here's a wee problem, hoping to get some insight into it...

i left my computer on as usual today, went out for a bit and when i came back to it, the screen saver just stopped, but i could move the cursor around.

so it's like it froze, i restarted it. it went throught the windows loading thing, but right as the desktop should have comeup, the screen flashed blue for a sec then went black. this repeated a couple times. i tried to boot in safe mode, but once to the setup menu, the keyboard wouldn't even work at that point. (yet it allowed me to get to setup in the first place, hmm)

right now i just started it up again and it's doing chkdsk.

maybe a virus? but i have an antivirus program (pc cillin). it is a few years old and the hard drive is pretty much full. i'm stumped here.

 

Ha, you have come to the right place.

This is what some of us would like to call a quickee BSOD. Basically, you have a BSOD (blue screen of death) error that doesn't last long enough for you to know what you have. The cure: A reformat of your hard drive should do the trick. The cause: In my expiriences, it has been due to the use of either a Western Digital hard drive, or some other brand that I can't think of the name. Seagates and Maxtor are probably some of the best out there for master drives, and you won't be dissapointed if you are willing to buy a new one.

If you want to save your files, it is possible if you slave the drive, and then put the files on another computer. I sincerely doubt it is a virus, considering that your antivirus should have blocked or killed it. Again, I have had this happen several times, and in my expieriences, it was a Western Digital, or just too much messing with the drives capabilities.

 

Is this a desktop or laptop?

 

BSOD's are usually hardware related (at least, on win2k and better)... assuming it's a desktop, try taking everything out of the system that doesn't need to be there (any pci cards, cdrom, floppy, all but one stick of memory) and booting like that. if that works, start adding hardware until you get to the one that makes it not boot.

 

as dz said.. they are hardware related... try running some diagnostics on your memory and harddrive (2 main sources for a BSOD, crashes and reboots). formatting your harddrive should be your last resort as that will take you a long time to finish, and you still won't be sure if it was indeed a software problem. I recommend doing the memory test first, if your memory was bad and you tried to do a hard drive diagnostic it will tell you that there are errors, leading you to believe your hard drive was the culprit. when in fact it was the memory.

click the links below for the appropriate diagnostic... all of them will create a bootable floppy disk, just put it in, adjust your bios to boot to floppy and follow the onscreen instructions.
memtest86 - great memory tester (some boards have this in the bios, such as the DFI LanParty)

- western digital - WD's diagnostic
- maxtor maxtor's
- samsung samsung's
- ibm/hitachi hitachi's... pretty sure ibm no longer makes drives
- seagate seagate's

 

Yeah, and replacing the engine on my truck may make it run better - or I could just change the plugs.

That is SUCH bad advice. There are TONS of ways to get around reformatting a drive.


Cal, start with Green's ideas...

 

mark you know about just about everything, it cracks me up, i love it

 

Since you're having random symptoms, I'm going to bet it's the motherboard. No real way to test that except but to rule everything else out. Well, there is, but it requires expensive equipment.

Run all the free hardware tests you can, then if that doesn't solve it, try to re-install windows (you dont' have to reformat), then if that doesn't work, try a clean install.

 

thanks for the tips guys.

another thing - last time i got it to start up, well as far as after a minute or two of the black screen, it went to a blue screen with a frozen cursor and a little folder icon in the upper left corner.

anyway, i'm on the laptop now and can't make a floppy. i'm just gonna take it to my boss's friends house, he's a real computer whiz with his own shop and all. he'll get to the bottom of this.

here's to hoping it's something simple.
(either that or totally gone so i can get a new, better computer )

 

bout $1000-1500 for the one we had at the shop.. was a card that plugged into the pci slot or agp slot by flipping it over, also had a usb connection... then a 500 page manual to tell you what every code meant. if only i took it when i left.. :pat:

 

turns out it was the video card. easy fo sheezy fix.

 

Glad it was something simple! As my luck would have it, we don't have to repair many of those around here, mainly because most of the PC's are configured with on-board video.

 

I was gonna say kick it... that works every now and then...