Computer Issue - screen shuts off

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maxwell_smart007

maxwell_smart007

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Any computer experts on the forum?

I have a desktop that I'm having trouble getting to work correctly.

The desktop will not boot without the windows disk, but does so perfectly when I put the disk in. I have been reticent to try and reinstall windows, as I still have a lot of files that I've been unable to backup first.

The issue is that if I ask the computer to work at all, such as copy files or anything even remotely like 'work', then the computer will pause and the monitor will go black. If I try and press buttons with the monitor off, the computer will beep once at me. The harddrive light is on on the desktop, and the 'busy' grinding sounds of the hdd continue.

Any idea what could be the issue? Is the video card the problem? I can't think it would be overheating, as the house is very cold, and the computer does this immediately after powering on...

Andrew
 
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Sounds like death is imminent. I am no expert but have had this happen twice, The first time I lost my butt. The second time a friend daisy chained my HD to his and pulled stuff off it. Goos luck.
 
first and foremost how long has it been this way? ifyou can recall when it started to go wrong, you can click start>all programs>Accessories>Systems tools, and preform a system restore to a date when you know your machine worked ok. this will not efect any of your saved files.

Secondly, if it was me personally, i would replace the harddrive and reinstall windows. once done plug in your old HDD and it will show as a slavedrive (Presuming its SATA oppose to IDE and does not have jumpers, if not already on cable select)

Once its showing up as your E: drive, you can then access it and either copy your files across, or leave it as your storga e drives, remove the directories no longer require, and defrag the hard drive..

If you struggle getting access to this task, then reboot the PC pressing F8, which will give you the option to start insafe mode. you may find it easier to do a system restore in this manner, if its problematic under normal conditions.

Hope this helps
 
When you go into the windows installer, you get two options: Repair or Clean Install.

A repair will only make new copies of the windows files and leave your other stuff alone. Depending on how badly corrupted it is, this has a good chance of fixing it.

A clean install will nuke everything. Don't do that if you don't have backups (DAMHIK).

The one thing that a repair might do is break some of your programs. It will go through the registries and modify them, so some software might need reinstalled. It doesn't sound like that is a big issue for you.
 
I hate to bring bad news, but if the computer will not boot without an OS disk, the odds are you don't have a working disk to back up.

About the best you can hope for is a reinstall Windows WITH REPAIR OPTION, THEN, if that works, IMMEDIATELY BACK UP YOUR DATA. This machine sounds like it is knocking on death's door.

About the only other option to retrieve your data is to take the drive to a professional data reclaim service. Even then, the odds are still about 50/50 and these places charge a fortune.

Sorry
 
Andrew; If the machine shuts off after it is powered on, you may be overheating. With the computer off, open the case cover, turn on and verify that all the fans on the motherboard are running. You may find one on the video card as well. TURN OFF AND UNPLUG the computer. Vacuum out (GENTLY) the heatsinks.

I concur that a backup should be the first thing you attempt. Backups are often neglected until problems arise, and then it may be too late.

PS. Modern CPU are very dependent on proper heatsinks and cooling.
 
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If you hear grinding noises from your HD it's gone, or very soon will be. As Fibonacci states, a repair will not overwrite the files you have on your hard drive. A clean install will format your hard drive, thus causing you to lose everything.

If your motherboard has on board video you can plug your monitor into the mb port, go into your bios and turn it on. If you have no problems after that then you know your video card is burned out. Personally, I buy a cheap video card just in case I get a failure. Considering you have to put a boot disk though I have my doubts if it's a video card issue.

If you have access to another computer (a friends perhaps) you can take your hard drive out, put it in a working system and try to recover your files. You could download free software to run a diagonstic on the drive and detect any issues. You could also use another computer to make a boot disk with software that will test your hard drive for issues. You can do this via floppy, USB, or CD.. all depends on the age of your hardware. Your hard drive manufactuer may also supply software to test the drive.

