the fan starts but no signal gets to the monitor. the hd sounds like it's trying to boot (whirring/pulsing), then beeps and then dies. this continues until i turn it back off.

i have tried reseating the ram and graph card with no success.

any advice would be greatly appreciated!

the fan starts but no signal gets to the monitor. the hd sounds like it's trying to boot (whirring/pulsing), then beeps and then dies. this continues until i turn it back off.

i have tried reseating the ram and graph card with no success.

any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Hello BellSteven Welcome to PCHF

I just listened to the video...if I'm hearing correctly, it sounds like a bad hard drive.

Have you tried leaving the hard drive unplugged and booting the computer up? You don't actually need a hard drive for the computer to boot.

If you unplug the hard drive and boot the computer up, does it at least display video and the BIOS splash screen?

Another thing to try after unplugging the hard drive and testing the boot is to unplug all peripherals from the computer. Sound card, network card, modem, video card (if you have on-board video that you can use). Leave them all unplugged and try to boot the computer again without the hard drive plugged in. If that still doesn't help, try one stick of memory at a time.

Also, take out your CMOS battery for 30 seconds and plug that back in. Be sure to note which direction the battery is facing when you take it out.

Let me know what happens and we will go from there

Hi Wadd,

Thanks for taking the time to help. Unfortunately I've tried all of the above and still haven't received a signal to the monitor and seen the BIOS screen.

However, when I have the HD unplugged, the surging/beeping noise isn't present.... any thoughts?

Cheers ,
Steve.

So you have gotten the computer to just the motherboard (on-board video or known working video card), PSU, cpu, and one stick of memory, with every other peripheral unplugged, and still no video?

Typically when it gets to that point, I would consider a bad motherboard. The only thing left is to try replacing the memory, PSU, and video card.

If you have memory, a video card, and PSU that you are for sure are all good and it still isn't booting with no other peripherals attached, then I'm afraid the motherboard is shot.

It could be the CPU, but I have never in my life seen a CPU that has been working and not modified in any way just go bad. For example, if you were overclocking, upgraded the cpu, put on a new heatsink and messed up the thermal paste, etc. Then I could say the CPU may be the problem.

There is another thing. It is very rare, but I have seen this work before...

You can also try unplugging all the headers to the motherboard. For example, try unplugging front panel usb headers, front panel audio headers, front panel memory card reader, etc.

I have seen in some cases a defective front panel USB port and memory card reader actually prevented the computer from booting.

Hope that helps!

Hello Bell,

thanks for the video. that makes it easier on us

Wadd has given some great advice. from reading your post i would say check your heat sink. if it boots up then shuts down then your heat sink might not be sitting right on the CPU. in that case the CPU heats up real fast then shuts off to prevent damage.

Good call Joey. That's another thing to check.

hi guys,

thanks so much for your posts. i tried all of the above and was still having trouble. i got the guitarist from my band who is a systems engineer to take a look at it. his first thought was that the mobo had somehow touched the casing and shorted. he replaced the power supply with one similar with no results, but upon trying a a much bigger power supply, it booted up and he hasn't found a problem with it since!?

obviously i have no idea if this is common, but it seems to be too good to be true?

fingers crossed anyway!
Cheers ,
steve.