computer problem

[kwak zzr]

ok so my pc either dont boot up to my desktop or it boots up then shuts its self down and reboots again or the desktop freezes :? if i try 3 or 4 times it will stay on :? like an old tele it need to warm up me thinks :lol: any ideas?

[kwak zzr]

i formated aswell so its not the os.

[kwak zzr]

also running it with the side covers off so it aint overheating.

[sharriso74]

Could be faulty memory

[Marshall]

Could be faulty memory

agreed, sounds like it could be a memory problem

[kwak zzr]

when it boots it does a memory check and its showing 1gig ram?

[kwak zzr]

i run 2 sicks of 512ddr ram if the pc is showing its all there in its memory check it cant be that can it? :?

[Mr Toad]

there is a memory checking utility that you can run - I think it's called something like Memcheck - try a search on google

[Filipe M.]

i run 2 sicks of 512ddr ram if the pc is showing its all there in its memory check it cant be that can it? :?

Is it running the full or the quick check? If you know how to do it, turn the full check on in the bios.

[kwak zzr]

cant find anything of that name, few simalair but they want you to pay for them :?

[kwak zzr]

i run 2 sicks of 512ddr ram if the pc is showing its all there in its memory check it cant be that can it? :?

Is it running the full or the quick check? If you know how to do it, turn the full check on in the bios.

quick check dont know how to enable the full check?

[philipMac]

It might also be the power supply on the way out.

This very difficult to diagnose. Eliminate the other components, memory and hard drive, and then consider the power supply.

In the mean time mate, I would buy myself a little external hard drive, and back my stuff up onto this. You will always have this extra drive for your peace of mind.

[kwak zzr]

computer has been on now for about an hour and its fine, its only when i turn the bloody thing off and it cools down and i try to boot again.

[kwak zzr]

i was actully thinking hdd boot up fault.

[$tevo]

My old 'puter did that until I put a new sound card in it! Go figure...

[kwak zzr]

OB sound?? :roll:

[$tevo]

Nah, took dusty old card out and put new one in - dunno why it fixed it :smt102

[Abyss]

this sounds like one of those problems that is normally solved by formatting and starting from scratch but as you have already done that it really falls onto hardware.

Memory is normally the cause of crappy issues like this but there isnt always an easy way to test without having any space to swap out and try.

first you can try running something like http://www.memtest86.com/ to see if that comes up with anything, if not try ripping out one of the sticks (so your downt to 512) and see if the problem re-arises. If it does rip out the other stick and put the 1st one back in and repeat. If it is a ram problem its not likly to be both sticks so this may help.

Ive had a problem like this be caused by a crappy PSU aswell (cheap jobby that was about a year old)

[kwak zzr]

cheers i try that.

[philipMac]

cheers i try that.

Sniff sniff... still smells like a burnt power supply to me...

[kwak zzr]

pc has been on for ages now and ive had no problems, if it was the power supply it would cut out but not reboot wouldnt it? ive had one pc that had a p s problem and this wouldnt boot at all :?

[Abyss]

not really, boot up is more power intensive to a PSU.

[philipMac]

pc has been on for ages now and ive had no problems, if it was the power supply it would cut out but not reboot wouldnt it? ive had one pc that had a p s problem and this wouldnt boot at all :?

If the PS was on the way out, the output would be a little uneven. This could cause crashes intermitantly. Try playing a CD, and plugging in lots of peripherals onto teh machine to see if you can increade load and induce a crash...

If it was completely dead, it would just not work, like you said.

[Skip]

I would definitely think about swapping out the power supply - this is the third one in my home PC - gradually spent more and more on them until I bit the bullet and bought a decent quality one - you get what you pay for...!

[kwak zzr]

sound like the problem, i find as soon as i boot up if i overload it with things to do it will freeze if cut out compleatly unless its been on for 15mins or so then its ok.

[philipMac]

sound like the problem, i find as soon as i boot up if i overload it with things to do it will freeze if cut out compleatly unless its been on for 15mins or so then its ok.

