Don Schlesinger: Computer not booting

[Don Schlesinger]

My son Jason is writing everything below:

Dell Dimension 2400 desktop not booting.

Here is what I did. The goal was to see how our 256mb of RAM were configured in the RAM slots (1 256 card or 2 128 cards) To do this, we opened the cover of the machine and clearly located the RAM slots on the motherboard. We gently vacuumed some collected dust (without touching the nozzle to any components obviously) and removed the 256mb card from its slot to get part numbers etc. Then reseated the card back into the same slot (RAM cards only fit facing one direction as you know) replaced the cover and reconnected the machine.

The machine will now not boot. When plugged in, the LED on the motherboard indicated power to the board. When the power button is pressed, the fans come on, the hard drive begins to spin, and for 3-5 seconds, you can hear the arms clicking inside the drive (indicating the processor is communicating with the drive???) There is NO video output to the monitor, and none of the external connections are regognized (keyboard, mouse etc etc) and the machine fails to boot up. When left alone, it remains in this suspended state with the hard drive spinning and fans running indefinitely with seemingly no processor activity. The amber LED is displayed solid on the front panel.

What could I possibly have done to cause this without laying a finger on the hard drive, power supply, ribbon cables, processor housing, video or accessory cards or USB interfaces??? There is NO visible damage to the RAM card and I have removed and re-seated it several times in its proper slot.

[BJinNJ]

POST problem?

Let me think about it for a while.
In the meantime... anyone?

I presume you use WinXP Pro, weren't
on a nylon carpet and grounded yourself
to the case, at least.

BJinNJ

[kc]

> My son Jason is writing everything below:

> Dell Dimension 2400 desktop not booting.

> Here is what I did. The goal was to see how our 256mb
> of RAM were configured in the RAM slots (1 256 card or
> 2 128 cards) To do this, we opened the cover of the
> machine and clearly located the RAM slots on the
> motherboard. We gently vacuumed some collected dust
> (without touching the nozzle to any components
> obviously) and removed the 256mb card from its slot to
> get part numbers etc. Then reseated the card back into
> the same slot (RAM cards only fit facing one direction
> as you know) replaced the cover and reconnected the
> machine.

> The machine will now not boot. When plugged in, the
> LED on the motherboard indicated power to the board.
> When the power button is pressed, the fans come on,
> the hard drive begins to spin, and for 3-5 seconds,
> you can hear the arms clicking inside the drive
> (indicating the processor is communicating with the
> drive???) There is NO video output to the monitor, and
> none of the external connections are regognized
> (keyboard, mouse etc etc) and the machine fails to
> boot up. When left alone, it remains in this suspended
> state with the hard drive spinning and fans running
> indefinitely with seemingly no processor activity. The
> amber LED is displayed solid on the front panel.

> What could I possibly have done to cause this without
> laying a finger on the hard drive, power supply,
> ribbon cables, processor housing, video or accessory
> cards or USB interfaces??? There is NO visible damage
> to the RAM card and I have removed and re-seated it
> several times in its proper slot.

Do you get a screen where you could access the CMOS settings? It would say press del or some other key to enter setup. Maybe when the memory was removed, it changed a CMOS setting. If it doesn't get that far, then I would look for something you may have done while inside the computer.

kc

[kc]

> POST problem?

> Let me think about it for a while.
> In the meantime... anyone?

> I presume you use WinXP Pro, weren't
> on a nylon carpet and grounded yourself
> to the case, at least.

> BJinNJ

I don't know if a POST problem is likely, but if he can get into CMOS setup maybe some sort of clue could be found.

kc

[BJinNJ]

Yes, there is a function key that should bring
up SAFE mode during the boot process. From there
you can isolate/troubleshoot the problem.
I think on my machine it's F8, but it's probably
different for various vendors.

Perhaps the config file was corrupted when the card was
removed. Clean the contacts on the card, and check the
config in SAFE mode.

Boy, it's been a while since I had to do any of this!
:-)

BJinNJ

[Don Schlesinger]

> Do you get a screen where you could access the CMOS
> settings? It would say press del or some other key to
> enter setup. Maybe when the memory was removed, it
> changed a CMOS setting. If it doesn't get that far,
> then I would look for something you may have done
> while inside the computer.

> kc

No, I can't get to any screen to access the CMOS or BIOS settings. Something a colleague mentioned to me today is to try removing the 256MB of RAM and booting the computer without it. The motherboard should have 16k of RAM available to access BIOS without an extended RAM chip. Any thoughts on this? This could prove that there was a static discharge when I touched the RAM chip originally.

What is a POST problem?

[kc]

> No, I can't get to any screen to access the CMOS or
> BIOS settings. Something a colleague mentioned to me
> today is to try removing the 256MB of RAM and booting
> the computer without it. The motherboard should have
> 16k of RAM available to access BIOS without an
> extended RAM chip. Any thoughts on this? This could
> prove that there was a static discharge when I touched
> the RAM chip originally.

> What is a POST problem?

POST stands for power on self test. It's the pre-boot sequence your computer goes through to check that its hardware is working. It checks memory, disk drives, keyboard, and so on. I think there is a beep code that can give a clue to the source of errors. Try Googling POST beep codes and see what you get.

kc

[BJinNJ]

I never tried to boot without a Ram card installed.
It's worth a try, but 16K isn't much to work with,
at least since DOS 2.0. :-)

Once my disk drive settings were wiped out and I
had to get some numbers off the back of the HDD and
reconfigure so the machine could access it. Not sure
if there were some dip switches involved.

Google "low-level format hard disk". Perhaps there are
some descriptions of symptoms of this potential problem.

BJinNJ

[BJinNJ]

good link to all things HDD.

Check out the link below.

BJinNJ

All Things HDD

[Don Schlesinger]

> POST stands for power on self test. It's the pre-boot
> sequence your computer goes through to check that its
> hardware is working. It checks memory, disk drives,
> keyboard, and so on. I think there is a beep code that
> can give a clue to the source of errors. Try Googling
> POST beep codes and see what you get.

This is Don again. Thanks to evryone who tried to help. The motherboard is fried. Probably caused by the vacuuming. Have ordered a new one.

Don

[BJinNJ]