PC Won't Start

E

EmmaC

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Hi Everyone,



I have a problem with my E-machines 820 (2.60GHZ, 80GB, 512MB, XP). It was working fine before Easter but failed to work when I got home from holiday.



When I plug the power cable in, the fan attached to the motherboard starts spinning quickly. I’m sure it never used to do this before. This is before I even press the button on the front of the case to try and switch the machine on. There’s also a rapid clicking noise coming from the front of the machine which I think is the floppy disk drive trying to operate even though it’s empty. The orange light on the front of the case is also lit.



Pressing the “on” switch has no effect and does not start the boot-up process. The fan continues to spin and the clicking goes on until the power cable is removed.



A friend came around and swopped over the power supply unit which had no effect. We tried a different power cable and the problem remained. We removed the battery and replaced it with another one but this made no difference. There is no burning smell or visually obvious damage to the motherboard or any components.



Any ideas?



Thanks, Emma
 
Can you please post info on the motherboard as it sounds like the motherboard might had failed. How old is the unit?

Thanks,

wizkid
 
The machine is about 5 years old and used mainly for surfing and MS Office applications - no music or games.

I've found the documentation that came with the machine. Hopefully it will mean something to someone!

AL845GE Motherboard
GeForce FX 5200 (MSI) Video Card

Thanks in advance for any help!

Emma
 
I would have said the power supply but I see you've tried a substitute.

Can't prove it but an educated guess would be the motherboard is faulty.

Try disconnecting the floppy drive and any optical drives from the motherboard and trying to boot.

If that doesn't work, disconnect the hard disk as well and try to get through the POST sequence.

If it still fails then it's likely the motherboard, possibly the CPU and an outside chance it's the memory.
 
You seem to have acces to some spare parts or another machine . If so try using the memeory from the other machine . Doing this will eliminate or solve one of the possible causes of failure .

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The only thing which seems to stop the fan from spinning is when I disconnect the square connector with four wires from the motherboard. Removing the connections from CD drives, floppy drive and hard drive doesn't stop it.

I've removed both sticks of memory and tried with just one then the other and then with them in opposite slots from originally. This appeared to make no difference so I think I can discount that possibility.

If it's the motherboard itself, it's quite serious, isn't it?

Thanks, Emma
 
EmmaC said:
The only thing which seems to stop the fan from spinning is when I disconnect the square connector with four wires from the motherboard. Removing the connections from CD drives, floppy drive and hard drive doesn't stop it.

I've removed both sticks of memory and tried with just one then the other and then with them in opposite slots from originally. This appeared to make no difference so I think I can discount that possibility.

If it's the motherboard itself, it's quite serious, isn't it?

Thanks, Emma
Click to expand...


Not realy. you could get another motherboard that would support the CPU and Ram and then install it and reload windows on the pc see what happens. :)
 
A link:

http://www.geek.com/forums/topic.php?id=28510&page

You'll need to find a motherboard that supports a Pentium 4 478 pin CPU; DDR RAM & an AGP Video card.

Hardly worth the bother or the expense I'm afraid, and that's assuming you could find such a board.

And also assuming the CPU is still good.

I'm afraid the machine should be considered a write-off :(
 
Oh dear. It looks like I will be on beans on toast for the next couple of months!

Time to start shopping for a new machine I think. Can I disconnect the hard drive from the old machine and connect it to a new one?

Any recommendations for good places to shop? I assume PC World is a rip-off?

Thanks, Emma
 
Thanks for the suggestion but it's way too expensive and I don't need/want to play games.

My primary concerns are using MS Office and general surfing. I'd expect to pay around £200-300.

Thanks, Emma
 
Yes. I think that will do nicely.

Is it possible to use an old hard drive as an external hard drive? Can I buy a cable to connect it to a USB port like a memory stick?

If not, can I install my old hard drive in a new machine to increase storage capacity?

Emma
 
Have a look at this thread here

And this one here

If you can still get one of those machines it would suit you fine.

If your hard drive is good you probably won't be able to fit it as your primary drive as it will contain drivers specific to your old e-machine and probably won't even boot.

However, you can connect it as a seondary drive and - assuming you're using XP or Vista - extract your important data from it.

After that you can format it and use it for storing stuff such as pictures and mp3's. Or, as mentioned, buy an external hard disk enclosure and use it that way. What size is your current hard disk? EDIT - just had a look at the first post, it's 80Gb :o So, big enough to make it worth using then.

If you need help, just ask here.

Good luck.
 
Abarbarian said:
You can still get 478 motherboards .

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Comp...=cF9zdHlsZT1saXN0JnBfcHJvZHVjdHNQZXJQYWdlPSY=

happywave.gif
Click to expand...

My goodness, I'm surprised.

But - is it really worth it?

Is the CPU of the computer in question proved good?

There comes a time when we have to move on.

However, if a person wants to gamble £42.39 (inc VAT & postage) as against several hundred quid, it's maybe worth a shot.

And also assuming they have the technical know-how to swap out a motherboard.
 
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