Yup. Power supply. My sense of smell is keen today. :lol:

[kwak zzr]

so it will graduly get worse then?

[philipMac]

so it will graduly get worse then?

Yup maybe... You might find one day the machine is not booting.

(Did I mention that external hard drive :wink:)
^ is money well spent no matter what you do with that machine. (get at least a USB2 connection. Firewire if you have it... )

[kwak zzr]

because i recently formated because i knew there was something not quite right i already backed up all the important stuff onto dvd's. an external hdd sounds good tho.

[philipMac]

what I do with my "external hd" (which is really a 4 Terabyte Redundant Array of Indep Disks) is I do a sync every night.

I have a little program that runs through my files and sees what ones I have touched, and then syncronises itself to those guys.

This means that I dont have to move the whole lot every week or so, I just do little updates all the time.

And, I can just rewrite over and over files that I am always meddleing with. The program is called rsync. I am not sure if it is available for windows. Its good though, having the flexibility of a hd, aswell as having a couple of DVDs just in case...

[BILLY]

Poor a drink on it and claim off your insurance for a new one :twisted:

[kwak zzr]

:D good idea!

[kwak zzr]

6 times to boot up just! shes on her way out :roll:

[Abyss]

You can get a PSU for next to nothing (but of course if you buy cheap it will die quicker) and they are very easy to change.

Apart from the fact that its generally a good idea to backup your stuff and PSU on the way out wont make you loose any data (unless it explodes and takes out everything but doubt that is going to happen :))

[svgirl78]

ditch the pc :reaper:
and buy a mac! :D

[Tara]

ditch the pc :reaper:
and buy a mac! :D

That would be advice too :D

[Abyss]

ditch the pc :reaper:
and buy a mac! :D

That would be advice too :D

Bad advice :P

[BILLY]

Yeah there big and ugly :lol:

[Quiff Wichard]

Yeah there big and ugly :lol:

Tara nd Sv girl?

or MACS Billy ?

[Tara]

I Love my MAC

[BILLY]

Yeah there big and ugly :lol:

Tara nd Sv girl?

or MACS Billy ?


MACS!!!!!! I would never insult the ladies!!!!

[philipMac]

ditch the pc :reaper:
and buy a mac! :D

That would be advice too :D

Macs run off power supplies too.
The guts of these machines by and large are similar.

The OSX operating system is much better than the OS that Windows uses (DOS). This is basically beyond question.

The question is which GUI you prefer. OSX or Windows. I think the Windows Graphical User Interface (GUI) is actually very well designed, and I prefer it to the OSX GUI. I find Windows to be very usable.

I would not use either OS though, because I use Linux which is much nicer in all respects.

[kwak zzr]

stuck a 400w power supply in and it still does it :evil: i'm going for the graphics card next.

[Marshall]

If it was the graphics card, you should get warning beeps when your trying to start the pc up. are you getting these

[kwak zzr]

no mate, the pc had a fx5200 graphics card in when it was playing up so i put an old geforce mx200 card and it was working fine so i narrowed it down to the card but it just did it again so it cant be the graphics card :roll:

[kwak zzr]

whats next? motherboard? memory?

[Marshall]

have you got 2 sticks of RAM in there,

if you have pull one out, see if you have the same problem, then try the same stick in the other ram slot, and like wise with the other stick

still sounds like ram to me

[kwak zzr]

will try that mate but at the start of bootup it does a memory test and reconizes that the 1028meg of ram is there? could it still be that?

[SoulKiss]

The question is which GUI you prefer. OSX or Windows. I think the Windows Graphical User Interface (GUI) is actually very well designed, and I prefer it to the OSX GUI. I find Windows to be very usable.

The real quesiton is "Once you have your operating system installed, do you want to have any software to run on it?" hehe

Tho admittedly apart from a 3d moddelling proggy I mess around with, I could probably get by on a Mac, as all I do is browse the web, read email and play World of Warcraft these days.

