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

Question

PC Won't Boot

Jul 23, 2016 9:56AM PDT

Hey guys,

So this is what happened. Friday night as I was going to shut down my desktop pc, "install updates then shut down" so I did that.

The next morning, I turned on the monitor then the PC and it seemed to be booting up just fine. The monitor kept blinking through HDMI, DVI etc which it does sometimes, so I swapped the ends of the HDMI cord then physically reboot the PC. After that, it got stuck at the (bios?) screen (black screen, white text) as shown in the pc1 picture. A computer friend said I should enable "smart" at the bios settings. I physically reboot, made the change (pc2 picture), and physically reboot again. At that point, there was no response at all. I hit the power button and 100% absolutely nothing happens.

Not 100% comfortable opening the PC up, but if it would just be a simple fix, I could probably handle it.

Not sure how to upload pics here, so I put them here:

http://janet141.tripod.com/pc1.jpg
http://janet141.tripod.com/pc2.jpg

Any advice is appreciated.

Thanks,
Janet

Discussion is locked

- Collapse -
Clarification Request
All I see is "image hosted by tripod"
Jul 23, 2016 10:51AM PDT

And seeing a BIOS screen is not nothing. Nothing is nothing and seeing the BIOS is something.

Keep telling more about this PC, age, BIOS battery voltage and more.

- Collapse -
PC won't boot
Jul 23, 2016 10:56AM PDT

Well as I stated above, the screens are what I saw before it stopped responding. The PC will not turn on at all. I press the power button and nothing. No sound, no lights, nothing.

My friend built the PC 2 years ago. I have no idea about voltage.

- Collapse -
So it's dead.
Jul 23, 2016 11:04AM PDT

At 2 years that helps me write it's unlikely to be that battery. But as I would have to open it up (remove power first) to try the usual push all the cards and cables gently home and see if the heatsink is on, I may as well unplug and replug in the memory too.

Then I try again.

Since there are no other PC details, I can't offer much else.

- Collapse -
Yep as a doornail
Jul 23, 2016 11:07AM PDT
- Collapse -
If it was mine.
Jul 23, 2016 11:13AM PDT

I'd downsize it to as few parts as I can. That motherboard seems to have onboard video so I could try onboard video to see if it's a GPU or power issue.

Many of these built machines have barely there PSUs (power supply uniits) so when I suspect that I take the usual voltage measurements (that's on the web) and then if in spec and even if not I downsize the machine.

It's a common approach to working "the dead PC."