Hardware problem?

Casper_aa

Casper_aa

Casper_aa

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8 Feb 2009
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5
For the past few months i have been having trouble getting my PC to startup. Its a relatively new pc (this year) and works quite well once it is on, but it still encounters problems even then.

Firstly turning it on:

If i shutdown or reboot my pc it wont come back on. Everything appears to be starting up but the monitor stays black.

If i power it off though (keeping my session stored) it comes on most of the time, though this is not always the case.

Usually there is no beeps, but on rare occassions i will try turning it on and i will get 1 long beep followed by 1 short beep. Apparently this means its a DRAM error but seeing as i usually get no beeps i have a feeling it is a faulty motherboard.

Secondly once it is on:

It usually works absolutely fine, i can even run Crysis on the highest settings with no problem at all. But recently i have been having a few problems when playing games.

I have mostly been playing Left 4 Dead recently, and i will sometimes get white blocks followed by thin blue lines at the top half of the screen. Then my game will freeze and the monitor will go black. I tried pressing my graphics card up (probably not a good idea) and everything went back to normal and i continued playing with no problems.

At first i thought it was just this game, but today i decided to play Thief 2 and when i got to the menu those pesky blue lines showed up. I loaded a game and the same thing happened! So now im thinking perhaps i have graphics card problem or a faulty motherboard? I mean this game is pretty old, there MUST be something wrong if i cant even run this game properly.

So to summarise, i am having trouble getting the pc to startup and when it does occassionally i get blue lines and it freezes.

Any ideas? Oh and im a hardware n00b so please use dumbspeak cause im really awful with technical jargon even if it sounds simple to you. :D

Here is some system specs too:

4GB RAM
ATI HD 4870 Video card
Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q6600 @ 2.40GHz
Abit IP35 Pro Motherboard
 
I would try reassembling the components and try it with only the necessary components motherboard, CPU, memory GPU, that should help you track down the faulty component.
 
Casper_aa said:
Firstly turning it on:

If i shutdown or reboot my pc it wont come back on. Everything appears to be starting up but the monitor stays black.
Click to expand...
I have also had this problem, and haven't yet bothered fixing it, but I find the probability of a correct startup increases if after shutdown I unplug the plug from the wall... but it might just be coincidence.

although at the moment this is not my prime concern as now the whole thing won't even go into BIOS...
 
mine did this also, i unplugged it from the wall and left it for the night, in the morning i got the bios screen up but then it hung on me.

Just got a replacement cpu so i am hoping that it will fix it. I haven't checked the psu but everything powers on so i doubt that the psu is the problem.
 
Now that you mention CPU, i do have better luck when i fiddle around with disconnecting the power cable/pulling the plug when turning it on. But then it also comes on if i push up the graphics card.

Im not really experienced with assembling components so im not really sure if it would be wise for me to do things myself.
 
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I'd start by checking out the graphics card and the PSU.

Take the graphics card out, clean any dust off the connector and out of the slot, and refit it firmly and screw in tightly.

What PSU are you using (make and model)?
 
My system is

Intel Core 2 DUO LGA775 E6600 2.40GHz Retail
Abit IP35-E
2GB Corsair XMS2-6400C5 DDR2 Dual Channel Kit
Nvidia 8800GTS 320

Last night the kids were ****ing arround upstairs on my comp and one of them fell of the seat and they said "there was a long bleep and then I pulled out the power cable" !! I went upstairs and the comp wouldnt boot at all. Something was touching the case and there was quite a lot of bleeping. After a while I decided to reset the CMOS unplug the MB Battery and leave the comp unplugged overnight.
Now it wont boot at all and as above the screen stays black! The power leds are coming on on the MB, the fans are going but no bleeps and no post screen. I have taken out the GFX Card and put in a diff one same thing. I am not sure if its a ABIT IP35 thing or my MB or CPU is fcuked :( Any ideas?:(
 
I just wanna bump my old thread as my pc still having the same problems.
The main problem is that it wont come on, i even got someone to take the machine away for repairs and after they tried replacing the cpu, motherboard and graphics card they still couldnt get it running.

I am able to get it running at random though, and when it is running it works fine. Perhaps its another piece of harddware at fault? Or some sort of connection problem?

It's a really puzzling problem. :confused:
 
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