GTX 780 TI prevents post

I bought an Asus GTX780TI with DirectCUII cooler on it last night.

Here's a list of the diagnostic steps attempted so far:

Machine specs:
Intel i7-2600K
Asus P8Z68-V PRO
Corsair TX850 850W PSU
1xSamsung 840 250GB SSD
1xCorsair 120GB SSD
2xSeagate 500GB HDD
Windows 7 Home Premium

Previous cards that worked successfully:
Sapphire 2GB Radeon HD 6950
2xHIS 2GB iTurbo Radeon HD 7850

I came home with the new card last night, pulled the 7850s, and installed the 780ti hardware. At this point the machine did not post.

The motherboard seems to run a test cycle every time it boots. There are red LEDs that light when errors occur. They cycle through CPU_OK, MEM_OK, VGA_OK, and BOOT_DEVICE_LED.

Throughout this process, the light always stops on BOOT_DEVICE_LED when the 780ti is installed. Any other set up lights each for ~.5s, and off we go to windows.

Removing the 780ti and plugging a DVI cable into the motherboard itself boots into bios, and windows.

I verified that the 780ti is getting enough power, there's 2 LEDs that light green when the correct power is connected.

I booted with no card, uninstalled the catalyst drivers, and installed the Geforce drivers. Still no post.

Inserting the card into a different PCIe port also results in the same issue.
At this point I assumed the card to be defective, and went to bed.

This morning, I drove down to the store I bought it at, and they offered to test it on their rigs. It booted and had no issues.

Speaking to their technician, He recommended that I update from the 3402 to the 3603 BIOS. He also mentioned that it was most likely an issue with the card being PCIE3.0 and my board only PCIE2.0.

Now I have flashed the BIOS, and the problem persists.

I've also done some research on PCIE2.0/3.0, and it seems like 2.0 can support up to 500Gb/s, where the card only requires ~340 (units might be wrong here)

So here I am with a beast of a card working as a fan to help circulate the air in my basement.

Any help would be appreciated.

TL;DR Card prevents post. BOOT_DEVICE_LED is lit. Power to cards seems fine. Motherboard is fine with no cards. PCIe slots work with other cards. Card works in other computer. Help!

 

Looks like you have taken all the logical steps.

Illogical steps you might try (not step by step, just directions to try):
0) If you are overclocking return everything to stock
1) Reinstall one of the old ATI cards
2) Be sure your onboard video is off in the BIOS
3) Check that the ATI card has no drivers, they hide well and can mess things up
4) Put your 780 in, leave the video on the ATI
5) install nVidia drivers and see if they find the 780
6) pull the ATI card

7) change your power supply or run a second power supply

8) post back here if you see anything change

 

Hey DOA,

I managed to get it figure out in the last day or so.

Turns out the motherboard has 3 PCIe x16 ports.

Port one runs at 16x speed in isngle card configuration.

Port two borrows half from port one in a dual config for 8x/8x.

Port 3 is irrelevant here.

What it looks like happened is the motherboard managed to confuse itself into thinking it was in dual card mode, probably due to the previous hardware installation, and possibly due to me testing both ports alternately.

Somehow, this setting persisted through the bios update, and it wasn't until I reset the CMOS with the jumper pins that it started to work.

I am guessing that this card can't run at the slower speed, but that doesn't quite make sense. Regardless, it's working now.

After that it crashed my PC every time the drivers installed, but here I am with a fresh install of Windows 7, and a working video card from hell.

I'm downloading the free copy of Assassin's Creed IV as I type this.

All that said, your suggestions do make lots of sense and I will keep them in mind should a problem like this arise again.

Thank you for your offer for assistance!

 

Gratzz on getting it going and thanks for posting how you did it.