Last week my home PC shut down and I can't figure out why. I'm on my work PC now, in case anyone wonders how I'm posting from a dead PC.
My system specs include: E6750 cpu with standard Intel cooler, 2GB RAM, 1 hard disk, 2 optical drives, 320MB 8800GTS, some kind of Gigabyte P35 motherboard (I forget the precise model), 650w PSU, Windows XP Home (32-bit) and an Antec 900 case. I'm sure everything is seated properly as the machine had been working for about a month since I last changed any hardware (uprated PSU).
The situation was this - I had gone AFK for a few minutes, no more than 10, while on a griffon from Nagrand to Area 52. When I came back to the PC, the screen had frozen and the PC was unresponsive, though it still had power. Since none of the usual keyboard commands worked to unfreeze it, I hit the reboot button.
Screen went off, lights on the case (psu and case fans) went off and came on again, just like a normal reboot but there was no output to the monitor. The "working" light on the primary optical drive came on and stayed on, not flashing. And that's all it does.
What might be causing this?
- Forums
- Cross Site
- Computer Hardware & Troubleshooting
- "dead" PC - what might have caused it?
"dead" PC - what might have caused it?Follow
Troubleshooting something like this is best done in person, not on a forum, but I'll see what I can do.
Any beeping coming from your system at startup?
I am going to take a guess and say you upgraded your PSU because of a new video card. Yes?
A CPU error or a MoBo error will usually cause a system restart, not a lockup so lets count those out for now.
A memory error can cause a reboot or a lockup but doesn't explain the video failure on reboot so lets skip that.
I would start with the video card and the PSU. A PSU problem will usually cause a reboot but not always. A video card error will usually cause a lockup. If you have another video card that you know works, swap it out but keep in mind that if it is the PSU or the MoBo, it may damage the replacement video card. (unlikely but possible) If the replacement video card doesn't work, try swapping out the PSU.
Any beeping coming from your system at startup?
I am going to take a guess and say you upgraded your PSU because of a new video card. Yes?
A CPU error or a MoBo error will usually cause a system restart, not a lockup so lets count those out for now.
A memory error can cause a reboot or a lockup but doesn't explain the video failure on reboot so lets skip that.
I would start with the video card and the PSU. A PSU problem will usually cause a reboot but not always. A video card error will usually cause a lockup. If you have another video card that you know works, swap it out but keep in mind that if it is the PSU or the MoBo, it may damage the replacement video card. (unlikely but possible) If the replacement video card doesn't work, try swapping out the PSU.
Did you say CD drive or Hard drive???
If I were you i wouldnt start pulling the graphics card yet. First start by unplugging one thing at a time. IE unplug one cd drive turn it on, see what happens, unplug your second one and repeat.
From CD drives I would move to reseating the ram.
From there try reseating the graphics card and swapping the graphics card. From there try unpluggin the hard drive.
Try slaving the hard drive up to another to see if it will spool up and let you retrieve info.
After all that and still not fix, try swapping powersupplies if you have one. Make sure your not overloading a rail or anything.
Also can you get into the bios or boot into safe mode?
Can you boot from CD?
If I were you i wouldnt start pulling the graphics card yet. First start by unplugging one thing at a time. IE unplug one cd drive turn it on, see what happens, unplug your second one and repeat.
From CD drives I would move to reseating the ram.
From there try reseating the graphics card and swapping the graphics card. From there try unpluggin the hard drive.
Try slaving the hard drive up to another to see if it will spool up and let you retrieve info.
After all that and still not fix, try swapping powersupplies if you have one. Make sure your not overloading a rail or anything.
Also can you get into the bios or boot into safe mode?
Can you boot from CD?
If I were you i wouldnt start pulling the graphics card yet.
I would, this is almost always a graphics card issue. Usually a fan getting "stuck" and shutting the card off. Clean the fan, re-seat the card.
Good luck.
Disclaimer:
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
Its probably been cleaned out with in a month so I doubt its dust build up blocking a fan. BUt, as mentioned above its hard to t-shoot problems like this over a forum.
Alobont wrote:
Did you say CD drive or Hard drive???
