On Mon, 18 Mar 2002, Roger Sherman wrote: > Sorry to address this to the list, but I'm at my wits end, and it's either > this, or find a service center or something to fix this problem for me, > and after building this PC, I really don't have the money. > > I built a PC about two 1/2 months ago (my first attempt at building a PC), > and I'm having a booting problem, and a problem with it freezing up, and > I'm hoping someone could help point me in the right direction, > troubleshooting wise. > > First of all, the system configuration: > > Abit KG-7 motherboard > AMD 1800XP > 512 Meg DDR RAM > ATI Radeon All-In-Wonder 32mg vid card > SoundBlaster Live! 5.1 Platinum w/Live Drive > 60 gig Maxtor HD > generic DVD/CDROM from my old PC, a Compaq presario (which is happily > gurgling along as a dedicated FTP server now) > > Now, it's got a boot problem that is baffling to me - to turn this PC on, > I have to press the start button, at which point it sounds like it's > starting up, the HD and all the fans start spinning, but I don't get the > beep that I get with a successful boot, and there's no video output. So, I > then have to turn the PC off, unplug it, and plug it back in - at which > point it will usually start up again. > > Now, I do mean it will start up again just from plugging it in - I don't > have to press the start button. But, sometimes I'll plug it in, and it > wont start, at which point I'll have to unplug it, then press start, and > it seems to discharge a little power. Then I plug it in again, and it will > start. Then I get the beep that it's booting correctly, and I get video > output and away we go. > > Now, I'd live with this problem, if it weren't for the system freezes. The > first time I turn the PC on each day, there is always a complete freeze of > the system - and I totally can't get it unfrozen, either by > Control-Alt-Backspace, or Alt-SysRq-r. My only recourse is to press and > hold the start button til it shuts down (with this box, you have to hold > the start button in for 5 seconds to shut it down, for some reason). Using > the reset button doesn't seem to work. > > This system freeze can happen anywhere, too. Sometimes it'll happen when > Mandrake is actually starting up, once it even happened at a command line > login (it's set up to start at runlevel 3), but usually it happens about 2 > - 3 minutes after the system is up and running...usually after I've > started X, and am checking my email. > > And I can't let it run all day - the PC actually works great once it gets > past the booting and system freeze problems (usually the system freeze > problem happens one or two times, and then the PC will run properly), but > if I get up and walk away for several hours, then come back, of course the > monitor will have gone into power save mode, and I jiggle the mouse to > wake it up, but at that point for some reason the PC will have stopped > giving video output, and I have to start the whole process over again. > > My ideal situation would be to just leave this PC running 24/7, but that > makes it impossible, obviously. > > Now, I've tried several things to fix the problem - a friend told me the > symptoms are indicative of a hardware incompatability, so I changed the > HD, the CD-ROM (which is why I have the DVD player in there - I originally > had a Plextor CD-RW), the power supply, and I took out the SoundBlaster > and nic card (a linksys nic), although I put those two back in, since it > didn't seem to make a difference. I also tried disconnecting the floppy > drive. > > Before I replaced the HD and CD-RW, they effectively stopped working with > this PC, and I'm worried what's currently in there will stop working as > well, as every time I make a change, things seem to get a little better, > but never really work right, and then things degenerate. I don't have > anything else I can swap into this box, so if it continues to degenerate > with the current config, I'll have to stop using it until I can afford to > take it to a PC doctor. > > Again, sorry for the OT post, but any help anyone can offer would be > hugely appreciated.
Ack...forgot to mention - I read somewhere that the KG-7 occasionally suffers from wierd voltage spikes caused by the CPU and case fan monitoring, so I tried hooking them up to fan connections that didn't use the monitoring, which made absolutely no difference. -- peace, Rog registered linux user #190719 ICQ #56469198 http://www.toddstheory.com
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