Topic: Intermittent start-up problem

[sobarel]

Sandra - I tried your bios suggestions, no change I'm afraid.

Tony - I'm a bit reluctant to try it because the system is becoming so unstable now.  Would it matter if a failure occurred whilst in the process of creating a new partition or installing the OS?

Thanks for your continuing help and suggestions by the way - I'm sorry if my frustration is showing...

[Sandra]

The only other thing I can suggest trying is to disconnect every device not needed on startup, ie any printers scanners, external modems usb devices and even the floppy and cd/dvd drives and any slave hard drive installed.
In other words you just want the master hard drive and mouse and keyboard connected.
If it starts and runs ok with just the hard drive connected then add the other devices one at a time and see if the fault reoccurrs  

[sobarel]

Okay, I removed all the nonessential components - I'm assuming I did the right thing in taking out the ribbon connections rather than the power ones?

In any case with the floppy and CD drives disconnected the system wouldn't post, but I did notice a difference:  usually when powering up fails I get the DVD drive light coming on but not the CDR one, with the ribbon connections removed though I still don't get to post but BOTH lights come on.  Does that offer any clues?

[Tony]

Tony - I'm a bit reluctant to try it because the system is becoming so unstable now.  Would it matter if a failure occurred whilst in the process of creating a new partition or installing the OS?

Thanks for your continuing help and suggestions by the way - I'm sorry if my frustration is showing...

No sweat mate, thats the beauty about PC's they can and do drive you mad  

Best to try what Sandra says first, strip down to bare essentials and work your way up.

Regards fearing your PC falls over whilst installing the OS on another partition. If you only have one partition on your PC [Primary Partition] then it may be risky.

See I have five partitions on mine, so I would not be frightened to give it a go on one. Plus I've got a spare hardrive all set up to run, if I have a HD failure.

[Simon]

I would put money (not a lot!) on an iffy graphics card or memory stick.  If you have more than one memory stick, try taking one out and see if boots up, then swap.  Might also be a dodgy PSU, if it's not distributing the power correctly to the various components.  Do you have access to spare parts you could try?

Have we ruled out a boot sector virus?

[Sandra]

I wonder if the bios sequence should be set to boot from hard drive first if the floppy and other IDE devices are disconnected ?
I did wonder about a boot sector virus earlier but discounted it as its not getting to the loading windows stage at all if it wont get to the F8 option screen  

[sobarel]

It seems to be getting even worse!  I was trying to change the bios to boot from the HD and it was failing whilst I was in the bios options menu.

This is the thing that's really confusing me - how come it's getting worse, but is also inconsistent and will sometimes work for a short time?  I feel like the more things I've checked the less I've known...

I'll try the memory stick thing and report back, after that I think I'm really out of my depth and will have to hire a tech or something to check it out.

[sobarel]

Okay, I've checked and it's not the memory!

[Sandra]

Apparently a boot sector virus can cause it to fail at such an early stage but if it was that then I would have thought it would be more consistant and never boot up  

[sobarel]

Hello all - just to update you: it was a motherboard fault.  It's now been replaced and everything is running normally.  Thanks to everyone who responded with advice and suggestions.

[Simon]

Glad you got it sorted - thanks for letting us know.  

[Nuli]

Sorry I can't offer any advice on how to fix it but I can tell you what I have tried as mine has had these problems since last September.
It all started when one day I started my PC, it went through the first screen then just hung. If I left it a day or two it would then miraculasously boot up.
I was running OS ME at the time. I dropped my PC in to my local PC repair chap and he upgraded it to XP home, I had a bigger hard drive put in some USB2s plus a new PSU AMD Athlon 1.8.
Anyway within a couple of days of getting it home it hung again.
Now when it does not hang it goes through the boot sequence then restarts and I can only get it to start in Safe Mode.
Again if I leave it for a day or two and I try booting about every 24 hours it will eventually start up and run, but then I can't get it to run again for another few days.
I have tried dusting it and checking all the internal connections.
Last summer when in use for a long time it would not start once switched off for about an hour or two. I put that down to over heating. I've also found that when my PC is left off in the house when no one is in i.e. no heating for a while it starts okay.
It may just be a coincidedence.
I'm stumped so far.

[Nuli]

Just read you found the fault.
Funny enough that is my next move replace the motherboard.
Now I can do that with confidence.
Thx for the post.

Martin