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MSI MEG X570 Godlike VGA Error

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Everytime I boot the desktop, my MSI X570 Godlike motherboard gets stuck at an “A2” VGA Error.
Furthermore, it will always sit there for approx 28 seconds and then seem to “advance past the error” and continue booting and within 14 additional seconds, it has gotten me to my sign in screen and from there everything works perfectly and as it should.
After 25 restarts and boots, I found a pattern.

I boot up the machine and the LED screen on the motherboard cycles through a bunch of startup codes for about 10 seconds.
 
Then the LED switches to an “A2” code and sits there for 2 seconds
 
Then after 2 seconds, it shows “VGA Error” with “A2” code above it. And it just sits there for 25-28 seconds on average.
At this point my screen will show a black screen with a white blinking underscore in the top left corner.
 
Then strangely it just advances past the error and starts cycling through a whole bunch of other codes. At this point it brings up the Boot Screen where it shows “MEG” (the model of my motherboard) and spinning circles underneath it as it is loading the operating system. It takes an additional 12 seconds until I am sitting at my sign in screen and I can start using my machine as normal.

On average, the total boot time with the error is 50 – 58 seconds.

Here are my system specs if it helps.
 
Motherboard:   MSI X570 MEG Godlike
Processor:          AMD Ryzen 9 3950x
Graphics Card:  ASUS Tuf GEFORCE RTX 3070
RAM:                   Patriot Viper 128GB (x4 32GB Sticks)
Power Supply:   EVGA 850W Gold Plus
Case:                   Couger Panzer Max G
CPU Fan:             Be Quiet Dark Rock Pro 4 BK022
 
I also have a couple of internal drives installed. I have 3 M.2 SSD sticks. One for the operating system, one for installed applications and software, and another for my virtual machines
 
Then I have 1 2.5 Sata 1TB SSD and 1 3.5 SATA 8TB HDD
 
The last thing is a PCIe expansion card that has 4 USB C ports on it that I can plug in my external drives that I run my virtual instruments from for music production.

My GPU is in the pcie x16 and my USB c card is in the pcie x8

And when I’m in the os, all devices and drives work and are operational.

Is this normal? Anyone know what’s going on?

Topic

Start with less parts.

In reply to MSI MEG X570 Godlike VGA Error

You mention all those M.2 and other drives. This is a new build so you start with the bare minimums and work up from there.

Be sure to:
1. Try it with less parts.
2. The BIOS is the latest offered short of BETA versions.
3. Ask in the motherboard maker’s forum why the delay.
4. Look in the BIOS for any onboard video system disable.

It is not possible for me to know what the BIOS entry is as this board is not one we have at the office along with how disparate BIOS and motherboards are today. But we have seen such clear up with BIOS updates and setting changes.

It’s possible this board supports onboard VGA and a BIOS change is required to disable this if the BIOS doesn’t know to do so on its own. Some will call that a bug but I consider this par for the gear I see today.

PS. Another issue we run into.

In reply to MSI MEG X570 Godlike VGA Error

Beyond the BIOS change we sometimes find the owner has transplanted drives with operating systems rather than a clean install which can cause odd delays. To figure this out, along with my other notes above we slip in a clean drive, perform a quick clean install and see where it stands.

Response

In reply to PS. Another issue we run into.

Thank you for your response. I updated the BIOS to the latest version but no luck.
I did however isolate this incident to be encountered any time I have an external or SATA HDD/SSD connected.
If no drives are connected, then I have no issues. If I connect even one external drive then it will mess up and encounter this delay or risk not loading at all.
I figured this might be it trying to boot into this drive instead of the OS so I disabled every device except the main OS drive in boots but still nothing.
I am starting to really scratch my head here. If I scratch any harder I might lose some hair.
I’ve never encountered this before.

MSI MEG X570 Godlike VGA Error

In reply to MSI MEG X570 Godlike VGA Error

I have the exact same situation. My graphics card is an Asus Strix 2080 TI, and my BIOs is version 1.70. This is not a new build, I’ve been running it for about two years. It was a fresh Windows 10 64-bit install, and Windoes is up to date. All my storage is m.2 (all motherboard slots plus the additional PCIE card populated).

Reply To: MSI MEG X570 Godlike VGA Error

In reply to MSI MEG X570 Godlike VGA Error

It usually takes my system about a minute to POST. I have 4 HDDs, 2 SSDs (one NVMe one), two optical drives, two ZIP drives (one internal one USB), a floppy drive, 2 GPUs, and a whack ton of other USB things. I have 12 of 16 USB ports on my machine filled at all times.
I also have a whole bunch of programs installed. And while I don’t have a POST code readout (yet), I do have the LED cycle through their thing before landing on green, and my system POSTs.
I have a diagnostic speaker plugged in as well.

Regards,
Jimmy

[Author]

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