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I recently put together a PC, intended to be used as a x86 router running either IPFire or OPNsense, but that's not so relevant yet, since when I try to turn it on, it doesn't even get pass POST. Instead the machine beeps 5x, which according to the EVGA motherboard manual means it's either "No Console Output Device detected" or "No Console Input Device detected". However, the keyboard, mouse & monitor are connected; the two input devices light up, and I'm inclined to assume they should work.

So it's the monitor/console output that worries me. About a week ago I'd already ran into this same 5 beeps error when I'd tried to do the OS install using a much older graphics card, and made this post on Reddit asking for help, and to confirm my suspicion that the problem was due to the ancient graphics card. The one responder seemed to agree, and so I went and purchased a GTX 970, hoping that this would solve the supposed HW compatibility issue b/w the GPU and motherboard. But as it stands, I'm still getting the 5 beeps error alert when turning it on. So now I'm not even certain that the GPU/mobo compatibility was an issue initially with the old graphics card (an ATI Radeon HD 4350 from circa 2008/2009).

Also just to clarify, the motherboard (EVGA Z370 mATX) does not have any built-in video output ports. So even though the Celeron CPU has an iGPU, I'm unable to take advantage of it, thus forcing me to use a video card for the ports alone.

This is how the rig looks like currently. It might be hard to verify from the pic alone, but I'm fairly confident I've wired things up correctly (but ofc I cannot completely discount this being a potential point of failure).

This is the PCPartPicker Part List for reference; and it seems to agree that there are no hardware compatibility issues.

I also list the parts below for convenience:

  • CPU: Intel Celeron G4900T 1.8 GHz Dual-Core OEM/Tray Processor
  • CPU Cooler: Intel E97379-001 CPU Cooler
  • Motherboard: EVGA Z370 Micro ATX Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard
  • Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 8 GB (2 x 4 GB) DDR4-2400 CL15 Memory
  • Storage: Western Digital Blue 250 GB 2.5" Solid State Drive
  • Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 4 GB Video Card
  • Power Supply: EVGA G3 550 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply

Any tips on how to diagnose, or better yet, advice/help on how to solve this problem is much appreciated.

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Any tips on how to diagnose,

According to page 129 of the documentation the 2-digit debug LEDs on the motherboard might help you distinguish between the two possible causes for a 5-beep POST code.

97 - Console Output devices connect
98 - Console input devices connect
...
D6 - No console output devices are found
D7 - No console input devices are found

I would remove any external USB devices (keyboard, mouse, etc), remove the graphics card and see how far the system gets and what ends up showing on the debug LEDs.

If the problem seems to be with the input side, I'd try with a PS/2 keyboard (many keyboards can work with a PS/2 socket using a simple adapter)

The AMI BIOS probably supports headless mode - working without keyboard and graphics.

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After many days of head scratching, I finally stumbled onto the cause. So I'm posting the solution to this particular problem for posterity.

See item 22 on page 18 of the motherboard's manual, i.e. the BIOS Select Switch. This motherboard (and possibly some other similar EVGA mobos) can hold 2 different BIOSes. And for whatever reason, this switch on my board was set to a position where there must have not been any BIOS saved. Flicking the switch to the other position did the trick.

POST now succeeds. And even with the outdated ATI Radeon HD 4350 video card from over a decade ago, I can now access the BIOS displayed on a monitor.

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