Weird computer problem that is making me miffed

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darkhunter139

Supreme [H]ardness
Joined
Mar 7, 2008
Messages
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Ok well I built a custom PC about 3 or 4 months ago and it has been working fine

Now all the sudden it is not booting right, When I turn the PC on the fans all start up but the hard drive doesnt. If I unplug it for a few seconds then plug it back in it will boot fine. What could be the problem?
 
I actually have a system that has a similar problem, the hard drives just don't always show up at boot... A second reboot fixes it and I don't reboot often enough to make it a hassle for me.

My guess is something finicky in the drive controller on the mobo... possibly a psu problem in your case... test your rails. if the psu is fine, either try to grab a pci HD controller and see if that works - or test in another mobo.
 
I mean it doesnt really bother me as long as its not going to hurt anything by doing this

Its a nice PSU so I doubt thats the problem. How do I test it?
 
You can get an idea if you have low volts from the PC/system health in the BIOS. Windows utilities like everest or Sisoft sandra will give you operational voltages under operation.
 
The light on my motherboard goes on so idk

Do you think its the PSU? What kind of volts should it be reading in the bios
 
If you have a USB hard drive plugged in, remove it and see if the problem goes away.
I have an external drive that makes my PC a real sod to boot.
It locks up on the memory test when it is plugged in.

Failing that...
If it is the PSU not able to supply enough power, you should notice the 12V rail drop a significant amount when the PC is under load.
(monitor this in windows)
There are other PSU issues that wont be highlighted by this though.
Booting is one of the most stressful times for a PSU so problems often show up when booting.

One way to test if its a power problem is to unplug as much as you can from your PC, PCI cards, USB drives etc.
Fit a lower power gfx card if possible and see if the problem gets better when the PSU is under less load.
 
is there any programs i can download to test my PSU? I cant really test it at the bios can I?
 
No but you can use the method I suggested which uses software (ie monitor the 12V rail in windows).
You can get hardware PSU testers but most only do basic tests and dont test for power saturation unless they cost a lot.
 
The monitoring software that comes on your motherboards CD.
 
Nope, that software just ties into the motherboard sensors which are almost always useless (I've never had one read voltage correctly) And those overpriced PSU testers are also usually... well... overpriced and sometimes not accurate either.

What you want is a multimeter (around $5-$10 shipped)

That and test your rails, you can find a number of guides online - but basically you want to test your post/idle/load voltages for consistency and accurate values (3.3v 5v and 12v)
 
IdiotCow said:
Nope, that software just ties into the motherboard sensors which are almost always useless (I've never had one read voltage correctly) And those overpriced PSU testers are also usually... well... overpriced and sometimes not accurate either.

What you want is a multimeter (around $5-$10 shipped)
Click to expand...
Agreed multimeter is best.
However the motherboard sensor doesnt need to be very accurate, it only needs to show the 12V rail dropping say 0.5V from whatever it started at.
 
Maybe it was just a bad connection that you have sorted out now.
 
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