Computer Won't Boot

Bought a HP 6300 referb desktop with Win 10 Pro for future use several months ago.  Fired it up when I got it and it registered, updated and ran fine.  Have used it several times siince with no problems attempting learn the OS.  

Went to fire it up today and got three beeps.  No keyboard flash and nothing on the monitor.  Back fan running like cracy.  DVD opens and closes.  

Forced a shutdown.  Restarted and got five beeps.  Nothing else.  

Would greatly appreciatel any help.

Johnny

Have you tried the HP diagnotics?

If you close down, wait 2 or 3 minutes then press power on button and immediately start tapping the Esc key once per second you should arrive at a DOS type menu.

Let us know how this goes for you

\regards

paws

Hi Paws.

No joy.  Get a keyboard flash and five beeps.  Nothing on the monitor.  No power light on the front.  Tried three times, same results.  Takes about 30 seconds for the fans on the back to come on full blast.  

Johnny

Hope you don't mind me chiming in while paws is offline 

Couple of suggestions but only undertake them if you are comfortable with working inside of a computer.

The following checks require the computer case to be opened so take the following safety precautions first, disconnect the power cord from the wall socket, press the computer power on button for around 20 seconds to get rid of any residual charge in the system, remove the side of the case, take anti static precautions before touching anything inside, you can do this by touching a bare metal part of the case or the PSU.

Remove and then reseat the memory stick/s + add on GPU if one is fitted and pull the CMOS battery and leave it out for five minutes or so, this will clear any possible bad MB settings.

Joy!!!

Story:   Removed the side panel and poked around.  Found the battery and pulled.  Waited and then reinstalled.  Plugged in the peripherals and then the power plug.  Without touching anything else, a message appeared on the screen:

161 - Real - Time Clock Power Loss

The system time is invalid.  This may be a result of a loss in battery power.  Set the correct time and date using your operating system.  If this message persists, you may need to replace the onboard battery.  

F1 : Boot

Hitting F1 it tries to go but returns to the message.  I wrote the message down and tried one more time with the F1 and lo and behold, it booted.  Date and time were wrong which MS and Google didn't like but got that corrected.  Needs lots of updates.  

Bottom line.  Was all this drama the result of a refurb computer with a very week battery?  Should I replace the battery?

Thanks to all for your help.  I really thought I was dead meat.

Johnny 4

Hello Johnny 4,

Bottom line.  Was all this drama the result of a refurb computer with a very week battery?  Should I replace the battery?

 

Computers can be fickle and even if the CMOS battery were dead you would normally get a checksum error message on screen like the one that you got when you removed the CR2032 battery from the MB, the battery powers the BIOS chip which stores among other things the time/date and boot sequence etc, hence the reason that in the attachment that was included above the steps for resetting the time and date are mentioned.

Without checking the CR2032 battery with a multimeter the only way to know if the battery has expired is to keep using the computer, if you do not get any checksum error message when you boot up the battery is ok, if on the other hand you need to keep on resetting the time and date in the BIOS it would suggest that the battery needs to be replaced, worse case scenario would be a bad BIOS chip so fingers crossed that this was just a blip.

You are welcome, glad that we have been able to help    

Fired it up this morning from a dead cold state and got a clean boot.  I guess one take-away is computers don't like to sit on the floor for a couple of months without being used.  Considering the age of the machine, I'm going to replace the battery just so I don't go thru this again.  Cheap insurance for heart health.  I gather Win 7 support is coming to an end soon so maybe won't be long before this unit is used daily.  

Thanks to all for your help.  Since I've now been released for the hospital, I'm going to mark this thread "solved".

Johnny

You are most welcome and good luck Johnny 

Well, after working good for a week, booted and got the five beeps again.  Replaced the battery and still get the five beeps. Old MB battery, 3.04, new battery, 3.26.  Back to my old problem, any more suggestions?  I can't have a computer that boots sometime and not another.  Help!!!

Couple of questions if I may;

Apart from the five beeps, does the power button also flash five times.

How many sticks of RAM do you have.

Is there an add on video card fitted.

📎IMG_0389.JPGHi Phil,

Yesterday, pulled battery, reinstalled and only got the five beeps (get the beeps as soon as the power cord is inserted).  Today, pulled the battery, (out over an hour) pulled the four ram mem sticks and reinstalled.  Pulled power plugs off MB and reinserted.  Doesn't look like an add on video card is in there.  Plugged in the peripherals and the power cord.  Got the message from 5 above.  Finally completed the boot.  Took five or six updates and seems to be running fine.  

I have no clue.  Appreciate any thoughts.

Johnny

Hello Johnny,

The message is normal but as to the original cause, suspecting the RAM atm and possibly a poor contact on the gold finger on one of the sticks of RAM and the contact inside the DIMM slot.

All we can do is see how things go for a while.