If I were you i wouldnt start pulling the graphics card yet. First start by unplugging one thing at a time. IE unplug one cd drive turn it on, see what happens, unplug your second one and repeat.
From CD drives I would move to reseating the ram.
If I were you i wouldnt start pulling the graphics card yet. First start by unplugging one thing at a time. IE unplug one cd drive turn it on, see what happens, unplug your second one and repeat.
From CD drives I would move to reseating the ram.
The optical drive is a CD or DVD drive.
I'm not familiar with the board but if the bios is set to boot from the optical drive first and the system is detecting a hardware error, it can cause the optical drive light to stay solid.
If it was a memory or optical drive problem, the monitor would still respond.
As I said in my first post, start with the video card, then the PSU.
I've just got it back from the repair shop and they say it was "most probably". i.e. they aren't sure, a problem with the CMOS. I'm not entirely sure what this means or whether it's right and that's why I came here looking for a second opinion.
I doubt it's the video card overheating because of dust preventing the fan from spinning. This might well have caused the lock-up but surely it wouldn't stop the machine from booting 12 hours later, would it?
There were no beeps on trying to boot. I'm not certain whether there were when it locked up because I was in another room.
The PSU shouldn't have had any of the rails overloaded. None has anything abnormal fitted and the only one which has more than one item to power is the lead to the 2 optical drives.
Thanks for trying to help guys, I do appreciate it. I guess I'll just have to learn more about computers so I can avoid this next time.
I doubt it's the video card overheating because of dust preventing the fan from spinning. This might well have caused the lock-up but surely it wouldn't stop the machine from booting 12 hours later, would it?
There were no beeps on trying to boot. I'm not certain whether there were when it locked up because I was in another room.
The PSU shouldn't have had any of the rails overloaded. None has anything abnormal fitted and the only one which has more than one item to power is the lead to the 2 optical drives.
Thanks for trying to help guys, I do appreciate it. I guess I'll just have to learn more about computers so I can avoid this next time.
This might well have caused the lock-up but surely it wouldn't stop the machine from booting 12 hours later, would it?
Yes.
I've just got it back from the repair shop and they say it was "most probably". i.e. they aren't sure, a problem with the CMOS. I'm not entirely sure what this means
It means they either 1. Have no idea. or 2. Didn't look at it. I'd say it's about 50/50 either way.
Yes.
I've just got it back from the repair shop and they say it was "most probably". i.e. they aren't sure, a problem with the CMOS. I'm not entirely sure what this means
It means they either 1. Have no idea. or 2. Didn't look at it. I'd say it's about 50/50 either way.
Disclaimer:
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
You have to understand, it's not the application of heat that's an issue, it's the resulting damage caused to the circuitry. If something overheats to the point of critical failure, then it generally won't come back up, since it's already irreparably damaged by that point.
I highly doubt this is a dust problem or a blocked fan. It sounds to me as something has come unseated or is loose.
I highly doubt this is a dust problem or a blocked fan. It sounds to me as something has come unseated or is loose.
No, but the graphics card needs to be reseated.
Disclaimer:
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
Quote:
I've just got it back from the repair shop and they say it was "most probably". i.e. they aren't sure, a problem with the CMOS. I'm not entirely sure what this means or whether it's right and that's why I came here looking for a second opinion.
Based on what you described, the odds of it being the CMOS is slim.
Quote:
I doubt it's the video card overheating because of dust preventing the fan from spinning. This might well have caused the lock-up but surely it wouldn't stop the machine from booting 12 hours later, would it?
Yes it could, but parts usually don't go critical on the first overheat. However, their are many other reasons a video card would just stop working.
Quote:
The PSU shouldn't have had any of the rails overloaded. None has anything abnormal fitted and the only one which has more than one item to power is the lead to the 2 optical drives.
It's not that the video card overloaded the rail, it's that the rail could have overloaded the video card. A rail surging or dieing and popping a VPU is a lot more common then people think. Todays video cards are so advanced that they can be extremely fragile, bumping it just the right way when your installing it can cause a critical failure.
Just for clarification:
Quote:
just like a normal reboot but there was no output to the monitor
No output as in the monitor came on but nothing showed up or no output as in it was like the monitor wasn't even connected?
