PC will not boot up help!

BriT · 9 Oct 2006 at 18:36

Hello everyone,

Well i am having serious problems with my PC. it won't boot up. The monitor stays in standby mode and i don't hear the boot up beep.
I've had a look inside and there are no lose connections which i can see, anyway, how do i go about troubleshooting the problem and locate what is causing the problem?

BriT · 9 Oct 2006 at 18:46

Hi,

It was a custom built PC (not by me), its a year old and was normally reliable but today it's decided not to work :confused:

CPU and graphics card fans spin and the 4pin power lead is connected to the MB.

BriT · 10 Oct 2006 at 11:56

Well i did what you guys said and nothing seemed to change anything.

Changed the mem, graphics card and PSU but still no luck, doesn't sound right when i boot up, could it be the harddrive? i mean it makes some dodgy noises when i power up then it does nothing..

BriT · 10 Oct 2006 at 14:02

Ok i'll try removing everything first.

Do any places still sell Socket 478 Mobos? i can't really afford buying a mb,cpu, mem and graphics.

BriT · 10 Oct 2006 at 15:12

Hi Michael,

I did what you said, removed all cards(not gfx), floppy, cd-rom and hard drive and now i get the normal beep i get when it worked and the post screen so maybe there is life (fingers crossed).

What next?

BriT · 10 Oct 2006 at 16:01

Ok, well all 3 worked. CD-ROM, Floppy then the Hard drive, all three did the beep and POST screen. So if it isn't the hard drive then what is it? all i have left which isn't plugged in is a LAN card and Sound blaster live card, oh and some usb plugs etc at the back of PC.

BriT · 10 Oct 2006 at 16:30

Well everything seems to be working ok, loaded up normally but i won/t touch wood yet, ill leave it on for a few hours play a few games etc to see if it will keep working. Thanks Michael!Everyone !

Oh and no, the hard drive doesn't make any 'strange' noises now....odd

BriT · 10 Oct 2006 at 17:17

Yep i think you are (sadly) right about the HD issue, The PC only lasted 1 hour before it, rather abrutly, froze when i played Rome : Total War and now the standby issue has reappeared.Although this time it starts to boot but then something happens and it goes into stanby mode.

When it works next time think i'll backup as much as i can and i'll order a new hard drive.

BriT · 11 Oct 2006 at 15:27

Hey,

Well i put the hard drive in the freezer lol my mum gave me an odd look when i did. But anyway i still don't get enough time to transfer the data, it locks up when i start to burn the data from my hard drive to the dvd.

BriT · 12 Oct 2006 at 12:16

Ok an update :

I am now thinking it's not the hard drive after all because now the PC will not boot up no matter what i unplug, disconnect etc, yet sometimes it boots up fine, i'm guessing my Mobo must be on the blink or complety fried now.

Also because i tried a different hard drive and the same problem occurs.

sigh, im getting to the point where i want to lob it out the window, i'm fed up, ill, tired of it all bah

BriT · 13 Oct 2006 at 10:18

The problem is that when i unplug all plug in cards, cd rom, floppy, hard drive now, it has no affect, sometimes it will boot up ok(once in a blue moon). I ve resetr cmos, set default settings in bios and tryed switching the memory to no avail. When it did boot up it ran for about 30min untill it froze.

The annoying thing is, is when i do something like unplug or plug something in, it may boot up but if turn the pc off and attempt to boot up again it doesn't work, so there is no certain pattern.

I ve taken out the cpu(P4 prescott 2.8 Socket 478) to check for damage, none found, although there isn't much thermal paste left. Never did any overclocking.