PCI-CAN card damaged two out of three PC's upon install

[tedb]

I just purchased two new PC's and two new PCI-CAN cards.  I had setup the first PC and it was working fine without the PCI-CAN card.  I then shut it down and installed the PCI-CAN card, and then I attempted to power up the PC.  At that point the PC refused to start, it would power up for a couple of seconds and then it would shutdown again, it would then wait a few seconds and then it would try to restart again, and the cycle just repeated itself.  So I powered off the PC and removed the PCI-CAN card and tried again to restart the PC with the same results. 
 
At this point I wasn't sure if the PCI-CAN card was faulty or if the PC was faulty, so I installed the PCI-CAN card into an older PC that I didn't mind losing if the PCI-CAN card damaged it.  This time the PC started up and windows XP found the new hardware and I was able to install the drivers for the card and everything seemed fine.  So I took my second new PC (identical to the first PC) and attempted to install the PCI-CAN  card (the same one that I had installed into the other two PC's).  Unfortunately, I have had the same results as the first PC that stopped working. All the second PC with do is to try to start for a couple of seconds and then shut off for a few seconds and then try to restart again with the cycle repeating itself.
 
Now, I don't know what to think, I didn't think that PCI cards were so picky about the PC's that they go into, has anyone else seen anything like this or have any suggestions that I can try?  
 
 
 
Tedb

[Lauren L]

Hi Tedb,
 
I have never heard of this happening.  What CAN cards are you using?  What particular computer did this happen to?  Are the computers running the latest version of the BIOS?  You may want to consider calling in to our support line at 1-866-275-6964, so that we can look into this further.
 
Regards,
 
Lauren L

[DirkW]

Hi,
I have seen this with computer mainboards, when there was still power on it. Are you really sure you switched the computer off? There is typically a on/off switch on the computers backplane. If not, you need to unplug the power cable, before you install or uninstall any hardware to the PCI slots. Thats because there is still power on the mainboard.
If that is not the case, please let us know which version of mainboard or PC yopu are using, thus we can try to reproduce it here.
DirkW

[tedb]

I turned the rocker switch on the back of the power supply off and waited for the power LED (labelled SB_PWR) on the mainboard to turn off, then I installed the card.  The power cord was still plugged into the power supply though, so I guess can't rule it out 100%.  The computer hardware is:
ASUS mainboard P5K SE, Intel Core 2 Duo 1333MHZ, 2GB Ram
400W Power supply
GeForce 8600GT 256MB Video card (PCIe)
250GB SATA Hard Drive
20x DVDRW
USB Mouse and keyboard

[tedb]

Here is some additional information that I found.  According to the NI-DNET user manual the PCI-CAN card has this for a power spec:
 

Power requirement ................................. +5 VDC, 775 mA typical
 
To me, this looks like the manual is saying that it is a 5V PCI card, is that correct, because the new PC's have 3.3V PCI slots, that would explain why it cooked the new PC's but worked in the old PC (I'm betting that the old one either has 5V slots or supports both 5V and 3.3V, but I have not confirmed that yet).  Can anyone confirm if that is the case or not?  If it is is there a 3.3V version of the PCI-CAN card (PN  777358-01)?  I am using it for a DeviceNet application.

[tedb]

This is my first project using NI hardware and software, so I am probably mixing up my terminology, the card has PCI-CAN on the silk screen and the part number that was ordered for me was 777358-01.  The intent for this is to connect the PC to some devicenet hardware (I am not sure of the part numbers yet) in a LabView project.  If the documentation is correct for this card and it is strictly for a 5V PCI bus, is there an equivalent card that will work for devicenet hardware that will run on a 3.3V PCI bus.  I ran across the following in the NI-DNET user manual, to me it looks like I can't use the  series 2 card, that handles both 5V and 3.3V PCI busses for devicenet applications:
 


Hardware in CAN kits is referenced as Series 2. Hardware in DeviceNet

kits is referenced as Series 1. Series 2 CAN cards cannot be used with the

NI-DNET software (NI-CAN only). The features of Series 2 CAN cards are

specifically designed for CAN applications, and provide no distinct
advantages for DeviceNet
 

[DirkW]

I thought about this again and i doubt that your motherboard doesn't support 5 volts PCI. If it would not support 5 volts it should have a plastic block within the pci slot to prevent 5 volt boards from plugging into it.
You should contact ASUS for Support. This could be a mainboard problem.
And no the universal PCIO Series 2 CAN boards do not support the DNET specifications and therefore do not work with NI-DNET.
DirkW