and install.

One more thing, this...

"But the bios may be limited due to hdd gig size. The limitations may be 360gig min or at a minimum of 500gig sata 6 or 3 gpm. Thats important to not."

... is pure nonsense, as you likely know, ignore it. Hopefully he was half asleep when he wrote it.

[Justin Rennex]

Re: Multiple ASRock Extreme4 Z77 problems.

Good pick up on my mistake. Ivy bridge supports pcie 3.0. His card is 2.1 but may not be compatible not all cards are. I have the asrock extreme 6 and have settings set to onboard graphics as the primary adapter and memory shared to max and dual graphics set to auto as a crossfire set up. The catalyst contains the drivers and even without them it should still boot. Unless the monitor is connected to the dedicated card. He has a bios issue it is not picking up the card and it shouldn't make a difference with or without drivers. I booted into my system with the graphics card with no drivers, no catalyst control centre as it is used for xfire, surround view and overdrive. Sounds to me that the managment system software is similar. Its not pure nonsense as the drive is said to be old and the system may not pick it up due to failed sectors on the drive. Using different pcie slots want do a thing accept find a faulty pcie. If it is not working in the first slot then there is either an issue with the bios or a hardwear problem. Have you got a graphics card installed i guess not then how would you know. It was also noted that it worked in his old board so i guess he has an idea where it goes.

[Bluj162]

Re: Multiple ASRock Extreme4 Z77 problems.

I have the same board as you do, and don't have any of the issues you do, but I'm using the onboard video.

You wrote "no output to my monitors", are you trying to use more than one monitor when you try to use the video card the first time? If so, try only one monitor, on the DVI connector. Are you using any adapters on the video cables, or straight in?

From the description of your problems, it sounds like you might not have the Intel Management Engine software installed. You should see that listed in the list of installed programs in Windows. It should be on the software disk that came with the board, or download from ASR's site, or even Intel's.

Next, if you have the Lucid Virtu MVP software installed, remove it, uninstall it, and banish it from your PC. If you want to try it after getting your video card working, be my guest, but for now, uninstall it as fast as possible!

Have you tried different PCI-E slots for your card? Check the manual about the correct location. Don't worry about PCI-E 3.0, most if not all video cards are not compatible with that. Build a PC in simple steps, putting everything in at once at maximum settings and expecting it to all work is asking for trouble.

You must install the driver for your specific video card, and check the manufactures web site for the latest version to download and install.

One more thing, this...

"But the bios may be limited due to hdd gig size. The limitations may be 360gig min or at a minimum of 500gig sata 6 or 3 gpm. Thats important to not."

... is pure nonsense, as you likely know, ignore it. Hopefully he was half asleep when he wrote it.

I uninstalled the Lucid Virtu MVP. Then I installed all of the disk drivers for my motherboard. I've used both slots and nothing worked. I don't know if I said this earlier but I have an old Nvidia card that's from the early 2000s and it works with my board for some reason. I thought that my card was broken so I got a replacement and it still doesn't work. I think I'm going to go to a PC repair shop near me to figure this out, even if it means paying out the ear for it.

[CRRacer]

Re: Multiple ASRock Extreme4 Z77 problems.

I have this same board I recently setup. I initially did a post out of case with CPU (i7-2600k), memory (two kinds, Gskill 8GB 1600 (2x4gb) and Gskill 1866 16 GB qaud 4x4GB(both are on the QVL, but had previously had an issue with the faster ram and the Sabertooth Z77 MB which I RMA'd). Also installed in initial post was the EVGA GTX560 Ti FPB. Both posts were successful so I transferred contents to case and installed windows 7 Pro on a Crucial M4. Everything was flawless. I even installed the Lucid Virtual MVP (not sure what it is for but I did).

Next day I took the PC to work so I could download some updates that were rather large (World of Tanks) on the faster internet connection. I had forgot to take my DVI to VGA adapter. At home I was running out of the video card via HDMI to the monitor by way the the included mini HDMI to HDMI adapter that EVGA provides. At work I only have VGA and the GTX560Ti doesn't have a VGA output. I hooked up to the onboard VGA and doing so shows no post or EUFI but does show windows booting and the desktop. I would launch a program only to not see it, then I realized my mouse would scroll off screen to the left so I blindly drug the open windows that were being displayed on the GTV over to the montitor that was hooked up to the onboard video using the Intel HD graphics.

All in all it was a pretty cool experience. Got back home and hooked back up via HDMI and back my usual desktop. Apparently Lucid recognizes when the onboard graphics has something hooked to it, once home and no monitor attached to motherboard, there was no more mouse going off the screen.

I am just posting this to point out my experience and I believe the GTX560 is a PCIe 2.0 card. I would start with the basics, CPU and RAM (you can do one stick, then two, then 4 if you wish but I always start with max installed, be it two or four, with two stick, install in 2nd and 4th slot from CPU, otherwise you'll be in single channel and not dual channel, which is fine, but slower).

As for the ASUS board, it arrived with one CPU pin that didn't look quite right, it was noticable in certain light reflections), I immediately called for an RMA with Newegg, then studied the issue and saw the horror stories about RMA and bent pins, mine was legit. Preparring for the worst I order this ASRock board so I could at least assemble the system. Prior to shipping the board I decided to give it a try and couldn't post with it, only the RAM light was displayed and I didn't have much time to mess with it. Fortunately newegg sent me a new board and the pins are perfect. Unfortunately, this caused my to order yet another i7-2600k onna counta I just can have incomplete parts laying around. Eventually, this one will get a GTX 570, but for now, it'll have to do with the HD graphics and a Radeon HD5550 video card.

[Bluj162]

Re: Multiple ASRock Extreme4 Z77 problems.

Thanks for the suggestions but I'm submitting an RMA right now. I've also realized that there's a code on my Dr. Debug. Code 00. Which is apparently not normal. So I'm pretty sure I just have a bad board.

I really appreciate the responses though. This is probably the best place I've been to for help and I'm glad to have found these forums. :)

[Paul_Mac]

Re: Multiple ASRock Extreme4 Z77 problems.

Thanks for the suggestions but I'm submitting an RMA right now. I've also realized that there's a code on my Dr. Debug. Code 00. Which is apparently not normal. So I'm pretty sure I just have a bad board.

I really appreciate the responses though. This is probably the best place I've been to for help and I'm glad to have found these forums. :)

Hi,
According to my manual, p42, the code '00' is described as 'not used' so I don't see that it means anything in particular.
Have you tried the latest bios ver. 1.70?
ASRock > Products > Z77 Extreme4
Scroll down until you find the bios listings, maybe it will help.
Cheers,
Mac