Computer says "Contact Compaq support" when booted

[tombstoner79]

I have an older Compaq desktop, from around 2002. I turn on the computer and I get a red screen that says to contact Compaq support. So I tried replacing the hard drive and I tried to reinstall Windows on it. Everything was going fine until Windows was almost completely installed, then the same screen came up to contact Compaq again, so I figured it wasn't the hard drive and I took the drive back. What is wrong with it? I don't want to throw a lot of money into it because it is older and a Compaq. (Btw, I've had nothing but trouble with Compaq and would NEVER buy another one.)

 

[Nagasama]

try contacting compaq.

 

[Lexluethar]

I have a compaq laptop that was purchased in 1999 and is still running fine (gave it to an older friend that just uses it for word processing and his budget).

Could be a number of things, try googling that error message to see if someone else has had the same issue (which i'm sure they have) and see what they replaced to fix it.

 

[Jorsoft]

Do you have a specific error message on there or is that all it says?

Since you swapped the hd and the problem reoccurred it seems like mainboard problem to me. You can try downloading and running Memtest to rule out memory, but I think it's likely the mainboard.

A new one would be maybe $50-60 and require some amount of time as you'd have to remove and replaced most parts in the computer. A better investment would probably be a new pc since this one is pretty old.