You can use these type of utilities to try and recover data as well. However, it will all depend where and what is damaged on the drive. If it's not extremely important data it may not be worth your time to attempt a recovery. Especially if you're not used to dealing with recovery/backup type software.
 
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I'm sorry, I feel your pain, as I am the dumbest of computer dumb, but it sounds to me like it has gotten involved in politics!:crying: "Turn it on, nothing happens, screen goes blank, it doesn't work! ??? ! Just trying to lighten things up a bit!:rolleyes:Hope you get it up and running without too much expense or grief!
 
+1 Fibonacci
+1 Rob73

Looks like your hard drive has problems. It probably has a corrupted boot sector (hence no boot) and posibbly has other corrupted areas. It may also be totally cactus. How old is the drive/computer? More than 5 years it may be on it's way out.

Booting from the Windows disk does only that. It seems that as soon as you start to access the hard drive the computer malfunctions. As the computer can detect the hard drive, there's a chance that the electronics of the drive is OK and it may just be a data corruption problem.

I would remove the hard drive and plug it into another desktop or use a HDD dock and plug it in as an external USB drive. If you can see your files on the drive, copy them to the other computer or another external hard drive. This way you have all your files if you can't fix the faulty drive.

Then I would try the repair option on the drive (once back in the desktop). If that doesn't work (or fails to start/complete) you will need to format the drive and reload windows, programs, and the saved data. If that won't work you will need a new hard drive as the electronics on the drive may have a problem.

Another thing to check is the power supply, if old/faulty, it may no longer be able to supply the current needed for the processor and/or hard drive to operate correctly.

There may also be a problem on the main board.

May also be the video card, but less likely.

Generally it will be one of these things but most likely the hard drive. Mind you in 25 years of repairing computers stranger things have happened.

Good luck

TonyO
 
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OK. This may have been said above, but I didn't see it..

If you have data that is not backed up that you need, here is my recommendation:

1) STOP trying to boot to it. If there is corruption, it can only get worse.
2) Pull the hard drive out of the computer
3) Put it into an external HD enclosure for the type of hard drive it is.
4) Using a completely different machine thats working, use the hard drive (now a USB external drive since its in the enclosure) and pull of any files that are important to you.
5) now you can do whatever you need to - put the hard drive back if you want and reinstall windows to see if its just file corruption thats causing your issues.

This is the safest low cost method and works for me for 95% of the people who have come to me with failing computers. (the other 5% are the HD has failed and its no longer cheap to get data off)

Dean

edit in: oops - I see it WAS suggested above too... good for those that suggested it IMO :)
 
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Keep in mind that if you opt to pull the HDD and put it in another computer, the second computer needs to have the same version of Windows. If you are running XP, it needs to go into an XP machine. Same for Vista (oy vey:eek:) or Win7.
 
I didn't see the part where you said he hd was clicking!:eek:

If you do put in a new hard drive and hook the old one up as a slave or through a USB enclosure you may, depending on your OS and how you had your user accounts setup, need to "take ownership" of your files in order to view/copy them. It's simply a series of steps ... Here is an example using WinXP ..
How to take ownership of a file or a folder in Windows XP
 
HD isn't clicking - it's just the normal 'busy' sound that it emits when searching for something...

I think I'll search ebay for an enclosed hard drive case (if that's roughly what it's called) to try first, and then follow the suggestions herein until something works! :smile:

Thank you all for the suggestions!
 
John that's not correct. XP, Vista, and Win7 all use the same formats for hard drives. Either NTFS or FAT32, usually NTFS. So if the faulty drive is going in as a secondry drive then any of the above operating systems will be able to access it if the damage is not too great.

Max, search for "external hard drive case". Make sure you get the right type, you probably have a 3.5" SATA drive. It maybe a 3.5" IDE but only if your computer is more than 8 years old.

It should say on the top of the drive if it's SATA

images


or IDE (PATA),

images


you can tell by the connectors as well.

2.5" is the size of a credit card and 3.5" is the size of your hand, roughly.

TonyO
 
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