[Rybo]

I've been trying to fix my Uncle's pc(Dell Dimension 4600) with only moderate luck. At first the computer wouldn't power on fully, but would just have a steady blinking yellow light after the button was pushed. After doing some testing, I found that his power supply was bad. With a good power supply, the computer completely powered on, but couldn't boot up. I tried a bunch of different hard drives(a couple EIDE's and an Ultra ATA with the little pin set to both cable select and master) and it couldn't boot up with any of them. All the hard drives made noise and such, but nothing would happen. Also, none of the 4 diagnostic indicator lights would even come on.

Could this be a problem with the mother board or specifically the cpu? My uncle mentioned that he got a new motherboard recently, but maybe this one is bad as well. Any ideas for what could be wrong?


Edit: Sorry I posted this before looking at the tutorial. I pulled the cmos battery out and set the jumper to clear the password. Once I put everything back and try again, I'll post an update.

Edited by Rybo, 30 March 2007 - 09:16 PM.

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Well, I think I've tried pretty much everything, including pulling out and putting back in the cmos battery and setting the reset jumper to pins 2 and 3, turning the computer on with the reset jumper in 2 and 3, swapping the cmos battery with a known good one, swapping the video card with a known good one, setting the hard drive to both cable select and master, and the results are still the same. The pc powers on, but nothing happens. All we get are 2 fog hornish type sounds that are a couple seconds apart, and the diagnostic indicator lights never come on. Is this basically a lost cause?

Edited to add: It turns out that those foghorn sounds were coming from the cd drive. Once we disconnected that, the computer stopped making any noise. When it powers on, there are no beeps, and the diagnostic lights are all off. Is there anything else to check?

Edited by Rybo, 31 March 2007 - 11:11 AM.

[Rybo]

Well, I think I've tried pretty much everything, including pulling out and putting back in the cmos battery and setting the reset jumper to pins 2 and 3, turning the computer on with the reset jumper in 2 and 3, swapping the cmos battery with a known good one, swapping the video card with a known good one, setting the hard drive to both cable select and master, and the results are still the same. The pc powers on, but nothing happens. All we get are 2 fog hornish type sounds that are a couple seconds apart, and the diagnostic indicator lights never come on. Is this basically a lost cause?

Edited to add: It turns out that those foghorn sounds were coming from the cd drive. Once we disconnected that, the computer stopped making any noise. When it powers on, there are no beeps, and the diagnostic lights are all off. Is there anything else to check?

Edited by Rybo, 31 March 2007 - 11:11 AM.