pc will not boot after installing pci sound card

[free1959]

I have a Pavilion A6700f running Vista SP2 w/ 4 GB ram and 500 GB HD. The onboard sound went bad so I bought a Diamond Xtreme 5.1 PCI sound card. When I installed it, the pc refused to boot. I have tried another card, assuming that the first one was bad from the factory, but it doesn't boot either. I have tried it with the BIOS setting for the audio on all possible settings, both disabled and auto. I have tried both a parallel port card and an old video card to make sure the slot works, which it does. It will boot with the others I tried as well as without anything in the PCI slot. It just won't boot with either sound card. Any suggestions?

[Big_Dave]

Hi,

Please explain what you mean by the PC refuses to boot?  How far do you get during the boot process?

Check the bios level on your PC.  BIOS level 5.29 is the latest level posted.  If you do update the bios then be sure that you go back into the bios and disable the on board sound.

[free1959]

When I turn it on, the drives initialize and the fans turn on. No video signal and no keyboard lights. I had 5.28 BIOS so I upgraded it. No change. I don't know if it's relevant but my network chip doesn't work either, although it stopped working 15 months ago. Luckily it came with a wireless card so I can still access the web.

[Big_Dave]

Hi,

If both the on board sound chip and the network chip are bad then perhaps you should take your PC into the local PC repair shop for further analysis.  It sounds like your PC got hit by a power surge or it has a faulty power supply that has caused the failures.

[free1959]

I'm starting to think the motherboard may be going bad. I have a 500w power supply that I could swap in but I'm guessing that the damage has already been done.