Right well, my pc has been working fine for the past 2 years. I upgraded it over easter with new RAM, graphics card and processor and again worked fine.
Until yesterday. I was just listening to iTunes not doing anything else and my PC completely locked up. Keyboard and mouse would not do anything. So I did a reset by pressing the little button and booted up iTunes again and carried on listening. The same happened again after about 10 mins so I decided to switch it off and unplug it and pack it away (as I was coming home from uni). I get home yesterday evening and power up my PC and it works fine all evening, but just in case I started running a virus scan over night. This morning I wake up to fine it has locked up again so I reset. This time it locks up the moment windows appears, so I reset again. This time into safe mode. The PC now locked up part way through booting safe mode (before the GUI has appeared). So I switch off the computer and check all my connections.
Now I press the on button and all the fans and lights on the tower come on and the hard drives start spinning but none of the peripherals show any sign of life. The monitor doesn't power up, the keyboard lights don't switch on nothing. Bit worried as to what could be the problem now. I am hoping it is a hardware problem because that is easy to fix (as long as it is not the HDD!)
What do you guys reckon?
Well I'm guessing kind of, based on an experenced guess.
It sounds like heat might have gotten the better of one of the componets in your PC. Another option could be the PSU might not have been able to handle the added load of the new CPU, Video Card, and RAM.
A couple of things you can try if you still have the old parts is swap test. Start with as many known Good parts as you can.
Then swap out one by one. Thats if the system will even boot of course. The two main parts you didn't swap out when you upgraded might be the two that could be a problem, The PSU and the motherboard. But since you do have know good parts start there since it won't cost you anything. Then move on to borrowing or buying either or both a MB and PSU.
Tonka
Right thanks for that answer.
I have tried booting with removing each stick of ram. Tried swapping to my old graphics card and processor.
Still not getting past the fans and HDDs spinning up. No beeps, no BIOS screen nothing.
I am guessing it is my motherboard then.
Now I am wondering a few things. Do I get a tech guy to look at it and confirm this before shelling out on a new mobo or do I just go and buy one. It is an athlon 64 (939 i think) so shoudn't be too expensive if I can find one
then also would I need to re-install windows if i get a new mobo?
And finally, do youthink it would also be an idea to get a new case with better cooling. Or just a tad bigger. I think my 4 high speed HDDs are possibly causing a heat problem in there.
Hey
Before you get a Techy out try reseting the bios, i have seen this exact same thing happen before and 2 of the times resetting the bois worked.
If you can try another power supply aswell just to be sure.
As for buying another 939 it may work out better to buy AM2 or Core 2 Duo
As 939 will be hard to find new.
Well there are 2 ways of resetting the Bios
1.) You can do it with the jumper setting.
2.) You take out the bios battery unplug the power cable and then hit the power button. When yu have done that put the battery back in and then the power cable.
Hope this works for you like i said has worked twice that i have seen.
As for a new PC they ain't that expensive, but then again others may think it is.
My instruction manual has resetting CMOS but not bios!
For me, someone who has just finished uni and is unemployed and about to start a contract on a house, everything is expensive!
nope resetting the CMOS didn't work.
I guess I will buy this mobo off ebay that i found. Pretty much the same as mine just a slightly different version.
You might need to consider a new PSU unit. You should check the one you have now for size etc. and check what is required for the componets you have in your system to be sure it can handle it. It could also be very likily that the PSU is bad.
So if you got the Mobo and the PSU "is" bad then the system still wouldn't boot up.
But it could be "just" the Mobo.
Wish it was more help, but gives ya something to think about.
Tonka
But the PC does fire up, just doesn't get as far as starting the BIOS. The fans start, the keyboard flashes, the hard drives spin up. Seems unlikely to be the PSU.
Hi,
I have been facing almost the same problem for the past few days…
I have windows xp sp2 installed on my system…
Processor is Intel pentium p4
For the past few days, while working the system restarted all of a sudden and then it goes blank…
It doesn't even reach the BIOS… Monitor/Keyboard doesn't get powered up, The mouse however is getting power…
If however there is a cd in my cd drive, it picks up the cd…and the pc boots up fine….
But again, after sometime, it goes blank and then there is no response from the keyboard or monitor…
Please help me…
Well if none of the above steps worked you could try a very big hammer.
On a more serious note you have to try a different (working PSU)
I would suggest when you use a different PSU only plug it into the MB and leave the HDD an ROM's out.
Also when you boot is there a beeping at all?
Last thing i would try is check your CPU it might be over heating.
I said I get no beeping at all.
My new motherboard has just arrived, but my PSU won't arrive till tomorrow.
Is it possible that the current PSU fried the MB? If so should I wait till tomorrow to try out the new MB?
