Odd problem
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- Re: Odd problem
Odd problem
29-08-2008 8:18 AM
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Switched on my laptop last night, and went off to make a cuppa. On my return, windows had frozen at the boot screen with the moving blue blocks. Couldnt do anything with it, so kept the pwr button pressed for a few secs to shut it down. Restarted and nothing. The CPU fan span up as normal, and I could hear HDD activity, but not as much as is normal, and the screen was blank, not even a BIOS spash screen. Tried a couple of times, nothing, but eventually got a BIOS screen. Went into BIOS, nothing unusual, so rebooted, and tried going into windows safe mode, but it halted halfway through the boot process. Rebooted again, back to a blank screen. This happened almost all the time then on, so I pulled the screen apart, wondering if it was the connector, but all OK. Managed to get a BIOS screen again, so managed to boot from a PARAGON rescue disk, as I have an image stored. Moved all the files I wanted to the backup partition, all also ran a file integrety check, which was OK. Rebooted again, just to see if it would work before I restored the image file, and all worked OK, all night, no probs at all. I was thinking this could not be a windows issue, as the BIOS screen was not showing up. Wondered if this was a symptom of a failing MOBO, or something else, but it now works fine. Anyone any ideas at all????
Re: Odd problem
29-08-2008 1:09 PM
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Re: Odd problem
29-08-2008 3:55 PM
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Quote from: artificer the fan is a good place for dust to accumulate.
Absolutely!
I have a solution (actually, not mine! but that of my longtime friend Peter Raistrick who has been in the computer business since he was a lad ...and that's a long time ago!!!!)
what he did with every PC he built for me was to.... reverse the fan so that it sucks instead of blows... and place a sponge pad over the exit air grille..
This way, instead of drawing in dusty air into your PC, you 'filter' the incoming air!!!!!
cheers
Eddie Johnson
Re: Odd problem
29-08-2008 3:58 PM
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So you are suspecting an overheating issue... I recently (4-5mnths ago) replaced the motherboard. It has for a while now, been used on a plastic mat by my wife, on the kitchen table, with n o issues, but maybe its overheated. It was odd, as it was working fine the night before.
Re: Odd problem
29-08-2008 4:09 PM
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The correct procedure is to have the rear mounted fan pulling air from the case with a dust filter on the front air intake.
For extra air flow a front mounted fan can be added which pushes air into the case from the filter and if you really want to go overboard one or more top/side mounted fans also sucking air through the case.
With respect to having a rear mounted fan pushing air into the case it is very likely most of the air will go out through the power supply instead of cooling the contents of the case. Have read of this - it is a bit out of date but still relevant
Re: Odd problem
29-08-2008 11:39 PM
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It hard like a doctor diagnosing a patient he cant see but I would look at the HD. If that is failing the bios could hang trying to find it and windows could then fail to load.
Do a full check of the hard drive checking the cables and connections and then running chkdsk c: /f also check other partitions if you have them
Re: Odd problem
30-08-2008 12:39 AM
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I suspect the HDD might of had an error reading some initial boot data and probably got reported to the mobo as faulty during POST.
Re: Odd problem
31-08-2008 6:15 PM
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I didnt suspect an overheating issue, I was actually thinking of a MOBO issue, as the inital BIOS splash screen never appeared, although the CPU fan was running, also the HDD light was very spasmosic, rather than the normal rapid activity when booting windows. I didnt think a HDD issue could cause a boot failure so early in the process. I have pulled the HDD, and reinserted it, and at the mo everything seems fine. Did a disk check through Paragon, and came up clear. Will try the chkdsk from within windows, see what that shows.
Re: Odd problem
31-08-2008 9:00 PM
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1.. Faulty power inverter (remote possibility). Dont think its this, as there is no HDD boot activity as well, and if it was just the scrren, windows in effect should boot normally.
2.. HDD issue. Cant do a scan, as cant get into windows, but I do have a 2.5 to full size adaper, so I can put into my desktop, and maybe run the scandisk from there?!?!? I have looked at the IDE connector, to the MOBO, its a direct connector, with no cable, and it seems OK. I did try another HDD, that I know is OK. Its blank with no OS on it at all, but still had the same issues, with no screen display etc etc.
3.. MOBO failure, although unsure as to why, as it went from working perfectly, switched off, and when tried again, nothing. We do however, occ leave it plugged in, on the chager as we forget to take it out, so if we have a power spike, it could have damaged it I suppose.
Would really welcome some advice, as I am now stumped...
Re: Odd problem
31-08-2008 9:25 PM
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Re: Odd problem
31-08-2008 9:34 PM
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I am sure the memory is OK, as its virtually new, and has always been Ok up to now, but will run MEMtest, just to be sure.
Re: Odd problem
31-08-2008 9:36 PM
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Re: Odd problem
31-08-2008 9:54 PM
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(MOBO was replaced as when I got the laptop off a mate, he had dropped it, and it would not work. Fitted another MOBO, everything OK, but it was from a dynabook, and the BIOS was in japanese, and some of the keyboard functions would not work. Managed to find an english satellite 1130 mobo, with a faulty power connector, which I replaced, and all was well again, and has been until this issue)
Re: Odd problem
01-09-2008 9:15 AM
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Re: Odd problem
01-09-2008 10:51 AM
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Anyone
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