Thank you for being a valued part of the CNET community. As of December 1, 2020, the forums are in read-only format. In early 2021, CNET Forums will no longer be available. We are grateful for the participation and advice you have provided to one another over the years.

Thanks,

CNET Support

General discussion

Home computer dead or comatose

Sep 10, 2004 1:25AM PDT

Win XP Pro sp1
Processor
1.5 gig AMD Athlon XP
128 kb primary memory cache. 256 kb secondary mem cache
Hard drives
Western Digital WD800BB-00CAA1
Maxtor 6Y120LO
Lite ON LTR-48246S CD ROM Drive
Toshiba DVD Rom SD-M1712
3.3 floppy drive
Controllers
VIA Rev 5 or later USB Universal Host Controller
VIA USB 2.0 Enhances Host Controller
Main Circuit Board
Board : MSI MS-6712 1.0
Bus Clock : 100 mhz
Bios : American Megatrends Inc. Version 07.00T 04/02/01
Memory
1024 megabytes installed
slot `0` has 512 MB
slot `1` has 512 MB
slot `2` is empty
Display
NVIDIA GeForce Ti 4200 with AGP8X

The system was working fine3 days ago. Next morning I turned it on and nothing. Screen only shows RGB test and status ok.
Floppy drive does not start.
CD Rom light comes on.
DVD Rom light comes on.
Power unit fan runs, CPU fan runs.
Otherwise nothing.

Where do I start. Nothing has been disturbed inside the tower , i cannot reboot as floppy fails to operate.

HELP
Thanks ralph

Discussion is locked

- Collapse -
Re: Home computer dead or comatose
Sep 10, 2004 1:34AM PDT

Something I forgot.

I had to recently replace the CPU Fan, I also bought the Maxtor Hard drive as the WD80 was showing a permanet blue screen and installed XP home as my XP Pro wouldnt install, the machine then repaired the fault and I disconnected the new Maxtor 6Y120. It doesnt make a difference whether both hard drives are connected or the main WD80.

- Collapse -
Re: Home computer dead or comatose
Sep 10, 2004 9:39PM PDT

can you enter the CMOS (bios) setup???

- Collapse -
Re: Home computer dead or comatose
Sep 11, 2004 2:38AM PDT

Check if your keyboard's LED's light-up during start-up, if it does light up, does the caps lock LED or Num Lock LED activates once the keys are pressed or are they steady (sometimes the 3 LED's are lit).
If that is the case, there might be a problem in the motherboard.
Check the capacitors near the power supply (there are 3 or 5 big capacitors in there as compared to other capacitors some read 2200 uf or 1500 uf 3.3 volts), is it bulging on top (showing a burnt-up capacitor)?
The capacitors in there control or maintain the power supplied to various parts. Once they are busted, there will be low power output supply to various parts. The DVR or CD ROM LED's may light-up but will not operate since LED's require a small amount of current to light-up.
Burnt-up capacitors sometimes show after you had put your electronic equipment off, since they had exhausted its reserved charge when they were idle and no power is supplied to it.

- Collapse -
Re: Home computer dead or comatose
Sep 11, 2004 6:31AM PDT

Had a similiar occurance recently on my daughter's machine. My wife was powering off, and a program was hanging the shutdown (Win 98), then the screen went black. Next day I found the vid card was blown. Popped in another, no bootup. Pulled all hardware except ram and cpu; no beep, no BIOS. Sent it to shop, and it turns out my motherboard just died. Can't say whether the amd 1.4 chip is dead or not, as there were no other boards to test in. Just installed another motherboard and Intel chip. All other hardware survived, best that I can determine. But do try to get into your BIOS; this will at least give you a hint as to what *may* have failed. Good luck.