PC Start up problem

LimerickBishop

Hello, anyone know how to get out of this problem. I took a few photos of the screen. No way around it. Went to F12 option for Test which 30 mins later said there was no problem, but yet I ended up back at square 1.

Note, this PC has and is being used by OAPs who may have clicked 'Yes' on Pop Up Malware. Also, CDRom for AutoCAD is being left in cd tray all the time by one OAP using this, despite being told not to do it. This means PC is started up with the AutoCAD cd in the tray every time.

OS is Windows XP. Dell Optiplex 360 is the PC.

Thanks for any suggestions.

LimerickBishop

2 More Photos of Screen

ElectricGirl

Hi LimerickBishop,

What happens when you go into Safe Mode, does it load?

hearny

The Computer is crashing and automatically being restarted before you get to see the error message.

First thing to do assuming Safe mode will not start is to disable automatic restart.

As soon as the Dell Screen disappears keep tapping F8 until you get the advanced options.

Select "Disable Automatic restart on System Failure"

Take another picture and take note of the error messages and post the results here.

LimerickBishop

Hi ElectricGirl,

This is what happens when I selected 'safe mode'

mp22

Try a different keyboard.

LimerickBishop

Hi hearny,

Pressed F8, Got this [first screen photo].

Then pressed F2, got this [second screen photo]

LimerickBishop

Hi mp22,

Only got the one keyboard. I'm using my laptop which is working perfectly fine to get online here and post.

hearny

Ok, were you getting the Drive 2 not found issue all along or is that a new error. It looks like an issue with the hard drive but I need to do a few things to confirm that.

It looks like your timing is off on pressing F8 as you didn't get the menu I was looking for.

Few things to do first.

Restart the PC and press F2 when you get the Dell screen to go into setup.

Scroll down the list on the left to the "Drives" section.
Take a picture of each of the SATA screens in the drives section which SATA is turned on (ignore any with off highlighted) The bit I am interested in should display device info at the bottom of the page.

Exit the BIOS Setup and try the F8 thing again.

Keep tapping F8 repeatedly as soon as the Dell logo disappears to see if you get the menu.

If not you might aswell press F5 to run onboard diagnostics if the option is presented.

LimerickBishop

Photos of Screen on Drives

hearny

Ok, SATA-0 shows a Hard drive (Hitachi) that it recognises ok.

SATA-2 has a status of unknown so there is either nothing connected to it or the device is not working properly.

Do you know if there is an extra hard drive in the computer or if there should be only 1.

Go back into the bios settings you just uploaded photos of and turn on SMART Reporting, make sure to exit saving changes.

Try to boot the pc again you may get a new Error from SMART if you do post it here.

If the PC still wont boot go back in and turn off SATA-2, exit saving changes and try to boot again.

Again keep trying to access the advanced menu by pressing F8 repeatedly to try to turn off the automatic restart.

If you are presented with the SATA-2 error or similar just press F1 to continue and try tapping F8 straight away again.

LimerickBishop

hi hearny,

I turned on smart reporting and saved changes on exit, rebooted the pc, but same old story again.

I don't know about whether there is one or two hard drives.

Back to square one again.

hearny

So the PC is still stuck in a loop.

Any joy with pressing F8, I am after asking you to do it in most posts but you are not acknowledging if you tried it or not.

If you cant get it to work try a few more times.

As soon as you turn on the PC keep pressing F8 dont hold the key down just tap it over and over (sometimes you get a keyboard error if you do it too fast but just restart and try again).

Do you have the XP installation Discs.

LimerickBishop

No luck with pressing F8.

Don't have installation disks, can I download them and burn a cd?