Mind you there isn't a Mac that can touch my setup for 3d capabilities at the moment so my WoW experience would be less good - Dell 24" Widescreen LCD's are really nice for gaming on :)

I would not use either OS though, because I use Linux which is much nicer in all respects.

Amen to that. Currently at work, posting on a nice Dell box, running Debian with VMWare to allow access to Exchange and the rest of the M$ bollox I "need" to do my job.

Still do have a couple of Windows boxes at home, namly the laptops, my gaming boxes and the Mediabox - basically anything the Wife needs to use :)

David

[Marshall]

will try that mate but at the start of bootup it does a memory test and reconizes that the 1028meg of ram is there? could it still be that?

it might all be there, but not be working properly

or one of the ram slots might not be working properly

[kwak zzr]

just running a windows mem test.

[shao]

Hey, came in pretty late on this one, but i would suggest downloading this one:
http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/
Burn it to a cd, and boot the pc with it in. Run the memtest, hd tests, and any of the other testing utils on the disk that pertain to hardware that you have. Should help narrowing things down.

[kwak zzr]

windows mem test shows no faults :?

[kwak zzr]

it was the hard drive :? i'm running my daughters hdd in my pc at the mo with no problems, anyone know of a 80 - 120 gig hdd cheap?

[SpankyHam]

Are you using NTFS or FAT32 ?

I'd run scandisk first - might be able to repair the bad sectors.

Format (Not quickformat) should do it aswell.

All my previous HDD's had some faults after power cuts etc.

scandisk managed to repair them all.

[kwak zzr]

NTFS mate, will try that before i buy a new one.

[mysteryjimbo]

Are you using NTFS or FAT32 ?

I'd run scandisk first - might be able to repair the bad sectors.

Format (Not quickformat) should do it aswell.

All my previous HDD's had some faults after power cuts etc.

scandisk managed to repair them all.

It doesnt repair them, it makes them as BAD in the FAT and never uses them.

Disk are very cheap these days. I'd consider getting a new one with warranty off eBay. I was watching some 80 gig SATA drives a while back to use as a backup RAID. £22 + £7 delivery.

[kwak zzr]

i'm now thinking its not the hdd :? what could it bloody be! its driving me nuts! i'll replace the ide cables then its going to have to go the the comp shop who love charging me around £100 each time it goes in :?

[shao]

Ok so with the other (known good) hard disk, one stick of memory and nothing else attached does it still crash? (ie. take out sound card, graphics card (if you have onboard you can use), netowrk cards if you have them etc...) If so it looks likely to be the mobo ( :( ), if not add things back in till it stops working. re. the cables, surely you can get a cable from the box you got the working disk from to test with?
And is it only crashing after some time now? im guessing so because you originally thought it was working fine with the other disk in.

[fizzwheel]

Sounds main board or CPU problem.

I assuming that you have checked that the CPU cooling fan if your CPU is fitted with one is spinning. I used to find that these got gunked up with dust and fluff. They would then stop spining and fry the CPU which used to then make the PC crash and hang.

Shao's tip about unplugging everything and then plugging things in one by one till you have identified the culprit thats causing your trouble is a good one.

[Sudoxe]

also running it with the side covers off so it aint overheating.

Take the CPU fan/heatsink off, check the termal paste and put the fan/heatsink back on make sure its on properly. P4's dont like having fans even the slightest bit loose.

Dan

[SpankyHam]

I thought he said his temps are all ok ?

Can't be bothered to read all posts again.

But try Speedfan - it shows you all Temps.

[kwak zzr]

all temps are fine.

[kwak zzr]

its not a p4 its a 2.8 amd.

[kwak zzr]

have try'd all the cards, memory, psu, format,but it still does it but its intermitant it can be fine for hours then a right pain in the ass. its just shut down on me 4 times and not let me reboot kept getting bootup errors and jumbled bios? :?

[kwak zzr]

Sounds main board or CPU problem.

I assuming that you have checked that the CPU cooling fan if your CPU is fitted with one is spinning. I used to find that these got gunked up with dust and fluff. They would then stop spining and fry the CPU which used to then make the PC crash and hang.

