PC won't boot up

[Diesel]

My fairly new pc (about 1 month old) has just developed a fault. When you switch it on the screen stays black. If you press the reset button a few times it will sometimes boot up. One time it had some error message on the bios screen saying something like 'failure to boot up'

:(

Help!
AMD 2200mhz
ASRock K7VM2 AMD Motherboard
40gb hard drive
dvd drive
cd-rw

[Stalker]

any error beeps of any sort?

does it boot to anything other than a black screen?

have you tried clearing cmos and doing it again?

Are your fans etc turning on?

What video card and Ram do u have?

[Diesel]

Hi Stalker,

Thanks for your reply.

No error beeps

it just stays black screen

the fans run normally

I don't know what cmos is; could you explain please.

I have 256M ddr ram and the graphics is onboard ie no video card

Regards
diesel

[kanezfan]

cmos is when you first turn it on and it says "Press Del to enter setup" or smoething similar. to clear it, look in your motherboard manual for the cmos jumper, it's usually three little pins on your mobo. there'll be a little plastic cap that covers two of those three pins. with your computer turned off, you simple move the jumper so that it covers the other pin. but look in your mobo manual, it'll explain how to do this.

[Diesel]

Why would it need to clear the cmos?
What does it do?

[kanezfan]

resets your computer's BIOS to default values. often helps in situations like these where you can't boot up

[primesuspect]

sometimes an easier way to clear the cmos is to unplug the computer, and look for the little lithium battery on the motherboard. Pull it out and leave it out for a few minutes. Then put it back in and turn the computer back on.

[mmonnin]

Sometimes those lil buggers are hard to get out tho. CMOS jumper works in like 5 seconds.

Also might want to try testing the memory. Never hurts.

http://www.memtest86.com

[Diesel]

The PC booted up OK last night, with some error message in the bios screen. Windows prompted me to go into safe mode, which i did. I was then able to restart as normal. I reset the bios to default values after that.

My PC often crashes; often I will be using a program such as (but no limited to) my slideshow viewer (slowview) and the computer will stop responding. Pressing ctrl+alt+del then end task will sometimes cure it but often the PC will have to be restarted.

Any ideas?

[mmonnin]

What OS (Please dont say ME)?

[kanezfan]

true, which OS are you using? another thing, and maybe I'm wrong, but I've never heard of asrock, and sometimes those lesser known motherboard manufacturers skimp on the quality control to save some money during the manufacturing process.

[Diesel]

Thanks for your help guys.

Windows 98se

I know asrock is a budget motherboard manufacturer, but they are quite well known (my colleagues have heard of them) and they claim to be good quality.

Please see website:

http://www.asrock.com/product/product_k7vm2.htm

Ben

[Diesel]

Whoops!

Gave away my real name there by mistake!

[cramstad]

asrock....sounds painfull

[AcidicDreams]

If you built the computer did you buy generic "cheap" ram and a small PS? please post specs with brands and costs if possible... cheap components can cause problems (like cheap ram) if you at LEAST used micron or better your probably ok... Mushkin or Corsair would be better... as for the PS get at least 300w and get a good brand, the cheaper ones don't regulate power well and if certain voltage fall out of an acceptable range BAM!! it crashes... ohh and as for it not booting up clear the bios and load fail safe settings in CMOS... then see if it boots normally... also imporperly plugged floppy drives seem to cause this problem... go figure?!!

[antthis]

cheap ram - i know about that but then again i know what it like paying over 3bills for a GBstick of register RAM ouch