Pc Won`t Start

ianjamie7

Original post below

At last I have got my Pc working again. I eventually took it to Maplin and within half hour they diagnosed that the start button on the tower was faulty as they tested it and it worked fine. They also changed one of the plugs from tower to the filter.
They said that they didn`t sell the switches but could change my tower which they have done and in total it came to fifty three pounds. They apparently charge 39.99 for looking at the problem and if they can repair it then it is cheaper but at this point I was n`t really listening as I was just happy to have my Pc working once again.

It was thirty pounds for the tower.

I must say that the two men who dealt with me were absolutely fantastic and showed me exatly what was wrong and they answered loads of questions in language I could understand and not nerd language where you don`t understad anything unless you are a Pc wizard.
I highly recommend Maplin as the staff like I say were fantastic.


This is my original post which I updated a few times : -


I have a windows media center pc and 5 weeks ago I could not log onto my aol account and even the pc fix it for you and reboot computer didn`t work but I could live without that for a bit as I am using Mozilla Firefox but the last three days as soon as I turn my pc on , it turns off automatically. I have pressed f8 when starting up and even got it to work on safe mode but after two hours even that shut down automatically. Every option on the f8 now doesn`t work. Any help please?

I decided to use the vacuum on the tower and the vents were full of dust , so once I cleaned them all without having to remove any screws I tried the Pc, after several attempts the Pc worked fine and worked for a couple of days but on the 2nd day after about 2 hours it happened again. Windows is shutting down. I felt like crying and I am pretty sure that I have a virus as I have tried to restore it to an earlier date but apparently this will not remove the worm. I have tried to start it in safe mode, safe mode with networking, in fact I have tried it in every mode but after a while , sometime sa couple of minutes, sometimes immediately I cannot get the Pc to stay on long enough to run a virus check/remover. I don`t have a blue screen when shutting down but sometimes when it shuts down it says that it is installing udates 1 - 6 and takes about 15 mins to shut down. Sorry I can`t post regularly as I can only post when I am in work and when no-one is around which is why my posts are sometimes a couple of days between each one. Does anyone have ay suggestions?





After the hoover out it worked for a couple of days but then kept shutting down again so in desperation I looked in the yellow pages and got a man to come out and look at it. He took it away and brought it back the next day , charging me £60 but the @ key is now on key number 2 for some reason and after working for another 2 days it won`t even start up now. When he fetched it back all data was lost and aol which is where I have my main email is also not present. I haven`t phoned him back yet as I bought a new mains adapter for a fiver which I can live with and I hoped this would do the trick but still not comig on. Every now and then, it would get to the first screen then shut down before you can actually do anything. This would be say one time out of ten goes of starting up on average. Anyone got any more suggestions besides from throwing it in the river dee.


Updated 6th April 12.40pm

Last thursday I took out my bluetooth dongle and moved my mouse usb to the back of tower instead of the front. I don`t know why I did it but I just did, anything that could be moved or changed I was doing as I was not at my wit`s end and to my complete amazement the computer actually loaded and I went and removed the bluetooth settings and it worked great for a dayt and then the usual happened and it shut down again. The next time I went to turn pc on it came up with an error message \windows\system32\config\system and said for me to press r on the first screen which I did and nothing happened. So I remembered I had a Norton Disk called Save and Restore I think so I inserted this disc and started the pc and kept my finger on the r button until the symantec came on the screen and I ran the check for errors and it found none, and my PC came back on after I exited the Norton disc but went off after about 3 hours. I did the same again by loading the Norton and disc and when I checked the hard drives it said there were errors on Drive C which it had fixed and touch wood it has worked fine for at least 7 hours yesterday while I watched Utd scrape another injury time win against Villa.





April 14th 2009
Out of curiosity I decided to put my bluetooth dongle back in to see if it was that and guess what, I haven`t been able to get the Pc to work again for more than 20 minutes during the past 7 days.

Save and Resrore doesn`t seem to want to work and sometimes I take the mains socket plug out and back in again to start the computer again and if I don`t hold down the f6 or f8 key then most of the time the Pc instantly switches off.


I run a virus check with the norton save and restore and it said it couldn`t ceck one of the disks as it couldn`t find it but I can`t remember which disk it said and I wouldn`t know where to find it anyway.

Please please please can someone help me.

thomas01155

Have you tried formating and reinstalling? If that didn't work its probably a hardware fault.

DatabaseError

My guess is the bloke who charged £60 did a format (explains the data loss and the incorrect regional setting (misplaced @ key))
Things I'd be looking at...cleaning the inside of the case...with a can of air or a compressor.
Checking all fans are spinning
swopping out the PSU with another...seems the PC comes especially flaky when messing with USB devices...drawing a bit more power...

Another possibility is..the bloke who put on a dodgy copy of windows (just a guess..but an educated one ) didn't add any malware protection...and in the 2 working days you went along and downloaded lots of rubbish...borking the install...

Pitchshifter

Save yourself a lot of headaches and buy a new, up-to-date PC with Vista. £250 from Ebuyer gets you a lovely little Vista box. You've already wasted £60 on that dusty heap, don't waste another penny on it.

DatabaseError

Pitchshifter wrote: »

Save yourself a lot of headaches and buy a new, up-to-date PC with Vista. £250 from Ebuyer gets you a lovely little Vista box. You've already wasted £60 on that dusty heap, don't waste another penny on it.

Did I miss the bit explaining the age/condition of the PC? so far as I am aware a 'media centre PC' could be a 5 years old P3...or a spanking new i7
...but I agree there is a point at which "good money after bad" becomes true..without knowing what we're dealing with...or the OPs finances..makes it hard to judge

Wig

Update,

He had it fixed by Maplin, see OP.

When you edit an OP it doesn't get bumped up or flagged to other users, so no-one knows that you got it fixed, hence why I put this post.

The OP original thread