If the monitor powered up but nothing appeared it could be any number of things.
If the monitor had no response like it wasn't even plugged in, it's almost certain to be one of these four things in this order.
1. Video card
2. PSU
3. Monitor
4. MoBo
When the system boots, everything receives power. Pretty much the only way for the monitor to have absolutely no response is for the video card not to be transmitting which means it isn't receiving power or it's critically damaged.
Oh the repair shop definitely looked at it, that much I can tell. For a start, the PSU connectors aren't as tidy as they were before, which means they have disconnected everything and not taken care when putting things back together.
All the components are the same, except for a different wire from the mobo to the case buttons.
Clarification on the monitor: it was as though it wasn't connected. It draws power directly from the mains, not the PC, so it only comes on when there's video feed.
As it stands, I'm probably going to upgrade the video card so hopefully that'll remove any chance of a similar occurance. On the other hand, depending how much cash I've got I might just get a new cooler for the current card.
And thanks for setting me straight on the whole heat issue. I'll certainly vacuum this room more often, to minimize the amount of dust that can get into the case.
All the components are the same, except for a different wire from the mobo to the case buttons.
Clarification on the monitor: it was as though it wasn't connected. It draws power directly from the mains, not the PC, so it only comes on when there's video feed.
As it stands, I'm probably going to upgrade the video card so hopefully that'll remove any chance of a similar occurance. On the other hand, depending how much cash I've got I might just get a new cooler for the current card.
And thanks for setting me straight on the whole heat issue. I'll certainly vacuum this room more often, to minimize the amount of dust that can get into the case.
On the other hand, depending how much cash I've got I might just get a new cooler for the current card.
Waste of cash.
The 4850 launch is going to bring prices for a new card way down. Bear in mind that while this is the most likely cause of your problem, it's not a guarantee.
Sell the card if you can, apply the money to a new 9600GT for $120ish or less.
Disclaimer:
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
Thanks, I know it's not a guarantee. However I'm more inclined to trust people on here than a shop that says "We think it's XYZ but we're not 100% sure. Anyway it's working now."
9600GT for $120? That makes me wish I lived in the USA - the best price I can find is £93. However, I need something with a little more processing power. I get the occasional stutter on CoD4 at 1680x1050 and I was hoping to get Crysis at some point.
9600GT for $120? That makes me wish I lived in the USA - the best price I can find is £93. However, I need something with a little more processing power. I get the occasional stutter on CoD4 at 1680x1050 and I was hoping to get Crysis at some point.
9600GT for $120? That makes me wish I lived in the USA - the best price I can find is £93. However, I need something with a little more processing power. I get the occasional stutter on CoD4 at 1680x1050 and I was hoping to get Crysis at some point.
AMD's partners were supposedly pushing for a €130 price point on the 4850.
http://www.dabs.com/productview.aspx?Quicklinx=54V1&SearchType=1&SearchTerms=hd+4850&PageMode=3&SearchKey=All&SearchMode=All&NavigationKey=0
That's likely the best deal you'll see for a while from a price/performance standpoint. The 4850 really is a home run for those guys until nVidia rolls out a die shrink of the GT200 chips.
Edited, Jun 25th 2008 8:00am by Smasharoo
Disclaimer:
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
€130 for the 4850 sounds right. Overclockers.co.uk currently has one on pre-order for around that sort of money. However, as I'm loathe to do business with them, I'll wait.
It looks like the ATI 4850 is a direct competitor for the Nvidia 9800GTX and the 4870 will be comparable to the 9800GX2. I'll hold out for the 4870 though as there also seems to be some talk going around about the standard fan on the 4850 not being adequate.
It looks like the ATI 4850 is a direct competitor for the Nvidia 9800GTX and the 4870 will be comparable to the 9800GX2. I'll hold out for the 4870 though as there also seems to be some talk going around about the standard fan on the 4850 not being adequate.
Recent Visitors: 20
All times are in CST
Anonymous Guests (20)
- Forums
- Cross Site
- Computer Hardware & Troubleshooting
- "dead" PC - what might have caused it?
© 2025 Fanbyte LLC