Sony Vaio Desktop Continuous Beep

[gsteffens]

Hey I am working on my girlfriend's desktop, it's a 1-2 year old Sony Vaio and the problem is when I turn it on, the fans all run fast, then they gradually slow down, and then I hear a "beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee" continuously from the inside. I have the covers off and checked all the cards and pieces to be sure everything is seated properly. Her parents had a new power supply put in and it still does the same thing.

Not sure what to try next. Any help let me know, thanks!

How i should include that she says every once in a blue moon it will turn on exactly normal and work fine. Thanks.

 

[carnageX]

Have you tried clearing CMOS by chance?

if you don't know how: unplug the PC from the wall. press the power button a few times to discharge any remaining power in the PSU. Remove the small silver coin battery on the motherboard. Leave it out for about 5 minutes. reinsert the coin battery, plug the computer back in, and turn it back on. See what happens then. If it still gives you the beep codes, try to find out what BIOS it has on it, and use this to help you figure out what the beep code means:
Computer Post / Beep codes

 

[gsteffens]

okay, I will try that, but see it doesn't even start enough to 'activate' the monitor to the point where I could access the bios.

BTW, clearing the CMOS will not clear off the HD will it?

 

[carnageX]

No, clearing CMOS is just clearing the BIOS settings back to default, and sometimes fixing boot problems.

Also, is there more than 1 stick of RAM in the computer? Are the stick(s) inserted tightly?

 

[gsteffens]

Yes there are two. I tried each individually by itself for grins, and got the same result. I am now goign to clear the CMOS for kicks and grins.

BTW thanks for the help!!!!

EDIT:


Cleared the CMOS as you described, same thing happens.

 

[carnageX]

You should be able to look up the specs on Sony's website, sometimes that tells you what kind of BIOS it has; you could also try looking on the Drivers downloads page for the computer and see if it tells about BIOS updates and find out what BIOS it is.

 

[gsteffens]

Okay. I have been searching the forum for continuous beeps and it seems like that happens when any number of pieces is failing/failed. Like the MOBO, HD, video card, or RAM.

 

[carnageX]

Try some spare RAM if you have some handy. If that doesn't work, then try a video card.

 

[gsteffens]

Funny you say that, i tried a stick of the ballistix ram out of my computer and hers still does the same thing. However, I do not have a slim enough video card handy to try out. would it be worth taking out and re seating every card in the pci slots?

is there a way to properly clean the contacts?

Thanks! I really appreciate your help!

EDIT;


For grins I took out the several cards in the pci slots (the video card included) and sprayed out the connectors with compressed air. I put them back in and it started right up. So I shut it down again and this time I took the heat sink off, and I had some of that "MX-2" thermal paste left from my build (that you guys recommended!!) and cleaned off the old stuff and put that on. I started it back up and it seemed to run a tid bit quicker. I'm going to try a few more on/off cycles to be sure it's going.

 

[carnageX]

Great to hear it started to work =). Hopefully it'll stay that way.