Or by only putting one stick of memory in, or changing the slot you’re using.
I was assembling a computer and everything seemed to be correct, the fan would spin up, I’d get some lights, but there was no image on the screen, not even the BIOS. I saw someone else make this suggestion and didn’t think it was likely to work, but it did. First I just tried one stick, and it booted. Then I tried both sticks and it didn’t work, but I reseated and then it did.
(Also worth pointing out that your motherboard should have diagnostic lights which if you check the documentation may point out which component has an issue)
Thinking about Lemmy’s demographics many here may have heard of something like this, or have more helpful suggestions about troubleshooting which would be welcome. But thought I’d write out a little post about my experience to contribute to Lemmy SEO supremacy.
Many modern motherboards will also do memory training the first time you boot with new RAM sticks, and sometimes this is very slow. Your PC will boot to a black screen and behave exactly like it would with a dead CPU or RAM… there’s no visual feedback.
This once caught me off guard and I spent a good hour panicking trying to diagnose a non-existing issue. Sometimes, you just literally have to wait in a black screen for a while.