Help! My PC won't boot

[CHHAS]

My Katmai 500 suddenly refuses too boot, I get drive spinup and keyboard flash, but then it resets, so all I get is a nice lightshow with the keyboard and drive activity indicator lights flashing.

I've reseated all cards, memory and cpu, still no go.

Help me MURC'ers, you're my only hope ...

[The PIT]

Anything on screen ???

[ayoub_ibrahim]

any error beeps?
was there lightening last night?

[Jammrock]

I suggest a nice big green crowbar. About a meter long and 5-7 kg. Take it outside and pretent your Tiger Woods.

But if you don't like golf, and you aren't getting any errors, beeps or the like it either because 1) your PC speaker isn't plugged in, 2) your CPU is not working or 3) the motherboard is toast. At least those are the common problems. Everything else should give you a beep error message of some sort.

If it was a video problem you would get 1 long and 2 short beeps. Memory is just beeeeeep, beeeeeeep, beeeeeeep, etc. And no CPU sounds like this...

Jammrock

------------------
Athlon 650
256 MB PC133 CAS3 from Crucial
87 GB storage from WD & IBM
Matrox G400 (it's not dead yet!)
SB Live! the original full retail, still going strong
Klipsch ProMedia v.2-400, the PC speakers that goes BOOM!
Hope Matrox releases the G800 before rebuild time, becuase the end is near!

[The PIT]

Sounds like something is toast. We don't know what else he's got installed. Yep I'd be tempted to make sure that the speaker is plugged in so I could hear an error code or not.
If the cpu is toast I'd think it would just sit there and do nothing.

[Jammrock]

I'm kind of torn about what's wrong. If the CPU was bad then you wouldn't get the beeps, but the keyboard lights shouldn't light up or flicker or anything, since that's after the CPU check. If it was a motherboard issue then there should be a beep message of some type alopng with the keyboard lights going flickering (trust me, just had a board go down on me last month).

CHHAS,

We need your computer specs and what troubleshooting steps you've taken.

Tak,

Jammrock

------------------
Athlon 650
256 MB PC133 CAS3 from Crucial
87 GB storage from WD & IBM
Matrox G400 (it's not dead yet!)
SB Live! the original full retail, still going strong
Klipsch ProMedia v.2-400, the PC speakers that goes BOOM!
Hope Matrox releases the G800 before rebuild time, becuase the end is near!

[Pace]

Any jumpers fell off?

If so, stick them back on - PCs get chilly when they don't have jumpers on (and no, a cardigan won't do the job!)

Also, check your chips! I hate it when I find something in my chips, and my PC actually hates it even more! Make sure there isn't any sauce or grease where it shouldn't be.

P.

[J1NG]

I wonder, if it's a bad BIOS. I was flashing mine, when it screwed up. (Power failure in area). I get the same thing. No screen, flashing lights, but no sound from the system speaker. Tried reseating and swapping components, haven't had much luck. (I suppose the board could be fried, but I'll have to wait for the new BIOS to be sure.) Hope you get your system going.

[Pace]

Mmmm....fried...

(sorry, in a funny mood )

[CHHAS]

Nothing on the screen, no beeping, and no recent thunderstorms either ...

I'll try to replace the graphics card when I get home.

[This message has been edited by CHHAS (edited 05 March 2001).]

[Ali]

I had a similar thing on an old Celeron 333A the other day.

It would start up, fans spin, lights on keyboard flash, and monitor just start to come off standby, then it would shut down again.

After swapping P/S, GFX card, pulling out all other cards (NIC, Sound, SCSI, etc), I thought it must be the mobo.

Partway through pulling the mobo out of the case I noticed that the on button on the case was sticking.

What was happening was you would push the on button, the system would start powering up, then 4 seconds later the system would turn itself back off again. A quick squirt of CRC (WD40) fixed it.

I felt a bit stink charging them 2 hours at $80 each for such a simple problem, so they got that one for a 6 pack.

Moral: look into the simple things first.

Ali

[CHHAS]

System specs:

Abit BH6 1.0x (SS Bios)
P3 Katmai 500
32 mb ram
ATI rage something video card
Cheap network adapter
13 GB Maxtor Harddrive
Floppy
Old CDR

I checked all connectors and everything appears as it should, I'll try fiddling some more tonight.