PC won't boot up.

darich

My daughter's pc has suddenly decided to stop booting up. She was using it a few days ago and all was fine. Then when she tried to switch it on a couple of days ago it was refusing to boot up.

The power light comes on, the PSU fan runs, the CD roms move and the trays open but the monitor says "no signal".
I'm fairly good with pcs so i opened it up.
The sata drive seems to be ok - I tried the cable and hard drive from my pc in hers but no change.
I removed the video card, cleaned the contacts and replaced it but no change.
I removed the RAM to see if it would try to boot up but nothing again.
I tried my monitor but still nothing.

All the above would lead me to believe the hard drive is shot. Once I've posted this i'm going to shut my machine down and try her drive in my pc and see what happens so if anyone posts before i get back you don't have to suggest that!!

thanks

[Deleted User]

If you're not even seeing the BIOS POST and manufacturers logo then I'd say it's more likely to be your GPU than anything else.

iviv

Actually, it looks more like a graphics card problem. If the problem was with the hard drive, you would still see all the stuff at boot-up, since that's run from the motherboard. If there's no signal going to the monitor, the problem is likely with the graphics card, the cable to the monitor, or the monitor itself.

You said you tried your monitor, how? Do you have a second PC there to try it with?

darich

I've just tried her hard drive on my machine and it worked fine so the hdd is ok

luckily i have both her machine and mine open so it's not too difficult to try swapping components. One thing i did discover though was when i connected her hdd to my machine windows xp wanted to be validated again. will that still be the case now that it's back in her machine or will that count as 2 changes to the hardware. Both her copy and mine are genuine so i'm not too fussed but just wondered.

I'll now try my video card in her machine.....mine is pci express - i think hers is too.

I'll post again in a few mins with an update.

thanks

darich

update : I'm now posting on my machine with her video card installed (thankfully both ATI so drivers are no problem).
I haven't tried my card in her machine but given her card is obviously ok since i can see my screeen, there isn't much point in trying it.

so the hard drive is ok, the video card is ok so does that mean the motherboard is faulty in some way?

iviv

Yes, you'll probably need to validate again. It should be done online, if not its an 0800 number they give you, should be a piece of cake to do, just explain what happened and they should let it through. You'll need your XP key if this is the case, though.

And hopefully, swapping the graphics cards over should show whats causing the errors. Don't actually log into windows with them, though. New graphics cards will want new drivers, windows will likely try and automatically install them, and you could end up in a right mess.

darich

iviv - thanks for the validation info - never done it before but i have both xp keys if necessary.
my machine is now back to normal with all my parts in it but hers is still down after testing various components in my machine and some of mine in hers.

just about the only thing i haven't changed or tested is the mobo.
The fan on the CPU spins but i guess the mobo could still be dead??

totalsolutions

Swopped the psu?? There are several voltage sources required, looks like you have the 12v present but may have lost ground plane (re-seat the power plugs) the +-5v or 3.3v lines may be down/missing.

Cloister

Is the display completely blank or are you getting something on the screen? I know this might sound silly but do you also have an onboard graphics card? are you plugging the monitor cable into that? (I did this on my work pc once.....)

darich

totalsolutions wrote: »

Swopped the psu?? There are several voltage sources required, looks like you have the 12v present but may have lost ground plane (re-seat the power plugs) the +-5v or 3.3v lines may be down/missing.

haven't tried that. i think i might have a spare psu that i can try.

darich

Cloister wrote: »

Is the display completely blank or are you getting something on the screen? I know this might sound silly but do you also have an onboard graphics card? are you plugging the monitor cable into that? (I did this on my work pc once.....)

The display is completely blank. It shows for a second to say "No signal" but nothing from the pc is visible. Once that message has displayed for a few seconds, the monitor goes into sleep/stand by mode.

I've defintely not plugging it into the wrong socket - there's only one it can go into. Besides, i made sure i was correct to test the video card.
thanks