Major Problems

Roddy23

Hi, I've an eMachines PC at home which is giving me major problems. Sunday night it was used to surf on the net and playing Solitaire for about 3 hours. The pc was shut down correctly. I came in later that night, to find the pc trying to shut down, but like it was detecting something in the A: . I was unable to power off the pc, by holding down the power button, so had to turn it off, by unplugging the power lead. I woke up in the morning, and now the pc will not boot up. The light comes on but there is nothing displayed on the monitor. I have checked all the connections and that doesn't seem to have been the problem. Nothing responds, neither the keyboard, the mouse, the cd or dvd rom drives. It doesn't even display anything on the monitor.

On Sunday afternoon before all the problems began, I had installed eWido, to remove any spyware. I removed something like 335 files, and ran a full virus scan, with no problems reported.

Last night I opened up the pc to make sure there wasn't a problem with the HD, or the Fan. When I opened up the pc, there was a slight smell of burning. I checked the memory, the processor, and the HD. Nothing seemed wrong. I disconnected the Floppy Drive. And tryed to boot it up again. no difference. When speaking to a mate who has been working in IT for a while he thought it might have been a power surge, or it could be the motherboard. I had backed up the important stuff, but I stand to lose all my music files, should it go down the swanny. Anybody any idea's as to what the problem could be.

Pc Specs: eMachines P4, 3.2ghz
128mb ram
80 gb hd.

Thanks for taking the time to read all this.

zilog_jones

Sounds dodgy. What happens exactly when you try and turn it on? Do the fans (power supply, CPU and any others) go on?

Everything on your hard disk is probably OK, so don't worry too much about your music but you should be making backups regardless.

MunsterCycling

Take the HD out put into another machine and get your music off it, then you can worry about the non start up problem knowing that your music is safe.

MC

Roddy23

Sounds dodgy. What happens exactly when you try and turn it on? Do the fans (power supply, CPU and any others) go on

The fan works, no problems there. The power supply works, the light comes on, but its like it keeps trying to respond to something. I'll check it out proper this evening. Would a power surge be able to fry the motherboard?

timeout

First unplug the power cable, hold in the power button for 5-10 sec. Now see if it will start.Can sometimes work.

If not then unplug everything. I mean cd, HD, modem, graphics, ram, all cables (ensure you make a note of where they connect to) except power connector on mainboard and power swith cable, then power it on.You should get a couple of beeps. Turn off and add in the ram and graphics.Restart and you should see the Bios screen. Keep adding components adding floppy, hd, cd, modem, cables, ect.

If you don't get the beeps above something seriously wrong.
Timeout

Roddy23

Cheers I'll give that a try tonight.

krissrodriguez

Did U try to check the video card? Is it on board video or pci, agp?

Howard the Duck

Hey man i've replaced the motherboard on two pcs that are similar if not the very same model so i'd say there's a good chance thats what it is although it could still be the PSU even though the light is coming on.
Good luck with it

Roddy23

Cheers for the replies. Went home yesterday, did as Timeout suggested. Took everything out, memory, cd, dvd, floppy, hd, everything, except the graphics card ( was told to leave that in). No beeps nothing not even the memory beeps. Sounds seriously wrong. Was talking to the auld one who was last on it, she said there was some Lightning around Sunday night.

Howard, is it expensive to replace the Mobo, and mores to the point, how hard is it to do.

timeout

Roddy23 wrote:

she said there was some Lightning around Sunday night.

There you go. Mainboard shot. Could have fried modem also which is very comon. Lightning damage is generally covered by your house insurance. You ring them up and explain the situation, they will take the PC off to one of their engineers and have it checked out before sending you a check or your fixed PC back. This can take a couple of weeks but don't cost you anything.

The other option is to replace the board yourself. The insurance crowd will send back your HD if they are writting it off.(just in case you worried about your music)

Howard the Duck

Roddy23 wrote:

Howard, is it expensive to replace the Mobo, and mores to the point, how hard is it to do.

Shouldn't be too expensive make sure you get the right one the ones i worked on were the 478 chipset which is the older pinned type they are getting harder to get you should be able to pick up one for about 79 to 99 euro.
Is it hard to replace?Well not really if you take your time and don't force things into place.Your better off going for the insurance option first like the timeout said.

SorGan

Roddy23 wrote:

Hi, I've an eMachines PC at home which is giving me major problems. Sunday night it was used to surf on the net and playing Solitaire for about 3 hours. The pc was shut down correctly. I came in later that night, to find the pc trying to shut down, but like it was detecting something in the A: . I was unable to power off the pc, by holding down the power button, so had to turn it off, by unplugging the power lead. I woke up in the morning, and now the pc will not boot up. The light comes on but there is nothing displayed on the monitor. I have checked all the connections and that doesn't seem to have been the problem. Nothing responds, neither the keyboard, the mouse, the cd or dvd rom drives. It doesn't even display anything on the monitor.

On Sunday afternoon before all the problems began, I had installed eWido, to remove any spyware. I removed something like 335 files, and ran a full virus scan, with no problems reported.

Last night I opened up the pc to make sure there wasn't a problem with the HD, or the Fan. When I opened up the pc, there was a slight smell of burning. I checked the memory, the processor, and the HD. Nothing seemed wrong. I disconnected the Floppy Drive. And tryed to boot it up again. no difference. When speaking to a mate who has been working in IT for a while he thought it might have been a power surge, or it could be the motherboard. I had backed up the important stuff, but I stand to lose all my music files, should it go down the swanny. Anybody any idea's as to what the problem could be.

Pc Specs: eMachines P4, 3.2ghz
128mb ram
80 gb hd.

Thanks for taking the time to read all this.

the problem seems to be your motherbord, normaly nothing on screen would tell me perhaps that either your connections /graphix card were loose, or less likely your monitor busted.
if you cannot after powering up, open your disc drive or see your screen then its likely your motherbord is shot, you can price one at 67 to 150 euro:D

Roddy23

Thanks for all the replies so far, much appreciated. When I plug the monitor in, I get the normal display, Green, Red and something else. So theres nothing wrong with the monitor.
The fact that I didnt get the memory beeps, when I removed the memory from the pc, would suggest something quite serious. My mate will be down later to give a more expert opinion, and to check my PSU.

First thing I'm gonna buy when this is all sorted is a surge protector (even if it proves not to be a motherboard issue).

SorGan

Roddy23 wrote:

Thanks for all the replies so far, much appreciated. When I plug the monitor in, I get the normal display, Green, Red and something else. So theres nothing wrong with the monitor.
The fact that I didnt get the memory beeps, when I removed the memory from the pc, would suggest something quite serious. My mate will be down later to give a more expert opinion, and to check my PSU.

First thing I'm gonna buy when this is all sorted is a surge protector (even if it proves not to be a motherboard issue).

yes i agree, that would point to a mobo catastropic failure,but because your monitor is on a plug of its own i would check your psu and its connections to the motherboard as i would check your plug fuse too,

lucernarian

I've seen 2 eMachines being repaired over the last week. They were very similar models and the problem was the exact same. The power supply failed, taking the motherboard with it. Stay away from emachines! Or if you have one, particularly 3 or 4 year old ones, I'd reccomend getting a new power supply for them (€50 should cover it). I wouldn't trust their power supplies, surge protector or not.