Help, wife's computer failed!

prescott28

prescott28

prescott28

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Well, title says it all!

The machine is

Mobo - Gigagbyte GA G33 micro board
Processor Intel Dual core
Windows 7

The machine has been having bouts of working or not when switched on and was running last night after a lot of trying. Today, though, nothing. There is no output to the screen at all. I have tried swapping between the graphics card and the mobo for the output to the monitor to see if there was any graphics card problem but nothing there. Everything seems to run otherwise.

The only clue I have is that sometimes the CPU far seems to not run . Could this suggest the CPU could have overheated? If so, how could I test this?

Any other ideas would be gratefully accepted to get this fixed.
 
Thanks for the reply, edscdk. When I press the power button -

The case lights come on
Fans come on
Noise suggestive of some disk action happen but only for a short time. (sorry no disc activity light on case)

That's about it.
 
koooowweeee said:
if the cpu is overheating the fan and heat sink could be clogged up with dust. have you clocked it?

test different ram sticks in each slot
Click to expand...

even if you remove the HS /Fan you are going to see some initial bios boot stuff... so its not likley to be overheating..
 
Ah, but that's the problem - there is no output to the screen at all. Not even any bios output. If I had bios output I could work things out rather more easily.
 
prescott28 said:
Thanks for the reply, edscdk. When I press the power button -

The case lights come on
Fans come on
Noise suggestive of some disk action happen but only for a short time. (sorry no disc activity light on case)

That's about it.
Click to expand...

very hard to diagnose then, could be anything

could be the screen if there is some disk activity (windows might stop booting with some message about something)... or it could jsut be the disk clunking about after power up making it sound like activity...

I would

1) disconnect CD / HD carbles from the mobo, and any other cable thats not power or power switch
2) remove any cards that dont need to be in there
3) remove both memory sticks and put 1 back in

power on see what happens, if it does not work remove the memory stick and try the other (assuming you have 2)

if that fails try both sticks in another memory slot

can you try a different screen...

if none of that works you are running out of free things to try and you will need to start buying bits.... most likley to be the mobo but if you can borrow a PSU or a memory stick (of you only have 1 stick) its worth a go...
 
I had a very similar issue with my old PC, which now belongs to my brother. I'd turn the power on and the case fans and lights came on but no output on the screen.

As it turns out the CPU was overheating because the thermal paste had dried up and wasn't working properly. I took the CPU out cleaned it and re-applied new paste and presto the PC was working again.
 
You might have to actually take out the gfx card to test the mobo output, I think some boards turn off the onboard if there is a gfx card plugged in.

Doesn't sound as if it would be gfx card though if it's just powering straight down?
 
Thanks for all the help so far, guys.

I have now removed all but one stick of RAM and the drives and there is no graphics output from either the graphics card or the mobo graphics ouput. No BIOS screen appears and the monitor never even indicates it has signal by stopping flashing. I'll try removing the graphics card but suspect I already know the answer.

So, we come down to the mobo or the CPU. Having recently had to replace a Gigabyte motherboard on my own machine (that was out of warranty because the 3 years starts at manufacture and not the date bought!) I am suspicious of the mobo more than the CPU. I am therefore inclined to replace the mobo and see what happens.

Anyone got any suggestions as to anything else I could check by way of deciding if it is mobo or CPU or is replacing the mobo the only really helpful way to go?
 
Generally speaking CPUs don't die unless they've been horribly mistreated, I suspect you're right in thinking that the motherboard is to blame.
 
prescott28 said:
Anyone got any suggestions as to anything else I could check by way of deciding if it is mobo or CPU or is replacing the mobo the only really helpful way to go?
Click to expand...

If the CPU fan has failed and the bios setting is set to monitor for it, some motherboards just turn themselves off as soon as they sense the fan isn't spinning. This might happen so quickly that the monitor hasn't had time to come out of standby on post before it powers off.

Otherwise it sounds like the motherboard to me.

Good luck!

E-I
 
If you dont have any more bits to test buy Gigabyte GA-G41M-ES2L Intel G41 (Socket 775) DDR2 microATX from over clockers for £33.98 problem fixed! (probably) if its not that stick it on MM ill buy it from you for the same price if you post it first... (can pay via PPG)
 
MOBO replacement is gonna be a lot of work also if its not the problem you will be stuck with one except if the guy above is really gonna buy it off you.
 
Sounds like a good idea to get a board ordered up straight away. It might be a bit of work - it is is a small desktop case so will be really fiddly - but I don't see much else to try. I am down to mobo, CPU or RAM and having 4 sticks of RAM and each tried I don't think it is RAM.

After my last experiences from Gigabyte, however, I am not too keen on Gigabyte and will probably go for Asus instead this time.
 
Silenced said:
I don't know if anyone has mentioned it but you might want to just check that the monitor even works on another PC
Click to expand...

Sorry, forgot to mention that. I link my net book to the monitor that is usually connected to the PC and it worked fine - actually a very good picture for such a small device!

Thanks for the suggestion though.
 
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