Refurb PC

Miroslav

NiftyDigits wrote: »

The new card will work, as long as it will fit in the PCI Express slot. Try it.

I'll send you the Vista DVD if you need it.

Despite the lack of required power in the power supply?

Thanks for the offer. I will try a system restore incase it's a software problem first.

googler

Lum wrote: »

Wipe and reinstall before wasting your money on a new PC. That recovery partition should sort you out, you just need to figure out how to access it. It's usually some key combination pressed just after turning the PC on.

Just make sure to copy any irreplaceable files you have (photos etc.) onto an external drive or CD first, and after reinstalling, make sure your PC is fully updated and is running a good antivirus (i.e. not McAfee) before you plug that external drive back in again.

A better solution might be to leave the existing HDD untouched, and move it to the secondary drive connections.

Buy a new HDD, and an operating system disc, easily obtainable for less than £181. Install the new HDD as a primary drive, install the OS upon it.

Any files you need on the 'old' drive can be copied from one to the other.

If you can install RAM, you can move HDDs around.

Miroslav

googler wrote: »

A better solution might be to leave the existing HDD untouched, and move it to the secondary drive connections.

Buy a new HDD, and an operating system disc, easily obtainable for less than £181. Install the new HDD as a primary drive, install the OS upon it.

Any files you need on the 'old' drive can be copied from one to the other.

If you can install RAM, you can move HDDs around.

Right, I may do that. I just have to learn how.

I already have a HDD from my old PC whose motherboard died - I already transferred the contents over using an adaptor, but it's a HDD - it has XP on it. I just need to learn how to fix it in.

The person who helped setting it up said their were not enough connectors for another drive, even though there is a spare bay?

googler

Miroslav wrote: »

Right, I may do that. I just have to learn how.

I already have a HDD from my old PC whose motherboard died - I already transferred the contents over using an adaptor, but it's a HDD - it has XP on it. I just need to learn how to fix it in.

The person who helped setting it up said their were not enough connectors for another drive, even though there is a spare bay?

There's tutorials on moving/replacing drives all over YouTube and the web generally.

If you put that one into the primary drive bay, it should boot direct into XP, then.

Maybe the person meant there wasn't the right cabling, rather than no connector on the motherboard? It would be a very strange MB that didn't have primary and secondary drive connectors. Can you get a maker and model number from the MB? Usually printed/embossed somewhere where there's a space between components.

Do you know if the Vista and XP drives are both IDE or SATA, or a mix? That might be an issue if you have one of each, but adaptors are easily found at Maplin and other PC stores.

Bollotom

Connections look different as well on the outside - has HDMI which my current one doesn't. It's ok though I think, as it has different size brackets to choose from.

What has HDMI?? And purple or blue screen? If you can see the windows desktop you might have made the background colour solid purple.

Also graphics card requires a minimum of 400 Watts according to

http://www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/graphics/ati-radeon-hd-5000/hd-5450-overview/pages/hd-5450-overview.aspx#3

closed

thread appears to be going off at tangents, backup factory restore to rule out software is a no cost option.

what is the make and model of machine

Miroslav

googler wrote: »

There's tutorials on moving/replacing drives all over YouTube and the web generally.

If you put that one into the primary drive bay, it should boot direct into XP, then.

Maybe the person meant there wasn't the right cabling, rather than no connector on the motherboard? It would be a very strange MB that didn't have primary and secondary drive connectors. Can you get a maker and model number from the MB? Usually printed/embossed somewhere where there's a space between components.

Do you know if the Vista and XP drives are both IDE or SATA, or a mix? That might be an issue if you have one of each, but adaptors are easily found at Maplin and other PC stores.

I will have a look around and hope I don't freeze.

He probably did mean that.

I will check MB later when I get back to machine. Could I use Belarc advisor as I've tried that before and it give MB details?

I have an adaptor that has IDE and SATA connections that helped me transfer data from old hdd to new hdd - can I use that, or some of the wires that came with it? Vista and XP drives are both different. One is IDE, one is SATA.

Bollotom wrote: »

Connections look different as well on the outside - has HDMI which my current one doesn't. It's ok though I think, as it has different size brackets to choose from.

What has HDMI?? And purple or blue screen? If you can see the windows desktop you might have made the background colour solid purple.

Also graphics card requires a minimum of 400 Watts according to

http://www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/graphics/ati-radeon-hd-5000/hd-5450-overview/pages/hd-5450-overview.aspx#3

The newer graphics card has an HDMI connection, the older one in the machine doesn't. The older one gas a fan, the newer one doesn't but it has a fan connector. One of the connections on the graphics card is white...8 rows of 3 holes with a little slit at the bottom.

Purple screen is fixed. I think I didn't reconnect properly after cleaning graphics card. VGA connection was loose.

I thought it was 400w so my 300w won't be enough.

closed wrote: »

thread appears to be going off at tangents, backup factory restore to rule out software is a no cost option.

what is the make and model of machine

It's a HP Pavilion a6130 UK - 2007.

will have to get data off first.

NiftyDigits

Miroslav wrote: »

I will have a look around and hope I don't freeze.

He probably did mean that.

I will check MB later when I get back to machine. Could I use Belarc advisor as I've tried that before and it give MB details?

I have an adaptor that has IDE and SATA connections that helped me transfer data from old hdd to new hdd - can I use that, or some of the wires that came with it? Vista and XP drives are both different. One is IDE, one is SATA.



The newer graphics card has an HDMI connection, the older one in the machine doesn't. The older one gas a fan, the newer one doesn't but it has a fan connector. One of the connections on the graphics card is white...8 rows of 3 holes with a little slit at the bottom.

Purple screen is fixed. I think I didn't reconnect properly after cleaning graphics card. VGA connection was loose.

I thought it was 400w so my 300w won't be enough.



It's a HP Pavilion a6130 UK - 2007.

will have to get data off first.

Too many cooks here...the Graphics Card will work.

Just slot it in to the PCI Express x16 slot after removing the old card.

You can do that before messing around with the data.

You can use Windows Easy Transfer to move any data to a new install, if necessary.

Miroslav

I haven't tried the graphics card....yet.

What I did was a system restore to the 25th January.

It uninstalled some programs and some windows updates.

I didn't think it had done anything as it stuck a couple of times but I then re-installed the windows updates.

It was then used by a few people for around 9 hours with no sticks.

I came on this morning for around an hour, no sticks....so then I put the better monitor back in and it stuck after 5 minutes - this is the monitor that originally came with the PC as part of the package, so they are meant to be together!

I've put the old one back in and all appears to be fine again, although this one was sticking alot too...but not at the moment....????

I'm still saving everything I can off of here as the newer monitor showed all is far from perfect.

Miroslav

Keeps sticking with old monitor again. Don't know if it's related, but some of my USB ports don't work - they haven't since I got the machine less than a month ago (from family, not new)

As soon as I try and download something the download freezes the machine, although for a period yesterday, it was fine. Whatever the problem is, it was behaving yesterday.