Chrisis: PC will not turn on

[mfaerber]

Hello everyone, I have a problem that's new to me and really has me stumped: pressing the ON button does nothing.

Computer Specs:
Old Dell Dimension 4600. 2gig ram, 512mb GXP vid card. 460w Everex PSU. Two hard drives, the master has winXP on it, the slave has win7 on it. It dualboots into win7.


What Happened Right Before This Started:
Firstly, my computer has been running fine and I have not cracked the case in about six months. I turned on the computer and noticed that it was not connecting to the internet. So I first restarted my cable modem, then restarted my router, to no effect. I then pressed "control - alt -delete" and the computer started to get to the point where it would give me a window of options, but hung up. I pressed the escape button, then the windows button, and the screen went black. So I waited for a bit and held in the ON button on the front to force it down. Nothing happened. "Oh crap" I thought, "this has never happened before." So, I turned it off by flipping the power switch on the power supply. I waited a minute, then flipped it back on. Then I pressed the ON button on the front and nothing happened.

What I Have Tried:
I swapped the PSU's, but nothing changed. I have disconnected and alternated the two hard drives. I have vaccumed the cat hair out of the inside of the case. I have unplugged and replugged everything many times. I tried plugging the computer into a different wall outlet.

What May Be Important Hints:
Usually, when I plug the computer into the wall the fans inside the computer turn on for a second. This is not longer happening. That's why I thought it was the PSU, even though it is only three years old. There is a little LED on the motherboard that DOES still light up when the PSU is switched on.

So, I'm afraid it's the mobo or the PSU that is the problem... What do you all think? This is my main computer, so this problem really sucks.... Thanks in advance!

-matthew

 

[Nubbleet]

Have you tried to reset the CMOS?

 

[mfaerber]

That worked!

Now I'm trying to remember how how I had the master and slave setup in the bios setup... I've gotten xp on the master to load, but it's not recognizing the slave, which is where win7 is.

Thank you so much Nubbleet

Why did this all happen in the first place?

 

[Nubbleet]

I don't know why it happened. But the good thing is that you got it fixed .

 

[mfaerber]

Crap.

I think I'm done for this time. After my last thread my comp worked for a week or so, and then it happened again: while just surfing the web, my computer completely froze - to the point that the front on/off button did nothing - so I flipped the PSU switch. It took a while to turn it back on... I'm not sure if popping the mobo battery helped or not. This scenario happened several times, but it has now been a week and I have not been able to start the computer at all.

Allow me to reitterate a few things:

1) My 460w PSU is good - I tested it in another computer
2) The PSU and CPU fan SHOULD spin up for a second, and the mobo should beep once, when the computer is plugged into the wall - EVEN if the front on/off switch is in the OFF position... This no longer happens.
3) The ONLY sign of life that my computer now has is the little green mobo light.
4) I have tried turning it on with absolutely everything unplugged from the mobo, even all of the RAM (so that means I only used the big mobo cable and the 12v CPU cable) - and still absolutely nothing ever happens.
5) All of the capacitors on the mobo look good.
6) I have never over clocked anything.
7) I have never removed the CPU.
8) Nothing changes when I try a different PSU

Is it possible that it's my CPU? I have another CPU I could try, but I don't have any paste, so I haven't tried switching it out. I would think that even IF the CPU was bad, that my fans would spin up for a second when comp is plugged into the wall... So...

I'm guessing the mobo has gone bad.

Any thoughts, suggestions? Thank you all again.

 

[Slaymate]

I'm betting the mobo has died.