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Problematic PC


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#1
Mighty Boosh

Mighty Boosh

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Hi all,

Since yesterday my PC has become somewhat unstable often shutting freezing or just powering down. This seems to be when I am performing more heavy duty tasks such as video conversion or burning a DVD. Light duty tasks such as browsing doesnt seem to be a problem.

As I said, video conversion seems to set it off so here is an example of what happens.

Occasionally it will not pass POST, PC powers up, fans start whirring but then I get BIOS error beeps that I have been unable to diagnose. My BIOS is Phoenix and I think the version is v5.17

The beep is a single beep about 1 second long with a 1 second pause followed by a 3 second continuous beep, then a pause then the pattern repeats.

(posting now before PC freezes)

If this happens, I power down and unplug the power lead , leave it for five minutes and try again.

Then it might work or it might beep again.

When it does work it boots up OK and like now I can perform light duty tasks but I am sure if I were to run a more demanding app I would have problems. I have tried running AV and ASW programmes but they seem to again cause the PC to freeze.

In case it was an XP problem I tried to do a repair install but that froze as well.

Anyway, I am at a loss here so any help would be greatly appreciated folks!

Cheers, Chris

Edited by Mighty Boosh, 25 October 2010 - 02:59 AM.

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#2
SRX660

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Phoenix bios beep codes that are of the 1 + 1 + ( usually more 2 or 3 short beeps) Most often says the motherboard itself is failing. Usually this is a CMOS problem. You could try replacing the 2032 battery on the motherboard, but i find that usually does not help 99% of the time.

http://www.computerh...es/ch000239.htm

I have also seen this happen on a computer that had a very poor power supply. Here's a good voltage monitoring software.

http://pc-wizard.en.softonic.com/

If your 12 volt lines drop below 11.88, or your 5 volt line drops below 4.8 then i would suspect the PS is causing the problem.

I hope this helps.

SRX660
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#3
Mighty Boosh

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Many thanks for the reply SRX and apologies for not answering sooner, had a couple of crazy days!

Anyway, downloaded the PC wizard prog and run it and I do seem to be running low on volts, approx 11.70 so maybe you are right and the PSU is beginning to fail?

It seems to be running OK atm but if I were to run something hefty I know it would shut down or just plain freeze. Might pop to our local electronics outlet at the weekend and buy a new PSU. For the sake of £25.00 its not a great deal to spend should it turn out to be something else!

Cheers matey, Chris
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#4
phillpower2

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Be careful what you buy £25 will not buy you anything decent, heres a link to give you an idea of what I mean;
http://www.novatech..../powersupplies/
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#5
Mighty Boosh

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Cheers for the info Phil and I understand what you are saying but the old budgets a bit tight right now to the extent that if it is the PSU I'll be bloody relieved!

Anyway, for just general day to day use would I not be OK with something like this?

Novatech 450w PSU
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#6
phillpower2

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Its not all bells & whistles but looking at the reviews the reports are not too bad.
I hope it resolves the issue you are having, best of luck & let us know how it works out.
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#7
SRX660

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The definitive explanation of Power supply's is below, along with the tests of many different PS's. This website is good for telling you what to look for in power supply's. Personally i prefer the Antec, PC power & cooling, and Thermotake power supply's for my computers. Most usually cost me around $75-100 US Dollars here in the states. I have had too many problems with the cheap ones to even bother with them anymore.

http://www.jonnyguru.com/
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