Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Hardware and Software => Topic started by: Ghosth on May 26, 2003, 08:23:07 AM
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Walked away from my computer the other night. Came back after supper to find a dead machine.
Hitting the power button spins the fans for perhaps a second before they wind down.
Tried replaceing the power supply, now it spins up for maybe 5 seconds.
What the heck fried?
AMD XP 2000 cpu on
Abit KD7e Mb, 256k pc2700 ram.
ATI 9000 pro 128mb agp video
WD 80 gig 8mb buffer HD
Liteon 48x cd burner
Anyone have any clues?
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remove everything but the video card and memory and see if it'll post
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Do what Eagler said first,but it sounds like a dead motherboard and/or cpu to me.
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yup...time for upgrade;)
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It sounds serious, Ghosth. Like maybe the cpu fan failed and the chip burnt up? :(
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CPU fan still spins up, first thing I checked.
Will strip it down & try again but I'm afraid its a new CPU.
As for upgrade, system is only 3 months old & I'm broke.
Good news is sitting next to it is the exact same thing, ie my wifes machine.
Loaded AH last night, so I can at least take care of my fix.
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Sad to hear that Ghosth,,,outta left field here,but could the on switch also be faulty,,from what u have described you turn it on,fan spins,does it stop when u remove your finger from button?,,will it stay on if u hold button down?
Also if it's 3 months old,warranty at all? :)
Good luck with it :)
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Steely switch was first thought actually.
Removed it, tried with bare wires, etc.
Holding button down doesn't do anything.
Tried it again this morning when it was VERY cold, computer was aprox 55 degrees F, fans spun up & stayed up for maybe 25 seconds then down she comes.
Afraid something is fried, likely CPU.
Only thing I havn't tried is reseting bios.
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2 things
1) Any beeps?
2) Some motherboards have this....an LED Status...any lights on ?
What brand MB is this?
Went thru something similar with a Gigabyte board a while back, mb died. No beeps, nothing
Another old system had the card die...2 beeps at bootup.
Hope this helps
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The shutdown after a few seconds (longer when cold) is indicative of cpu thermal shutdown , seems for whatever reason your heatsink is not doing the job. If it tries to post then cpu is still functioning. Try removing heatsink, cleaning cpu and heatsink and apply some new thermal compound, maybe try another heatsink. Could be a faulty heat sensor (unlikely). But, it definitely sounds like a thermal problem.
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Does the Abit KD7e use an auto power off feature? If so can you disable it?
The Asus board I use does......it's supposed to sense when the CPU is about to fry itself and shutdown before it does to save the chip......
(http://image1ex.villagephotos.com/extern/640697.jpg)
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No beeps, has an amber power on led, thats it.
Swoop It does have autopower off for cpu fan failure, but I can't get up into cmos to do anything like that.
Phantom I'm thing you may be right, tried pulling off the heat sink, clearing off their gunk, put on a smear of artic silver 2. Replaced all, no change.
Can the thermistor under the CPU go bad? Telling the system its too hot when its not?
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XP2000 cpu is $75 (http://www.insightcomponents.com/ic/apps/productpresentation/index.php?product_id=AMDAXDA201)
saw a board here for less than $70
at some point your time is worth more than the parts to troubleshoot/fix it
gl
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Certainly any part can fail - however, thermistors are fairly reliable and fairly stable, but they can change over time. If you have another mainboard, (maybe a friend) test your heatsink and cpu on their board. It works ok, probably an bad thermistor, replace mb(repairs will cost more than replacement). If it fails there also, then problem is bad heatsink or cpu. Fan could be crapping out (turning but much slower) or cpu could have shorted out in some part of the die area causing to draw too much current and therefore heat rapidly. But it would certainly point to one of those three components. Gettitng a way to test them can be a problem. I was having a similar problem (almost identical), I had bought all a Fry's. So I took all three in, and had the tech test them, which they did for no charge (probably because the mainboard was bad and still in warranty).
btw Eagler is right, prices as they are today , a new chip AND mb are less than $150, and quickly be "cheaper" than the time spent trying to figure it out.
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Thanks guys
Problem with just replacing them is finding the cash to do so.
Things a bit tight around here just now.
It will happen just hard to say when.
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Couple things to try: Reset the BIOS.
If that doesn't work, unplug the main power connection to the motherboard, press the power button the PC case, unplug the power supply from the wall socket, reconnect the motherboard power cables, plug the PS back into the wall and try powering on the system again.
I've had troubles like you describe before, the fans would come on with the HDD activity light- but nothing would actually power up. Doing the above, the system would work again.
I'm pretty sure it was due to a faulty surge protector, replaced it and haven't had the problem since.
-SW
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Ghosth, I'd try re-seating the CPU in the socket.
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AKSwulfe
Did the reset bios thing, no change.
Tried changing power supply to differnt source, no change. Tried following your directions to the letter, no change. :)
banana, doubt thats it but I'll try it anyway :)
Good news is I heard from the Mwave.com people. Bad news is they asking the things I've already tried. :(
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Good news, after trading emails for day & half with mwave tech support. I just got off the phone with customer service.
Because I bought it as a bundle, they will take mboard, cpu & mem back as a bundle. They will then test, fix, & ship working bundle back to me.
:)
Now the hard part is just the wait.
Thanks for all the help & ideas guys!
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That *IS* good news.
I was only going to offer one last solution- to see if your mobo or your CPU was done, take the CPU from your working PC and place it in your dead one.
But since they'll test and replace anything thats bad, let them deal with that labor. :)
-SW
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Great news on the warranty mate,very glad to hear that :)
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Got an email today, its on its way back to me as of late last night. :)
Got to love a company that not only sells top stuff at great prices, but stands behind em also.
I'd have to say they are right behind HTC for tech/customer service.