OT Computer crashed

14 years ago

Hi all, just wanted you to know that I am suffering with computer withdrawals and may not be here as often as normally. Maybe a weird coincidence, but I did 2 things yesterday that were out of character...downloaded the Farm-ville plug in and clicked on one of those forwarded emails from a family member. My puter froze and I shut it down with the power button. It will not power back on and after a couple hours of trying this and that I determined that the motherboard is fried like a bad egg ;-) Thank goodness I still had my old computer in the closet, but it is really slow and frustrating to use.

Of course everything hits at once, the car needs a clutch and I need a new aquarium filter to keep my cichids healthy. Guess who wins?

The fish because they are god's creatures ;-)

Pam

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Comments (5)

knotz
14 years ago
Aw Pam....I hope all gets better for you FAST!!!...I don't do ANY applications or requests on Facebook...My daughter in law lost her computer from a virus that came from there.

Hope you have a GREAT day!!

knotz
haase
14 years ago
I'm glad that the fish come first.
the other stuff will get fixed in time. Best of luck to you.

Ingrid
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eloise_ca
14 years ago
Oh Pam, I feel your pain! I just got my computer a couple of days ago after it too crashed! Cost me a pretty penny to get it backed up, cleaned up and running again. Just a while ago I talked to my sister in Arizona and her computer also crashed due to a virus. Good thing her son knows how to fix it.
sandysseeds007
14 years ago
Hi Pam:

I've been building these machines since 1990, although I have called it quits years ago, except for family and close friends. I have a collection of 'obsolete' motherboards starting with the 8088 and the 8086 and so on. This is my process of ilimination and has no concern for your own abilities for analysis it's just the way it would have to be worded/questioned.

If you want some help, go through these steps and send me an email.

What sounds do you have?

If no sound at all, make sure there is not an on off power switch on the back of your power supply box. Make sure it's on and all plugs are tightly in and your power bar is also switched on.

If you hear the power supply box but not any of the fans, try switching out your memory cards, they (or one)may be what burned out.

If you hear your fans as well, listen for one beep, if you hear it, all is well with your hardware and something is wrong with your operating system bootup.

Make sure you have no floppy disc of cdrom in your drawers.
Most systems' bios' are set to have at least one of these to boot up first, in case of the need. They must be empty when you boot up normally everytime, if they are set up to check for a bootup disk first.

If your motherboard is fried you will not get anything but the powersupply fan. Although if your second memory slot (and maybe some other rare places) is fried keep memory cards out of it - check the teeth on the memory card to. If it's your first slot that's burned (I have a gigabyte board that burned this one out), your motherboard is done in. While your in there, clean it out - those viscious little dust bunny are wickeder than you think. Crossing currents where they don't belong. Make sure it's unplugged before working in a machine. Also tighten all connections/cables and you'll likelier to have a smoother and faster machine than you had - supposing we can get it working.

You can email me and let me know where you're at with it. Your lucky you have a second machine. I always keep an old Win98 around, eccential for internet info for some repairs or analysis.

Which environment do you have? Windows XP? It would help to know if you have a P2 or newer as well. 1 ghz or better.
If so press F8 on boot up to try to get to safe mode. Once in, you can use system restore back to a prior date.

Virus's can remove the boot sector (genb and genp are older virus' that did this) but that doesn't mean your machine can't be rebuilt.

I'm hoping to avoid the process of booting up from another disk as that's a whole new ball game. It's pretty much a call to rebuild your software environment which will scrub out all your prior data. But it is a whole lot easier to rebuild than in the old days as long as you have all original disks.

Keep 'em clean people, they'll purr for you - Sandy
PKponder TX Z7B
Original Author
14 years ago
Thanks all for your concern and empathy.

Sandy, the standby led on my motherboard is on and I've got an alarm sounding but no bootup. No post sounds either Sandy, just the alarm. I attempted to run a Windows recovery but got stop code 0X0000007B which indicates a possible boot sector virus or hardware failure. I opened the case, cleaned out the dust bunnies and reseated the connections, memory, ect. She is a Dell Dimension E520 with Win XP Home SP3 (also just installed that service pack).

Hardware is really not my best thing, so I appreciate the help, but I am tired of working on it this week. I have a full weekend of other people's computer troubles to deal with at work. I have some troubleshooting steps from Microsoft and plan to try rebuilding the registry hive (which should work if it's a boot sector infection), but that's next week...too burned out right now over it.

Pam