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Dead PC?
Mark Allanson - 28/6/07 at 08:04 PM

Swithched on my pc tonight and it hung on startup, just a mouse pointer and hourglass on a black screen. No amout of rebooting would get ANYTHING on the screens, no BIOS - nothing.

I reset the CMOS, removed all the PCI cards, DVD drives, hard drives in sequence, replaced the AGP graphics with an old PCI vid card to test, and still nothing.

I am now down to either the MB, processorr or memory.

The system is a ASUS A7N8X-X with a socket A 3200 AMD with 3x512m of PC3200.

Is there anything I have missed, or any suggestions before I increase my overdraft again

Thanks in advance
Mark
(At least the laptop is still working!)

rayward - 28/6/07 at 08:09 PM

could be the power supply, quite cheap to replace.

maybe worth a shot

Ray

blakep82 - 28/6/07 at 08:18 PM

my mate's did something similar. turned out it was some fairly major corruption of windows. something to do with a java update it think

Mark Allanson - 28/6/07 at 08:20 PM

quote:
Originally posted by rayward
could be the power supply, quite cheap to replace.

maybe worth a shot

Ray


I upgraded the power supply about 3 months ago, does anyone know how to test with a basis multimeter? Just so i can remove it from the list of suspects

andyharding - 28/6/07 at 08:27 PM

No way to test it for sure but I'd guess on the PSU too.

If it's memory the motherboard will usually beep at you.

Mark Allanson - 28/6/07 at 08:40 PM

I have all the LEDs illuminated on the MB, and the power light is shining bright, but I suppose that doesn't prove anything, I will try the old supply to see if that makes any difference

coozer - 28/6/07 at 08:45 PM

Hey Blakep82! your crap notice of my machine is WRONG!

Get rid of it, we have enough crap from the government spying on us

RichardK - 28/6/07 at 08:47 PM

Prob main board , if memor processor you should at least get a bios screen and plenty of beeps.

Tried with only video card installed no mem, processor or disks etc in?

Regards

Rich

Catpuss - 28/6/07 at 08:59 PM

With duff memory you should get lots of beeps as said. Missing graphics card is something like long beeps generally.

If the lights on the mobo come on then the PSU is *probably* OK. CPU could be shagged, but if its a cheapish mobo look at the capacitors, espesh around the CPU. If the tops are swolled (usually a slight dome shape on top) its to good chance that they have failed. I've seen countless Dell mobos have this problem. All looks perfect, then one day it either just shuts down sparodically then gives up or just doesn't boot one morning.

ecosse - 28/6/07 at 09:16 PM

This will help with testing the PSU

http://www.pcguide.com/ref/power/sup/funcVoltages-c.html

And if you haven't already, you could try reseating the CPU

Although it does sound like Mobo failure I'm afraid

Cheers
Alex

CaptainJosh - 28/6/07 at 09:17 PM

Did you turn it off and on again?


(couldn't help it)

flak monkey - 28/6/07 at 09:23 PM

So its not even showing the bios screen? But you are getting a cursor, so the graphics card is working at least?

As others have said, the bios will beep a series of beeps for std faults, such as GPU, RAM and CPU failures.

I would hazard a guess that the MB has died, not uncommon, but its usually as the result of something else such as a PSU blowing, and then they usually take the MB, CPU and RAM with them. It could be that the bios has been totally corrupted...

However if its getting to loading windows, then i would suggest its a corruption of a major windows file.

David

flak monkey - 28/6/07 at 09:25 PM

quote:
Originally posted by coozer
Hey Blakep82! your crap notice of my machine is WRONG!

Get rid of it, we have enough crap from the government spying on us


If you are that bothered you had better stop surfing the net It displays freely available info which is broadcast by every computer connected to any network. Its really very easy to get the info, and any server you connect to needs it to be able to transfer data to you. Also works well at scaring people who think they are being spied on .

David

Mark Allanson - 28/6/07 at 09:38 PM

quote:
Originally posted by flak monkey
So its not even showing the bios screen? But you are getting a cursor, so the graphics card is working at least?

As others have said, the bios will beep a series of beeps for std faults, such as GPU, RAM and CPU failures.

I would hazard a guess that the MB has died, not uncommon, but its usually as the result of something else such as a PSU blowing, and then they usually take the MB, CPU and RAM with them. It could be that the bios has been totally corrupted...

However if its getting to loading windows, then i would suggest its a corruption of a major windows file.

David


David,

It only got a cursor on the first attempted boot, but I suppose that does suggest that the vid is OK, the lack of boot is still present with the hard drive disconnected so that probably excludes a window problem!

I will test the power supply with the old one tomorrow, and I have an 1800athlon to check the processor, and I could remove the RAM and replace one at a time to test them. I still suspect the MB, but stand to be corrected

blakep82 - 28/6/07 at 09:45 PM

quote:
Originally posted by flak monkey
quote:
Originally posted by coozer
Hey Blakep82! your crap notice of my machine is WRONG!

Get rid of it, we have enough crap from the government spying on us


If you are that bothered you had better stop surfing the net It displays freely available info which is broadcast by every computer connected to any network. Its really very easy to get the info, and any server you connect to needs it to be able to transfer data to you. Also works well at scaring people who think they are being spied on .

David


yep, and also every server that has any picture linked to on here has yours, and my, and everyones info sent to it. i can't see your info, and its nothing to do with the government, so calm down...

yes, i'd have to say major corruption of a windows file too, if it manages to load part of windows then its not memory, mother board should be working ok for it to load as far as it does, same fromCPU, and power supply.

Mark Allanson - 28/6/07 at 09:59 PM

quote:
Originally posted by blakep82
quote:
Originally posted by flak monkey
quote:
Originally posted by coozer
Hey Blakep82! your crap notice of my machine is WRONG!

Get rid of it, we have enough crap from the government spying on us


If you are that bothered you had better stop surfing the net It displays freely available info which is broadcast by every computer connected to any network. Its really very easy to get the info, and any server you connect to needs it to be able to transfer data to you. Also works well at scaring people who think they are being spied on .

David


yep, and also every server that has any picture linked to on here has yours, and my, and everyones info sent to it. i can't see your info, and its nothing to do with the government, so calm down...

yes, i'd have to say major corruption of a windows file too, if it manages to load part of windows then its not memory, mother board should be working ok for it to load as far as it does, same fromCPU, and power supply.


I really don't think it is windows as the hard drive is now in a different room!

blakep82 - 28/6/07 at 10:05 PM

^oh, er, right. ok then....

britishtrident - 29/6/07 at 06:32 AM

In order check

Cooling Fan
Memory --- cut it down to one chunk and try booting
Processor

Mark Allanson - 29/6/07 at 08:33 PM

All now working, albeit with an athlon 1800 instead of the 3200 which seems to be totally dead.

I checked through the temperature log, and it never went above 36°C, just seems to have expired like a lamp bulb.

At least its working, if at a slower speed.

Thanks to everyone who helped, much appreciated

Thanks
Mark