Impossible to fix
This will be a long, somewhat confusing post because of this long, somewhat confusing problem I've been having. I'm trying to get in all the details because skipping over one thing can ruin it all.
A couple of months ago my computer wouldn't beep every time you pushed the on button. The fans would come on, lights would blink, everything would happen except for the beeping. Because it wouldn't beep, the computer would be left with a black screen (Obviously Windows wouldn't boot). For a while, about one in three presses of the power button wouldn't turn on the computer. Then it got to where you'd have to push the button about ten times to turn it on.
Then my power supply blew up. I replaced it with something that I thought/still think works. It worked perfectly until the second time I turned on the computer; it started not beeping or booting windows yet again.
For some strange reason, the computer would then beep but, after displaying the motherboard logo and checking for IDE devices a number of different things would happen instead of displaying the giant Windows flag that precedes getting to actually use the computer. Sometimes there would be a blank screen. Sometimes there would be a blue bar going near the bottom of the screen and a text parser in the top left hand corner of the screen. Sometimes just the text parser would be there. In any case, the computer would reboot and go through the whole thing again if you waited for about four or five seconds. Or it would just stay that way.
I messed with the BIOS settings. But there were even problems there... I'd push delete and I'd only rarely get to play with the BIOS settings. I'd see the blank screen, the screen with blue bar and text parser, and plain text parser screen in addition to a few new ones. Sometimes the BIOS screen would load up only a few of the options, and there wasn't any way to access these two or three options. Sometimes all of the options would load, but there would ba a text parser in the middle of of of the words. All of these things would end in, of course, another reboot or nothing else happening.
In the 1/4 instance that the BIOS loaded up, it still wouldn't be tell-all, end-all. The computer would do yet more odd things. Sometimes when switching between options, the red outline (The parser in my BIOS) would disappear. Other times it wouldn't move until you waited a while. When going back to a previous screen in the BIOS, sometimes your parser wouldn't be visible, a text parser would show up on one of the words, and only a few options would load up. At any point in time during this, the computer would turn to a blank screen or reboot. (However, I have been able to put everything on the right settings via saving my settings when everything works and I've messed with one or two settings)
Now, for more reasons I can't explain, the computer beeps and turns on and everything pretty much every time I push the button. I'd say 6 out of every 10 times. Still, problems arise. Instead of booting windows, it now displays the "Windows did not boot properly, choose from Safe mode, Safe mode with networking..." screen. Not always; it'll sometimes still display a blank screen. Nevertheless, if I choose any of the options, the computer freezes up. Nothing happens at all.
I've tried putting the Windows CD in, but it doesn't work either. Not only is it very hard to make the CD drive boot first with the crazy BIOS shenanigans, but after I push any button to boot from CD and the system's hardware is checked (Or whatever it does) the screen just goes blank. No matter how many times I do it, the screen always goes blank.
Earlier I thought it may be the graphics card, so I swapped it out for another one. Nothing changed. On Monday I'm going to try another power supply to see if that's the problem. I've looked over the motherboard and everything seems fine; no leaking capacitors (Or whatever you call them). I sincerely hope it isn't the motherboard... I built the computer myself, so I can't send it to anyone for a warranty or anything.
At this point I'd just like to learn a way to wipe a hard drive. I'd love to start fresh again. Maybe that would help? Anyone out there have any other ideas? I've had to go without playing World of Warcraft for about a month and a half because of this, and it's starting to get to me...
Last edited by Manamicool : 08-19-2006 at 12:20 AM.
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