Can someone tell me what happened?

Discussion in 'General Hardware' started by whitt212, Dec 17, 2004.

  1. whitt212

    whitt212 Geek Trainee

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    I recently had to leave home for a short time so I turned off my computer and unplugged it (due to weather,etc) When I returned home a couple of days later, all it does when I turn it on is beep. Nothing comes up on thescreen or anything. :eek: My OS is Win XP Professional. What can I do to get this thing up and going again? Thanks.
     
  2. Addis

    Addis The King

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    Strange this should happen if its just been unplugged.

    We can help you if you can tell us the motherboard you have and the exact beep codes you get from your computer.
     
  3. ProcalX

    ProcalX all grown up

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    This would not have been caused by a storage problem, if you hard drive stopped working your computer would still boot, but you would receive the error: "Boot Failure: Cannont Find System Disk" or "Boot Failure".

    If your computer is posting no video display on the monitor, this suggests several things..

    Either :
    - Your CPU Is not seated properly
    - Your Memory Is not seated properly
    - Your Video Card Is not seated properly

    Take your case panels off so you can see the hardware, make sure you have good light and try and get your motherboard manual, if you can't find your motherboards manual, download one from the net using another computer.

    Now Reset your CMOS, this is a 3 pinned connection on your motherboard, two of the three pins are covered by a "Jumper" (a small 2 pin covering piece of plastic). Move the Jumper from where they are situated when you find them, to cover the other two pins (the middle pin and the pin on the opposite side), leave for a few seconds, now move it back to its original place.

    Once you have done this try booting up your comuter, if you get the same problem, you know its not the BIOS settings on your computer (doing the above resets your cmos, which loads all default settings for your motherboards BIOS).

    Now, If you have two or more pieces of memory, try one at a time in "Dimm1", "Dimm1" is merely the name of one of the slots in the motherboard.

    For example if you had 4 memory slots (4 places to put memory) they would be called: "Dimm1", "Dimm2", "Dimm3" & "Dimm4"

    "Dimm1" is the slot that is nearest to your Processor (the fan thats on your motherboard ontop of a large heatsink (piece of metal :) )

    Try each piece in Dimm1 one at a time, if one of them works, keep it in that slot (Dimm1) and try adding one at a time in Dimm2, till you narrow down which one's work and which don't.

    If none of that works, you know its not the memory, if you only have one piece of memory try testing it in another computer that will use your type of memory (either DDR or SD) - if u post the speed of the computer and when u got it we can roughly work out what its going to be.

    If none of this works, try removing your graphics card making sure there is no dust in your system, or in the AGP / PCI / PCI-E slot (whatever slot your graphics card is using - most likely AGP), then reseat your graphics card back in the slot it was in.

    If none of this works, you will need to make a note about what the computer is "posting" by posting i mean the "beeps", so get a piece of paper, a pencil and right out as if you are writing morse code, (lines and dots) how the sound is being displayed..

    ie: Short beep, long beep, short beep, short beep, short beep, long beep

    or something.. or just one long beep.

    Then record the make and model of your processor and post back with the details. Then we can try and work out what the problem is.

    Also on the memory side, if you have any extra memory which you KNOW works.. try JUST running that in your system that isn't working.

    If you have a processor that is in another computer that is compatible, swap the processor you KNOW works (beacuse you can use your computer with it) and put it in the computer you are having trouble with.

    This way if the pc then doesnt work you know its the motherboard, or the powersupply.

    Diagnosing a computers hardware fault, is merely a matter of deduction.

    Hope this helps

    - PX
     
  4. Addis

    Addis The King

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    Its probably due to the PSU failing or something which can degrade over time since he hasn't messed with anything its unlikely to be the RAM.
     
  5. whitt212

    whitt212 Geek Trainee

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    Thanks for the fast replies. I will get to work on it as soon as I can and will post back.
     
  6. whitt212

    whitt212 Geek Trainee

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    Well I have tried all the steps given and still come up with the same results. I listened to the beeps and there are 4 short beeps and 1 long beep. My motherboard is a Gigabyte GA6VTX. Hope this will help you help me fix this darn thing. Thanks.
     
  7. Addis

    Addis The King

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    With your mobo, the BIOS is AMI i believe. But I had a look at AMI BIOS beep codes and the closest one to yours is 1 long and 3 short. Which is a memory test failure.
     
  8. whitt212

    whitt212 Geek Trainee

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    Well, I got the memory thing fixed. Thanks. But now the stupid thing hangs up in the middle of booting up. I can get logged on in Safe Mode, but that is it. What the heck am I doing wrong?
     
  9. Addis

    Addis The King

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    Sounds like software problem to me. Do you have your XP disc?
     
  10. Dave35k

    Dave35k H4ck3r

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    if i was you m8 i would reformat your harddrive and re-install your os, unless there is a piece of software u have installed recently u think may have caused the problem, in this case start up in safe mode and uninstall it. If you have installed any new hardware such as a graphics card with drivers start up in safe mode (as this doesn't use drivers) and uninstall it and see if that works. hope it helped Dave.
     
  11. whitt212

    whitt212 Geek Trainee

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    I don't have any XP discs. My ex built this puter for me. The only thing I could not do was clear the CMOS. On my mboard, It said that this was an optional feature. No pegs to reset it. Also nothing to tell me how to get it set back to where it was originally. I have 2 hard drives on this thing. If I move all of my main stuff to the F drive and disconnect it, will I lose any info on it if I reformat the C and will it work?
     
  12. whitt212

    whitt212 Geek Trainee

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    And now the stupid thing won't let me boot up in safe mode.
     
  13. Addis

    Addis The King

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    I'm not sure simplying copying the data from C to F will work for some reason.
     
  14. Waffle

    Waffle Alpha Geek

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    files such as music and documents will be backed up, so you could do that

    just be sure you don't accidentally delete that partition during XP Setup or you'll lose it anyway.
     
  15. Dave35k

    Dave35k H4ck3r

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    you not lose anything on drive f as long as you format drive c whether you disconnect f or not. it sound to me like someones as been messing with your pc or its a hardrive fault. u might have to see if you can get yourself windows xp as this would make it much easier m8 post back Dave
     

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