Need help diagnosing problem (1 Viewer)

[Mike LS]

I need some opinions. Last week I tried to "wake up" my PC from sleep mode and it wouldn't come up. It had been on for a few days and was working fine the last time I used it.
It never would come back up, so I turned it off and powered back up.
I can see that the CD, floppy and harddrive are getting power from the lights on the individual components, but I get absolutely nothing. No start screens, no manufacturer splash, nothing.
I also noticed that the system fan isn't turning. The fan on the power supply is working, but not the main fan. Everything else seems to be working from what I can tell.
I thought that it might be a mobo problem, so I took all the components out of that case and installed them in another case and on another board. I don't know the condition of this board to begin with since it was given to me and I haven't taken the time to rebuild it yet.
At any rate, I pulled the HD cables and power supply from the old PC and put them into the new one, using the exising CD and floppy drive that was in this new case.
I get pretty much the same result. All components get power but after the initial power up, everything stops. No signal to the monitor at all.
The only difference is that this mobo has a fan mounted directly over the processor and that fan is getting power.
Is this a power supply problem or what?

 

[Neil Joseph]

I don't know if this is related or not but I used to run Windows ME on my PC. When I used to suspend it, sometimes (maybe all the time) it would not wake up so I always had to power it off and then on. Ever since upgrading to Windows XP it worked. Mind you, when I upgraded to XP I also had to download the specific drivers for my keyboard which has some extra buttons on it to provide one touch to the internet, volume control, and CD player functions. After the XP upgrade, none of those buttons worked because it thought I had a regular microsoft keyboard but after providing the proper drivers, everything worked ok including waking up from suspend.
Just a thought.

 

[John_Berger]

Not that this necessarily helps your situation, but I have never had success with the suspend/sleep mode on any PC with any version of Windows. I avoid it like the plague to the point that if I get a keyboard with a Sleep button, I break the button off. I also disable all Advanced Power Management functionality in the motherboard. I've just had far too many bad experiences.

 

[Eric Gan]

I find that the suspend/sleep function works pretty well after a fresh install of a Windows O/S. After a while, as you install more and more programs, the sleep function seems to die off....it either never goes to sleep, or won't wake up. I guess it's not really Microsoft's fault...most likely some other piece of bad software or driver.

Anyways, back to the original question. Mike, is your system fairly new (PIII, Athlon etc)? If so, and the cpu fan isn't running, then that's your problem right there! Modern processors require lots of cooling and will usually (and hopefully) shut itself off when the temperature gets too high. If it's an old Pentium II or something, it might just keep chugging along without a fan.

Regards,

Eric

 

[JustinW]

When you turn the computer on do you get any beeps from the PC speaker and if so how many.

Computers have what's called a POST (Power On Self Test) and depending on the number of beeps produced you can tell what is causing the problem.

Also when you installed the components into the 2nd case did you use the same keyboard as Win9x systems will stall during the boot process if the keyboard is not detected, again something that can be deciphered from the POST.

 

[Mike LS]

I don't think the deal with it not coming back from sleep mode has anything to do with it. I think whatever fouled up just did so while it was in sleep mode.

System is a few years old. Celeron 500mhz running Win2000.
When I power up, there are no beeps at all. I can see that the CD, floppy, zip and HD are getting power since all of their lights come on. The monitor never gets any type of signal.

The only reason I think it's something other than the mobo or processor is that it does the exact same thing in the other case.
BTW, I'm using the same keyboard and mouse (and HD) in the other case.

Could this be the power supply not getting power to certain parts of the board?

 

[Neil Joseph]

Does the computer ever turn on?

 

[Mike LS]

Does the computer ever turn on?

Depends on how you define "turn on". You press the power button and the power light comes on. The CD drive spins up, the floppy drive powers up, and the HD power light (on the drive itself and the HD light on the case) both light and that's the end of it.