[goodguy718]

The beginning for about a week now I leave my pc on over night and when I go to check it, it is flickering like a movie reel I go to touch the GFX card and screen connectors and fix the issue.

Now

1. I was burning files to a dvdr disk using an external hard drive, BUT I removed all of the stuff surrounding the external hard drive allowing me to switch between hard drives because I don't have enough external connectors for all my HD's.

2. I accidentally nudged the chip running the hard drive while it was burning, obviously a failure in the burning process occurred.

3. disconnected the External drive canceling the burning app and waiting 3 mins and re-connecting the external drive caused some automatic reset in my dell dimension 9100. (yea its old)

4. I obviously freak out and wonder what the [bleep] is going on, boom upon reset and rebooting I get a keyboard failure message, so now my keyboard is screw?! no it's not because I disconnect it and try it on another pc i have, it works, so what gives? Thinking driver error or corruption!? it's not the standard dell it's a logitech keyboard.

5. Ok figured out it works where's my dell keyboard, find it connect it STILL keyboard failure, ok. Power off disconnect battery from MOBO wait a while restart the process boom keyboard failure and no floppy disk found press f1 or f2, guess what I can't.

6. Find and install a Drive A FLoppy, ok done, Restart PC and see what happens next, keyboard failure.

7. Deside to give the PC a good cleaning, not that dusty but it could use some work, touching metal the whole time working inside the PC to avoid a static shock and unplugged PSU, good everything's fine, restart pc.

8. Boot vertical pixel lines | | | | across the screen first they were gray still keyboard failure, restart now they are in various colors, restart boot seems like they disappeared, keyboard failure automatically restarts once, boot blank screen, bleeps, i do not know where they are coming from, disconnect GFX card, still bleeps, disconnect everything still, check the front of the Dell for the numbers that light up in front displaying errors.

9. I suppose these are my error's, one is 3-4, then 1-4 < wait what? there's no 1-4 in the dell manual under the light errors section.

10. PC stops totally booting up all together the switch doesn't start the boot sequence, my green light on the mobo is on when plugged into an outlet while the battery remains in the mobo and without the battery (does that matter?).

11. what do I do now? To make things even better I get called to preform some work after waiting 2 weeks for that call and this happens 1 hour before, I love my life.

I am here in hopes of finding some help or solutions, if I need to buy parts please supply reasonable/affordable links for PSU, mobo, ect..replacements

12. Thank you for reading all that and hope you can help me out.

Edited by goodguy718, 09 March 2010 - 12:20 PM.

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10. PC stops totally booting up all together the switch doesn't start the boot sequence, my green light on the mobo is on with and without the battery.

That's a lot of things that seem to all relate to the original accidental cause.

Looks like your Bios settings have defaulted, and your power supply may have caused a spike to the motherboard from it.

Try this:

• Remove the Power cord
• Remove any addon Video card
• Confirm your Ram is seated correctly
• Confirm all internal connections are securely connected
• Then hold the ON button in for 30secs (dispersing any residual power)
• Plug the addon video card (I think you have) back in securely, also fit any required power connector to it
• Put the Power cord back in
• Turn on

Total time involved about 5 or 10mins (But no rush required)
Did it work?

[kimsland]

10. PC stops totally booting up all together the switch doesn't start the boot sequence, my green light on the mobo is on with and without the battery.

That's a lot of things that seem to all relate to the original accidental cause.

Looks like your Bios settings have defaulted, and your power supply may have caused a spike to the motherboard from it.

Try this:

• Remove the Power cord
• Remove any addon Video card
• Confirm your Ram is seated correctly
• Confirm all internal connections are securely connected
• Then hold the ON button in for 30secs (dispersing any residual power)
• Plug the addon video card (I think you have) back in securely, also fit any required power connector to it
• Put the Power cord back in
• Turn on

Total time involved about 5 or 10mins (But no rush required)
Did it work?

[goodguy718]

No that didn't work.

[kimsland]

This could be a hardware fault (as you have stated) Possible candidates in order:

• System Memory
• Power Supply
• PCI Express (x4) Video Card
• Motherboard

Before deciding on replacing hardware, lets try another couple of options

Memory (RAM)
Looking at your Diagnostics Lights
Your error code points to RAM. One of the options is to:

• Remove all RAM cards
• Remove all dust (high pressure air cans can be purchased from electronic/computer service stores)
• Fit one Ram card only
• Test, if fault remains, try the next RAM card only, or try another RAM slot

Reset Bios

• Read HERE how to Clear CMOS Settings

BenchTest

• Read HERE how to Benchtest your Motherboard
• You should also try disconnecting all non critical internal data cables (Hard Drive CD Drive Floppy etc)

Hopefully this time?

[goodguy718]

I did everything you suggested in your post and here is the result.

Does the green light being on when the PSU is plugged in matter? Does that tell me the PSU or motherboard isn't the problem?

I removed everything and checked to see if any metal was touching and I didn't see any problems there I also looked at every part to see if there was some sort of burn marker anywhere on the hardware, there was none.

But on the motherboard there is some sort of scratch looking thing on the Intel chip NOT the processor chip but the chip on the motherboard could that be the problem?

I didn't bang up the motherboard in anyway so did it crack from some sort of overheat or short???

That's all I got as for the PSU how do I get it to spin so that I know it's not the PSU, what about the flickering at the beginning of my post what is that from? GFX card, PSU dieing?

Thanks for assisting me thus far.
But it did not start up.

Edited by goodguy718, 10 March 2010 - 11:46 AM.

[kimsland]

Thanks for assisting me thus far.
But it did not start up.

Does the green light being on when the PSU is plugged in matter? Does that tell me the PSU or motherboard isn't the problem?

It means power is getting to the motherboard ok, but it doesn't mean anything really either way (it can still be Power Supply or Motherboard)

on the motherboard there is some sort of scratch looking thing on the Intel chip NOT the processor chip but the chip on the motherboard could that be the problem?

That sounds ok, not the problem

did it crack from some sort of overheat or short???

Unknown as yet

That's all I got as for the PSU how do I get it to spin so that I know it's not the PSU, what about the flickering at the beginning of my post what is that from? GFX card, PSU dieing?

There are PSU testers that you can purchase, note I've never bought one and I had a computer tech shop!
What I did was replace with a known working PSU to test it (this can even be a real old PSU that's running 250Watt, just as a test)
How do you know its not the PSU ? Even if all lights come on and fans it does not mean the PSU is ok.
Regarding the original "flickering" This points to Graphics card or PSU.


By slim chance, do you have another PSU ? I've even pulled them from other computers to test (usually whilst BenchTesting still)
I'm leaning to PSU still