Computer issue.

I have never run across this one before and was wanting a second opinion or two from you guys. I have a clients computer and here are the symptoms:
1. One time boots fine, next time boots to some point and no output to monitor.
2. On one occassion the cpu sounded like a plane taking off.

Here is what I did to troubleshoot:
1. Ran HW tests on RAM, Motherboard, HD, CPU and all other HW related parts. No failures through running the test via a bootable CD.
2. Tried with new power supply and still no change.
3. All cables connected properly.
4. No busted capacitors on the MB.
5. Reseated CPU(checked pins), added some heatsink compound and reseated heat sink.

Things I noticed:
1. At boot there is no beep or error codes.
2. The HD light, flashes insync with the cd rom when you are using the cd rom.
3. When it boots into Windows, I get to use everything fine but everytime I use the mouse the screen flickers.

I am thinking the CPU is malfunctioning (even though it passed CPU HW test), unfortunately I don't have an extra CPU of this type to test with.

Thanks!

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Comments

JDMurray

boyles23 wrote:

1. One time boots fine, next time boots to some point and no output to monitor.

Does it always succeed in booting when cold and always fail to boot when hot? That a classic symptom of an electrical problem.

boyles23 wrote:

2. On one occassion the cpu sounded like a plane taking off.

That can be from dust or bad bearings in the CPU fan, or a cable is brushing against the fan blades.

You didn't mention swapping-out the video card, or disabling the on-board video and adding a video card to test the problem. Sometimes a specific sub-system on a mobo (audio, video, USB, disk controller, etc.) can malfunction and cause an instability in the whole system. Turn each sub-system off and see if the mobo starts booting normally. Or simply replace the mobo, re-using the CPU and memory, and see if the problem disappears.

GT-Rob

replace mobo

wd40

is it a Dell GX 270 - GX 280 ?

we have a lot of those, many of them had the same problem, we send them for repair and they replace the mobo.

for some we had to send the PC for repair many times, they bring it back and the problem reappears after a few weeks.

Netstudent

Does it go black after the splash screen? HAve you tried booting into safe mode several times to see if goes black. I had a similar issue and it was my graphics card. When I booted into safe mode it would hang at mup.sys because right after mup.sys is when it loads the video drivers. Doesn;t explain the CPU sounding crazy. Could it have been the heat sink fan? You could try to reinstall the chipset drivers before you replace the mobo.

Lee H

is it a Dell GX 270 - GX 280 ?

You took the words right out of my mouth, a lot of these models have swollen capacitors and the mobo will need to be replaced, check out this link so you can see what i mean

http://monkey.org/~blandoon/gfx/caps/

Lee H

boyles23

The computer is an emachine, and I was thinking CPU or Mobo. I would tend to lean towards the Mobo at this point. I pulled all internal cards and tested the options that way also. Will check the caps tonight again and see if there is any swollen ones but I know there is no busted ones.

j938

boyles23 wrote:

The computer is an emachine, and I was thinking CPU or Mobo. I would tend to lean towards the Mobo at this point. I pulled all internal cards and tested the options that way also. Will check the caps tonight again and see if there is any swollen ones but I know there is no busted ones.

Oh yeah those e-machines crap out usually after a yr or 2 if you had it longer your doing pretty good

ive seen alot of motherboard replacements for those