Shao's tip about unplugging everything and then plugging things in one by one till you have identified the culprit thats causing your trouble is a good one.

i'm now thinking mainboard or cpu :? i wish it would just break altogether it would be easy then.

[fizzwheel]

Personally from what you've said I think your motherboard is FUBAR.

Edit - One more thing. this will sound daft. But I've had troubles before with random rebooting caused by the motherboard shorting out on the mounts inside the case. Might be worth checking that out to.

[Law]

its not a p4 its a 2.8 amd.

Athlon?

[kwak zzr]

me 2 but its an expencive replacement if it turns out not to be.

[kwak zzr]

yea Athlon 2.8xp

[fizzwheel]

me 2 but its an expencive replacement if it turns out not to be.

I just added to my post.

I havent built a PC for ages. How much is new motherboard going to cost. You could always flog it on Ebay if you don't need it and get some money back.

[kwak zzr]

will take a look at that now, the puzzeling thing is its been ok for 18months and i hav'nt even had the side off messing so it sould be ok.

my douts come to mainboard because a; ive try'd everything else and b; it a jetway vb400 board which is what the shop i had the pc off use.(cheepo me thinks)

[Filipe M.]

will take a look at that now, the puzzeling thing is its been ok for 18months and i hav'nt even had the side off messing so it sould be ok.

my douts come to mainboard because a; ive try'd everything else and b; it a jetway vb400 board which is what the shop i had the pc off use.(cheepo me thinks)

Very much cheapo. Try and find a MSI K7N series... got one for 3 years now, not even a single glitch.

[kwak zzr]

sorry but i dont know much about m/board but does the MSI K7N series support my amd 2.8xp? what do i need to look for in a compatable m/board?

[Filipe M.]

sorry but i dont know much about m/board but does the MSI K7N series support my amd 2.8xp? what do i need to look for in a compatable m/board?

The K7N series is based on the nForce2 chipset, which used to be the fastest /less buggy for the AthlonXP. The other viable (no pun intended) option was VIA chipsets, but IMHO the drivers made them very unstable.

I'd be looking for an nForce2 m/board; IIRC they all support the AthlonXP (socket A? someone please fill up on this, my memory is failing! - no pun intended again!).

[Law]

I've used ASUS motherboards for years without problems if you're looking for a recommendation.

[kwak zzr]

just going to check on net on prices.

[Filipe M.]

I've used ASUS motherboards for years without problems if you're looking for a recommendation.

What he said.

I ranked them second after MSI, but that's essentially for price / value ratio (on nForce2 boards at least).

[kwak zzr]

this type of thing? http://www.computersupermarket.com/ProductDetails.php/144/389

[Filipe M.]

this type of thing? http://www.computersupermarket.com/ProductDetails.php/144/389

Right specs, wrong board. That's El Cheapo again! :wink:

[Law]

List of Socket A boards prices - PCindex

http://www.pcindex.co.uk/results_Pro.asp?Category=2&PartDescr=socket+A

[Filipe M.]

List of Socket A boards prices - PCindex

http://www.pcindex.co.uk/results_Pro.asp?Category=2&PartDescr=socket+A

Cool, good list.

MSI is referenced there by Microstar (their full name, who'd say?).

Abit and Gigabyte used to be good too.

[Law]

If you haven't worked it out, when you click on the prices it brings up a list of websites that sell the motherboard and their prices. Used to use the site a lot back in the good old days of building and upgrading PC's with my student loan.

[kwak zzr]

cheers guys, been on the pc now for a while and its fine! until the next time :? this is why i have ruled out overheating.

[kwak zzr]

on that recomended site could someone point out a good board they all look the same to me?

[Filipe M.]

on that recomended site could someone point out a good board they all look the same to me?

