Mach I Trouble

[Abital]

Alirght, so we got everything mounted, and everything cools to about -34 degrees, but the display never pops up. Thinking it was a graphics card, processor or motherboard problem, we bench tested everything without the unit. And we got video, but as soon as we plug up everything to the Mach, nothing works, Im ready to send the damn thing back. One representative said it could be my motherboard compatability, if thats the case, heres all the specs for whats trying to be set up.

Asus A8V Deluxe Ai motherboard

AMD 64 3500 939-pin CPU

2GB PC3200 DDR400 Dual Channel Mem (Chaintech)

BFG nVidia 6800 Ultra OC'ed graphics card

Those are just what we bench tested everyhting with, the Hard Drive light lights up waiting for response whenever we wait for the video to appear, but nothing happens, the temp just hovers at about 34-5 degrees, any help.

 

[Phil Stanbridge]

It's one of two things in all honesty - motherboard compatibility with the Mach 1 or the motherboard is shorting against the tray.

What PSU are you using?

 

[Abital]

[font=Arial,Helvetica]Enermax EG651P-VE FMA 550 Watt ATX Power Supply[/font]

is the PSU im using, with a Lian Li case, Is there any way to test the Mach I on a different board without having to seal it all up, I've already gone through two. And dont want to waist another one.

 

[boardy]

Sounds alot like the P4 problem with some mobos and the Mach I. They don't hold reset so the computer doesn't boot because the proc gets too hot and shuts the board down. Can you power the Mach unit with another PSU and then use your Enermax for your PC? Wait until the Mach unit gets down to temp and then power the PC up and see what happens then.

Boardy

 

[Abital]

I already took the Mach off, And i dont know if I have enough seal string left to re-attach it again, I think the PSU might be frying my CPU, we tried booting it up just with the heatsink and fan and nothing happened, can to much di-electric grease keep that CPU from running, i didnt think so, but it seems like the CPU has gone out, we tried hooking it up to nother board and nothing happened still. Would I be able to attach the reset cables, and wiring from the Mach up to the motherboard still, and just use the heatsink and fan? That way I should be able to figure out if its motherboard compatability right?? I think it could work out that way, and if it doesnt, i can try a different PSU to the mach, and test it again, correct??

 

[boardy]

Seal string can be re-used so just use the stuff that you took off when removing the Mach unit from the mobo in the first place. Di-electric grease isn't really needed for Mach units. I would think if way too much is used it could maybe stop stuff working but I very much doubt it.

If you have tried the CPU in a different mobo and it still doesn't work, I'd say it's a fubar'd processor. I can't see the PSU being the culprit to that one tho because they wouldn't be allowed to sell it if it killed CPU's. I was running an Enermax with my FX53 and everything was fine. Definately sounds like a processor thing.

Attaching the cables to the mobo will defo test the compatability of the mobo and Mach I. You can indeed try a different PSU no problem.

Hope you get it sorted mate

Boardy

 

[Abital]

Hope i do too, this whole thing has just been an incredible mess. Ill let you know what goes on after the testing for your knowledge

 

[verbalGynt]

Sounds alot like the P4 problem with some mobos and the Mach I. They don't hold reset so the computer doesn't boot because the proc gets too hot and shuts the board down. Can you power the Mach unit with another PSU and then use your Enermax for your PC? Wait until the Mach unit gets down to temp and then power the PC up and see what happens then.

Boardy

By power with another PSU you mean leave the prometia power and reset switch leads spliced into the mainboard power and reset posts and just plug in the prometia molex connector into a seperate PSU to turn on and off manually?

 

[boardy]

No, basically plug the Mach I into the mains as normal, then get a seperate PSU do the jumper trick on it so that it starts up with no mobo and plug a molex into the Mach unit.

Connect the mobo and switches exactly how you would for AIR cooling. Leave the Mach unit UNPLUGGED from the mobo, because the Mach I's use the PSU as their startup and not the powerswitch like Mach II's.

It's easy to do you just need to know the jumper trick for ATX PSUs, or easier still, use an AT PSU with a built-in switch .

Need any more help on this gimme a shout.

Cheers

Boardy

 

[Arterion]

What's an AT PSU?

 

[verbalGynt]

An AT is an old standard for power supplies. Any power supply you buy now in stores is ATX.

The solution offered has the drawback though of 1) having to turn everything on and off manually and 2) prometia won't shutdown the pc if it goes past its heat threshold. Not that big of a deal I guess as long as the motherboards own internal sensors shut down the cpu fast enough in case of failure.

What motherboards do we know work by holding reset? I have tried asus P4C800 and abit ic7-max3 and neither do. Does the Mach2 have the same problem or did they do something different?

 

[boardy]

The Mach II doesn't hold reset mate, the power switch actually turns the Mach unit on and then the mach unit turns the mobo on when it's at temp.

Boardy

 

[verbalGynt]

That must be on a circuit board or something? Can you buy just that component and rewire the mach1 compressor to use it?

How does the mach2 draw power if the power to motherboard is suspended? Does it have its own powersupply?

 

[boardy]

1) Unfortunately the Mach I isn't compatible with the Mach II circuit boards, and there not available anymore since nVentiv went bust.

2) The Mach II has some sort of power supply yes. Basically its control board is its motherboard if you can picture that, which has high power relays on. When the power switch is pushed the board sees this and switches the relays over to supply power to the compressor. Thats the simple working of it, it's much more complicated than that but I havn't figured much more out yet.

The Mach I does the same only using the main mobo in the system as it's realy if you will, and uses simple technology to simulate the reset button being held down until the right temps are met, and releases reset. This is where problems arrise with boards that don't hold reset and why nVentiv came up with a new design for the controllers.

The plug that goes into the Mach unit is the power for the compressor and Mach unit. Nothing is actually powered by the PSU in the PC on the Mach units unlike Vapo PE, and XE's, the molex is only used to let the control board know that the PC is powering up and not to shut down again. Uses some sort of PIC Microcontroller in it, with a built in program running enabling all of this in the Mach II systems. The Mach I was the same sort of idea only much simpler.

Cheers

Boardy

 

[verbalGynt]

That's kind of what I thought.

Depressing.

 

[verbalGynt]

Vaopchill's older units seems to have some problems with these boards that don't hold reset as well.

http://forum.vapochill.com/showthread.php?postid=21397#post21397

They seem to be using the reset out of their unit and splicing into the PWR_OK of the mainboard PSU.

Couldn't same thing be used on the Prometia mach1? The case power switch would close PWR_ON turning on both the prometia and the mainboard power.

I'm assuming the reset out from the mach1 is closed at this point until operating temp is reached? If you spliced the reset out from the mach1 into PWR_OK and ground wouldn't this close the circuit on PWR_OK out from the psu to the mainboard preventing normal POST from happening until which time the mach1 came up to temp and opened the PWR_OK?