Catz's computer died!

Technology and Gaming Help and Support
#1

NOTE TO ALL MY FRIENDS: My computer refuses to boot and I dont know how long I will be without internet! I am on my son’s laptop right now, but this is not a permanent solution. Below is a string of info that Carlos and I went through to try to troubleshoot, but in short, please don’t rely on me being here for a while. I am convinced this is gonna cost money, of which many of you know I DONT HAVE. So I may be gone a while. =(

Whimper

Victoria
CatzEyes93

=======================

Victoria
The power goes on, front panel light on, cd drives lights blink, power supply fan on, video card fan on, dirt cleaned, plugs all tight. I dont get “beep.beep” noises tho and no ‘boot menu’ is sent to monitor. Eventually my front panel light shuts off even tho all other ‘power’ seems to be on. Shutting down and trying again, for the 15th time.
2 hours ago ·

Kelly
That happens to me sometimes when there is another device the computer is trying to boot to. Try unpluging everything but your monitor, keyboard, and mouse and see if that helps.
2 hours ago ·

Kelly
Oh and make sure there’s no CD in the CD drive.
2 hours ago ·

Carlos
If your BIOS doesn’t post to the screen that sounds pretty bad. I’d say some core component inside has gone bad. I’d try removing your RAM one stick at a time and hoping it’s that. Are you sure your monitor is working/plugged in tight? If absolutely nothing shows up on it, it might be your video card. You can try borrowing a monitor from someone to check that it’s not the monitor. If this all fails it may be your motherboard or CPU. But all signs point to hardware failure
2 hours ago ·

Victoria
I saw on one of the boards to take out each memory stick and gently rub the copper plating on both sides with an eraser… that this gets rid of static electricity. I made sure they snapped tightly back in. I took out the video card to see if it would “beep” at me but nothing. (it has an onboard video card, so removing my radeon wouldnt matter …
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2 hours ago ·

Carlos
Did you try removing one stick of RAM at a time and booting without it though? If it’s bad it could prevent the pc from booting. Not all motherboards beep for these kinds of problems. It is highly likely your data is safe, this sounds like some other component has gone bad.
2 hours ago ·

Victoria
Didnt do that. I took them all out, gently wiped them and rubbed them, then put them all back and tried to boot. I will do it your way.
about an hour ago ·

Victoria
Here is something weird to note though. This has happened before. At least twice in the last year. But after turning the puter on and off about 10 or 15 times it would finally boot like nothing was wrong. (We rarely turn our puter off) This morning hubby was on it for a while, but when he went to shut the computer down, it didnt power down / turn off fast enough so hubby pushed the button to MAKE it turn off without waiting. I am not puter savy, but isnt that REALLY BAD TO DO? GAH all memory sticks were checked! Not working.
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about an hour ago ·

Carlos
You could try checking your CMOS battery. If this has happened before that seems like a likely source of the problem. https://bit.ly/6PQ2QS
about an hour ago ·

Thomas
feeling your pain. willing to bet that your data is not gone, though. probably still residing on your HDD. Sounds more like something wrong with the motherboard.
about an hour ago ·

Victoria
Its not the battery. =(
32 minutes ago ·

Thomas
What make, model and configuration of computer is this?
27 minutes ago ·

Victoria
Am I a geek cuz I jpg’d my specs?
https://www.catzeyes93.com/images/General/specs.jpg
59 seconds ago ·

#2

Shouldn’t this be in the help section? :stuck_out_tongue:

Not sure if I can help.

#3

Damn, that sucks Catz D:

Sadly I don’t know anything to add aside from what Carlos etc already suggested.

Look at it on the bright side though: Maybe you can use this as an excuse to buy a new gaming pc, that can play BM on full :retard:. That X1600 ain’t gonna pull it off that’s for sure.

#4

This was just a notification of sorts I guess. If I would have only posted “computer died it wont start” I knew I was gonna get a lot of you lovely ladies offering some suggestions. that is why I put all that other stuff in there so that ya’s know I am already 4 hours into troubleshooting.

i be sad kitty.

#5

From what I can tell it’s hardware failure, and I know that doesn’t help.

#6

I have an old and unused pc in my room, too bad Denver is 5000 miles away from me. :confused:

#7

Damn me for not living anywhere near Catz - I could save her day now by donating my Notebook. :frowning:

#8

Your data is almost definitely safe - don’t worry about that too much.

#9

This happened to me recently as well.

I did this.

#10

What kind of laptop is it? Can you hook the laptop up to the monitor and toggle between the laptop screen and the monitor just to verify that it’s not the monitor? I had to do that with my wife’s monitor to verify that the monitor was bad and not her on-board graphics.

#11

I am out of a job for over a year now and cant afford a new puter. I am at the point I cant afford my HOME anymore.

A new rig is not an option.

And I already know it is not the monitor. My computer normally makes tiny grinding type beeps or noises when starting up and it simply isnt doing it now.

#12

Catz, those beeps you get when you turn your computer on but it doesn’t boot up are an error code. Can you post what the the sequence of beeps you get is? Like “two long, two short” or “one long, two short”? Those would tell you a lot about what’s wrong with your computer if you get them translated, and I’m willing to help with that.

#13

Methinks it’s the motherboard, because I’ve yet to see a CPU die and since it’s not the ram…

Try to remove the Graphics card and boot with the built-in graphics card, the way it works, it can’t switch to the onboard card unless the AGP/PCIe slot is empty.

Anyway Gayway really sucks, my mom bought me a Profile 2 back in 2001 and it broke in 1 year, everything that could be reused was broken, even the LCD panel.

#14

*You say there’s nothing on screen and no beeps… This seems indeed related to the motherboard.
*If the BIOS were to be corrupt, you’d still have a message about it on screen. At least that’s what I’ve seen. It would also be accompanied by sounds…

I don’t think this will help but it might be worth a shot: Resetting your CMOS.
First you will need to locate your Jumper, here’s the main view of your motherboard.
Locate L - Clear CMOS Jumper <- it’s indicated in what position it should be. Before doing this cut the power supply! Leave at the reset pos for at least 3 seconds before reverting back.
Another way to reset your CMOS would be to remove your battery which you can easely spot.
Again I don’t believe this will magically work, but you never know. I’ve seen some strange things…

By the way looks like you’re not the only one. :frowning:

#15

As I said, stay away from gateway (aka acer) in the future.

#16

Yeah, easily 80% of the computers I get called to repair are Gateways. Not a good brand by any stretch of the imagination.

I hope Catz gets back to me with that beep code. That would help a lot to lock down what her real problem is.

#17

Do you have any idea what may have caused it to happen? For instance, if you cleaned out the inside of your case or changed any hardware recently.

Double check it’s not something silly like the CPU not being connected to the power supply.

#18

From what I understand there’s no beep at all!

#19

Oww… that sounds pretty bad. Do you at least have any alternative place to stay if you need to leave there?

#20

my computer achieved sentience 2 years ago and it’s been beeping kill me in morse code for 7 months now.

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