Mine is a Microstar K7N2Delta-ILSR. Like I said before, it has performed quite well over the years and has onboard sound, firewire, sata raid if needed. And the price on that site looks quite low... too low for what I paid in 2003! :roll: :cry:

[kwak zzr]

this serial ATA is SATA init :roll: my hard disk is PARAELL which is PATA init :roll: sorry i'm a dunce :oops: so will a SATA m/board support my PATA hard disk?

[Filipe M.]

this serial ATA is SATA init :roll: my hard disk is PARAELL which is PATA init :roll: sorry i'm a dunce :oops: so will a SATA m/board support my PATA hard disk?

Most m/boards, if not all, still support PATA devices. The K7N2 (and I'm talking about it because it's the one I know better) has the traditional dual PATA channels (up to four devices, as usual), in addition to the two SATA channels and an extra PATA, all routed into the integrated RAID controller. So if you still have, say, a PATA hard drive and one or two PATA optical drives, you don't even need to address the RAID thingy... just plug'em in the normal old fashion way.

[kwak zzr]

cheers.

[arenalife]

Power supply when mine did that the first time.

Failed motherboard the second.

[kwak zzr]

this is where i'm looking now, ive found out if i boot the pc and the desktop comes on ok and i leave it for 10mins without ragin it through web pages or other stressfull operations it seems to be ok and i have no problems?
its when i boot get to desktop go on net and flick web pages rapidly straight away :?

[therealvw]

Defo try the single ram swap out. If the psu was going a bit belly up you can normally tell that with how hot it is. Touch the case. Fan issues. But as you said it has beenon for a while and runs ok, it does sound like a Mem issue. Have you tried it in SAFE MODE when it first goes pear shaped on pwering up?

i.e. When the pc has been off for a while and it won't properly boot, what happens if you get it into SAFE Mode.

To do this, once the BIOS pc info screen has gone of,f keep tapping the F8 key. This should bring up a little menu, Choose SAFE MODE. and then press Enter. This should then let you choose which O S to use.( If ur on XP it should show you that) When Enter is pressed you should see a list of things that are being loaded up which you normally don't see.

If you can get into it no problem with safe mode then it could possibly be an issue with a driver that is loading up into Memory when in normal mode.

Try doing a Defrag and Diskcheck on the drive when in Safe mode, CAN TAKE A WHILE.

Ian

[therealvw]

Sorry should read ALL the pages in the post first! D'oh

ABIT are a good manuf' of M/B's

:roll:

[kwak zzr]

ive got 2 sticks of 512DDR300 i'll remove one then the other and see if that sorts it.cheers, daz

[shao]

If money is of more concern than time, get something like http://tinyurl.com/rnv4e (99p+$4.00 p&p on fleabay) and try it, if it works then you know its the mobo. In fact, if it works, problem solved :P Theres plenty of socket 462 mobo's on there for under £5. But before doing that, you'd better confirm what socket your processor is, people have already suggested socket 462 and socket A mobo's, and theyre not interchangable, i'd guess your Athlon XP is socket 462, but it's not a given. :P. Run something like HWInfo32 (http://www.hwinfo.com), find out what you need, and order something close to the cheapest compatable you can find. Doesnt sound to me like you spend hours tweaking BIOS settings and overclocking for the best performance, so dont worry about getting a good motherboard. If they crashed, they wouldnt be in production, you pay extra for features not reliability.

but agreed, im sure someone suggested removing one stick of memory about 4 pages back, i assumed you'd done that....Shouldnt be the problem if memtest86 is happy with it though.

[kwak zzr]

it is a socket A mobo with a 2.8xp cpu the board is a jetway v400dbl if thats any use to you?
thanks

[kwak zzr]

i'll prob get that board of ebay and try it, its a quick fix init.

[kwak zzr]

hey all! thanks for all of your advice, it was in the end the motherboard!
i struggled on with the pc for a few months until it no longer evan booted got a new m/board one of those nforce2 chipset thingys and its fine now, again thanks all! :D

[Apophes]

out of daft are any of the mother board capacitors domed on the top as this is a good sign your board was on the way out

[kwak zzr]

i did check this but i couldnt see anything. fine now tho.