Dead PC

[lancsdave]

For no apparent reason my PC died last night. The power was still on but it stopped functioning while I was in the middle of printing something.

When I tried rebooting I wasn't even getting the bios information. I suspect that means the motherboard has died or the chip has died. How do I tell. When I switch it on, the fan on the heatsink is still alive.

I took my hard drive out and put it in another PC and it won't boot up, I get the blue screen which says STOP on it !! If I boot up using the XP disk it does see the drive, and I now have the drive attached to the spare PC as a slave. That way I can at least do some backups

Am I missing something that allows this drive to boot up on a different PC. ?

Contrary to what a certain memebr thinks on here I'm not a techy, just dabble with hardware so this one has me puzzled.

[accymel]

just dabble with hardware

sorry made me laugh hehehehe

[AccyJay]

The old drive won't be configured to work on the other (new) motherboard i think.

[entwisi]

Correct, there are lots of low level drivers that basically will be different, its trying to talk german to a frenchman

As for teh PC, try resetting teh CMOS by removing the battery off teh m/board for a good 30 mins then try booting with just CPU, GFX and 1 stick of ram. Remove everything else. If this works, try adding stuff back one piece at a time. If you don't get anywhere, try a different stick of ram and gfx card

If you still don't get anywhere, buy one of those PCs you were selling

[accymel]

Yep i remember trying that entwisi on my old dell that died - was told to try that method [i forgot about that sorry Dave lol] it was definately dead, it isnt a dell is it dave.....?

[lancsdave]

Originally Posted by entwisi

Correct, there are lots of low level drivers that basically will be different, its trying to talk german to a frenchman

As for teh PC, try resetting teh CMOS by removing the battery off teh m/board for a good 30 mins then try booting with just CPU, GFX and 1 stick of ram. Remove everything else. If this works, try adding stuff back one piece at a time. If you don't get anywhere, try a different stick of ram and gfx card

If you still don't get anywhere, buy one of those PCs you were selling

I can't afford one of them

Am I right in thinking that even if I don't have a hard drive in the PC I should still get some sort of response from the bios ?

[lancsdave]

Originally Posted by accymel

Yep i remember trying that entwisi on my old dell that died - was told to try that method [i forgot about that sorry Dave lol] it was definately dead, it isnt a dell is it dave.....?

Not a Dell, it's a Blue Peter one

[entwisi]

Yes, BIOS or (POST Power On Self Test, yes I know, uber geek) needs only CPU, gfx and a small amount of RAM, In Fact a lot of M/boards carry a tiny amount of RAm to POST without any RAM installed. One thing that srings to mind, one board I had wouldn't post as the jumper used to reset the CMOS had been left on 'reset'

[lancsdave]

Originally Posted by entwisi

Yes, BIOS or (POST Power On Self Test, yes I know, uber geek) needs only CPU, gfx and a small amount of RAM, In Fact a lot of M/boards carry a tiny amount of RAm to POST without any RAM installed. One thing that srings to mind, one board I had wouldn't post as the jumper used to reset the CMOS had been left on 'reset'

Not changed any jumpers so it shouldn't be that. Looks like I might have to 'work' from home this afternoon and start the process you posted.

Thanks for the help and will let you know how it goes.

[lancsdave]

Well looks like my motherboard is retired so going to have to buy a new one. Don't know about the CPU until I get a new motherboard.

Managed to get my hard drive to boot up in a different PC after some arguments with XP Repair !!!, so that's a relief, better get some backups done before I forget

[flashy]

ah i hope your going to give it a proper burial dave

[accymel]

Cool pc shot put over wall then heheehehehe

[Tinkerbelle]

Originally Posted by lancsdave

For no apparent reason my PC died last night.

Awww dear, that's such a shame !!! It's good to have a pc that works