Motherboard or hard drive?

[n00dle]

When i went to turn my comp on it wouldnt fully boot up.. all that happend was the fan was running... no beeping or anything.. so i thought it was my power supply so i put a brand new one in and went to turn on the comp and its still doing the same thing.. so now im thinking its either the mobo or hd.. i have no clue how to figure this out so if someone could help me that would be great...

 

[jesteraver]

I'm having the same reply as you. One thing I hope for me its the motherboard. It suck if it was the HDD. Have so much stuff on the HDD.

 

[n00dle]

in a way i want it to be the motherboard too b/c i dont want to lose everything but.. the thing is the motherboard costs double what a harddrive does... why do things have to break damnit lol

 

[vnf4ultra]

I'm not sure what your problem is but my one pc's hd got corrupted(for unknown reasons), and the comp. just wouldn't boot. I reformatted and reinstalled and all is well now. Strange.

 

[Samstoned]

does the MB post
if so does it show the drive present

 

[n00dle]

samstone.. im not all that smart when it comes to building comps.. so can you tell me how i would know if the mb posts ?

and to be more clear on what my comp does.. when i plug it in.. it turns on by itsself.. and all that happens is the fan turns on and nothing appears on the moniter..

 

[jesteraver]

I can tell u what might be the problem. Only tomorrow though. I get my computer back from the shop.

 

[Merc14]

First check that all your connections are good and that the cables themselves are still sound (swap the HDD cables if you can. If no change then remove the CMOS battery and clear CMOS via the jumper. Replace the battery and boot back up.

 

[n00dle]

i know its not the battery... and i made sure all the connections were good... and how would i check weather its the motherboard thats the problem or the hdd?

 

[Molson316]

If all your connections are good, replace your current HD with a different one and see if the same problem occurs.

 

[Merc14]

You have a new PSU so that isn't the problem. You said that when you plug the system in the fans start spinning? If so it sounds like you have a short somewhere. Could something have slipped behind the mobo that is shorting out your power system. When you plug in you should only see a LED (if your board has one) until the power-on switch is selected. Look between the mobo and the case side and try and see if an old screw or something is caught back there.

 

[Merc14]

Also noodle, I am not saying the battery is bad, I'm saying you should reset the information that the battery holds in memory. Sometimes that is all you need to get back up and running, it's like a reboot for your BIOS.

Pull out the battery. You should see a little set of 3 pins near the battery with a little blue cap covering two of them. Take the cap off 1 & 2 and put it on 2 & 3 for a minute. Put the cap back on 1 & 2 and replace the battery and reboot.

 

[n00dle]

resetting the bios wont screw anything up though right...? like it will work just like before? and there isnt anything i can find under the mobo but dust lol

 

[IronDuke]

I'd verify the jumper in the manual before moving it. Don't want to short the wrong one.

 

[Merc14]

you'll have to reset the time and date.

 

[n00dle]

that didnt seem to be the problem.. what should i do next? and thank you all for helping me.

 

[n00dle]

nobody has any idea what i can do?

 

[Norak]

Could be the graphics card

 

[Justin]

Does the machine make any beeps when you turn it on? If so, how many and what is their pattern?


A non-posting machine could be faulty ram, a bad video card, a bad cpu, an improperly seated peripheral, a number of things. Beeping is good though, so tell us if it does.