Motherboard refuses to boot, possible hardware failure?

H

HotL3@D

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Oct 5, 2000
Messages
1,606
This is my father's computer, by the way, so i'll try to be as specific as possible.

Here are the specs:

Abit KR7A motherboard
AMD athlonXP 1800+

I dont know what kind of Vid card, or sound card or ram, but i dont think it matters much..

Heres the problem,
The computer will show the post screen, where it shows "hit delete to enter setup" Etc... But doesnt do anything past that. No startup check, no memory check. It simply freezes up. You cant hit enter to go into the bios and the optical mouse doesnt light up upon boot. It beeps, and does nothing after that. We tried swapping keyboards to hit delet to enter the bios. No luck. Tried resetting the jumper pin to reset the bios. NO luck. Tried taking out the battery to the mother board and let it sit overnight. NO luck. Nothing was done to the computer except turn it off and move it from one side of the room to the other. It wasnt bumped or anyhing and everything seems to be seated well into the motherboard.... I dont see how anything could have been fried in the process of moving, when the case was never opened up. I think the motherboard is FUBARed, but i cant seem to find why it just decided to up and quit one day. Possible lightning strike? But if that were the case, wouldnt the rest of the elctronics in the house, or the monitor, etc be fried as well?

Any suggestions on furhter things to check?
 
Try disconnecting the CD/DVD and hard drive cables and try to boot from floppy. I've had a bad hard drive which would freeze the computer on the post screen. Add and remove your devices if the floppy works. Same thing with all of the peripherals including the floppy. Sometimes a short in a device will drop the voltage. Go into bios and check the bus voltages. Switch out memory. The usual stuff.
 
gigaxtreme1 said:
Also reseat the heatsink fan because CPU overheat can cause this problem too.
Click to expand...

Well, i'll try what you suggested, but if that doesnt work and i cant get into the bios, then what?
 
everything seems to be seated well into the motherboard.... ?
Click to expand...

Did you reseat all of the electrical connections? I worked on a friends computer that did the same thing after they moved across town. I pulled all of the connections (AGP/PCI cards, power connectors, ata connectors, etc.) and reseated everything. Put the side back on and powered it up, she was running like a champ, until her daughter put AIM and RealPlayer back on it anyway. ;)

If that don't work, try shaking it. I've found that a good violent shaking fit will cure most computer ailments.
 
Have you reset the CMOS yet?

There should be a jumper somewhere on the mobo so you can reset it without getting into BIOS.
 
Captain Colonoscopy said:
Have you reset the CMOS yet?

There should be a jumper somewhere on the mobo so you can reset it without getting into BIOS.
Click to expand...

read his first post, he did.


Try swapping RAM, maybe one of them is bad, maybe all of them are bad.

First, take all his RAM out and try one of your sticks that you know works.

Then (if that doesn't work) we know it's something else like a HDD/mobo problem.

This one's a longshot: Try taking out the vidcard and booting, (assuming it has some form of onboard video, which i'm sure it does).

btw, what does "FUBAR"'ed mean? Fscked Up Beyond Any Recognition ?
 
Oops, I forgot to re-read the first post completely before I posted again. My bad. The only other thing I can think of is maybe swap the PSU with one you know works. It's possible it isn't giving it the right kind of juice in the right spots. Have you tried maybe taking out some of his components, HDD, vid card, etc, and putting them in to your system to see if they work? If they work in your system but not his then you can at least eliminate some variables. My guess is its either the mobo or the PSU. Good luck. Don't forget to curse at it and shake it a little, they love that. :)
 
Thanks for all your help on this. I have tried all your suggestions and it seems that once i took off all the ram and ribbon connections and pulled the battery as some one said i let it sit awhile about an hour. Once i did this and reassembled it it all came back on and i was able to get into bios and reset everthing thanks again
 
jsteel714 said:
Thanks for all your help on this. I have tried all your suggestions and it seems that once i took off all the ram and ribbon connections and pulled the battery as some one said i let it sit awhile about an hour. Once i did this and reassembled it it all came back on and i was able to get into bios and reset everthing thanks again
Click to expand...

Hi Dad. :eek: :D
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top