New Network Adapter causing boot up problems with Optiplex 790

Question

The secretary at our company recently had an issue with her computer not connecting to our network/internet. I traced it to either a bad Ethernet port on the motherboard or some other fault related to that. I purchased the Broadcom NetXtreme 10/100/1000 Mbps Gigabit Network Card PCI-E SFF for DELL from NewEgg after looking at the specs for my computer and seeing that as a valid replacement.

I installed the drivers and hooked everything up fine and it all worked. The next day, now I'm getting my boot screen, then it goes black and I see a 1 3 4 on the tower of my PC. After some research, I found that I needed to reset my CMOS/BIOS settings. I did that and after a restart, it boots up perfectly. I shut down the machine to confirm that it will reboot and be fixed still. Only to find that when I reboot, I get the same problem! I'm so confused. I know the card isn't bad, because it works when I reset the BIOS. Why would it only work the first time after resetting the BIOS? HELP!!!!

Side note: If I remove the new network card and start my machine, it works perfectly, I just cannot access my network or the internet because the on board Ethernet port is not working.

Thanks!

tbayler · Answer

Brad,

My bios version is ao5. I just updated it to the most recent version of ao5 last week when troubleshooting, per an online suggestion. I had already disabled the NIC. I do not have another PCI-E slot to plug the card in to. On Friday I was able to power on, log in, and work on my network just fine. However, after letting the unit sit for around an hour without being used, the keyboard/mouse froze up and nothing was happening. No lights were blinking, nothing. The fans were still spinning and I still had my desktop image on the screen. Just no function of any peripherals.

any other suggestions? I powered up fine today as well, but I'm assuming the keyboard and mouse is going to stop working again. Please let me know if you need more information or anything. I currently have my secretary set up with a spare computer so I can pretty much try anything whenever is convenient for you.

Thanks,

Tucker

Brad L (retired) · Answer

Hi Tucker,

Thanks for the update. Can you send me your Service Tag on the machine in an email? I am sending you an email from my Dell email address now to request this. I wanted to look into this a bit further before declaring the board failed/is failing etc.

Thanks,

Brad

Networking, Internet, & Bluetooth

New Network Adapter causing boot up problems with Optiplex 790

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