Our kids PC has died and we don't know why

[Woodzie]

Help! Calling all computer experts out there......we left the other PC on as the disk was defragmenting and went back to it after returning home from paintballing and it won't boot back up. It makes an intermittent alarm noise which goes on for about 5secs a time and the screen remains blank. I've tried pressing ctrl alt and delete, nothing, the monitor, keyboard and mouse are all fine. Is this terminal???

[BUSHWHACKER]

Help! Calling all computer experts out there......we left the other PC on as the disk was defragmenting and went back to it after returning home from paintballing and it won't boot back up. It makes an intermittent alarm noise which goes on for about 5secs a time and the screen remains blank. I've tried pressing ctrl alt and delete, nothing, the monitor, keyboard and mouse are all fine. Is this terminal???

Switch off the mains power to the PC (pull the plug) leave for 30 secs re-connect and restart the PC.


I'm no expert by the way!

[RodLeach]

If mine messes me around, I turn it off on the button on the tower... Just give that a shot.

I know someone will come along an say thats bad - but lifes to short to be waiting for a computer to make up its mind!

[Woodzie]

Switch off the mains power to the PC (pull the plug) leave for 30 secs re-connect and restart the PC.


I'm no expert by the way!

Tried that and it's still deceased

[BUSHWHACKER]

Tried that and it's still deceased

Ok, as you power up, press and hold F8, it should go into safe mode, see if that works.

[Scorpion]

If mine messes me around, I turn it off on the button on the tower... Just give that a shot.

I know someone will come along an say thats bad - but lifes to short to be waiting for a computer to make up its mind!

As long as there isn't any data being written to the hard drive, and as a last resort when all else fails, it's normally okay to do a hard power down.

[Woodzie]

Ok, as you power up, press and hold F8, it should go into safe mode, see if that works.

No that didn't work and we have lost the hard drive light as well

[That Ruddy Squirrel]

Try it with a different monitor, if it's still down I would look to changing the PSU first.

And that's a job well within your range of skills old bean

[24Seven]

"intermittent alarm noise" is an error code.

Try

reseating your memory or/ and video card.

If that does not work try removing one stick of memory at a time (if you have more than one) to see if it will boot then.

[BUSHWHACKER]

No that didn't work and we have lost the hard drive light as well

Internal fuse or battery, thats as far as I can go.

[Woodzie]

Had a wiggle ....looks like a HDD fault

[Scorpion]

No that didn't work and we have lost the hard drive light as well

Hmmm, no hard drive light eh? May be a hard drive crash while defraging ,but then again the hard drive light normally only illuminates when the hard drive is being accessed. Do you have another computer at hand where you could mount the hard drive as a slave just to check that it is functioning?

[24Seven]

No that didn't work and we have lost the hard drive light as well

Is it making a noise, are the fans spinning?

It will still boot if the Hard drive is U/S

[Woodzie]

Is it making a noise, are the fans spinning?

It will still boot if the Hard drive is U/S

Only the bleep ,fans are spinning every thing else blank and no boot up

[Woodzie]

Hmmm, no hard drive light eh? May be a hard drive crash while defraging ,but then again the hard drive light normally only illuminates when the hard drive is being accessed. Do you have another computer at hand where you could mount the hard drive as a slave just to check that it is functioning?

thats beoynd me .........wiggleing things are my limit