General hardware troubleshooting on a system that won't boot

English Install/Boot/Login
#1

Thanks to my Linux box I’m still up and running, but I’m looking for a little help troubleshooting hardware on bootup of my WinVista box. Any help greatly appreciated.

My just over a year old system froze this morning and now won’t boot up. What’s happening is the system tries to start and maybe 2 seconds later shuts down and then maybe 10 seconds later tries to start again. A couple of times it has gone past this point, but my monitor doesn’t get a signal so I can’t see if it’s really booting up. I’ve reseated the video card, pulled out the TV tuner and firewire cards. But the same thing is happening.

All help appreciated in advance.

System:
MB - Gigabyte GA-P35C-DS3R
CPU - E6750 - overclocked to 3 Ghz most of the time
PSU - 600W - the one with the blue light in it
HD - (1) 320 SATA, (2) 250 UATA, (3) 500 SATA
DVD - Pioneer Bluray Rom
RAM - 4GB Ballistix DDR2 800
Video - 8600 GTS 512MB

#2

I’d start by pulling out all the add-in cards and see if it seems to
start up (all means pull the video card as well).

If it does, pop the video card in and boot again. Then add cards back
until you get a failure.

Jim

#3

Hang on… waiting for the admins to move this thread… no point posting
to it if it’s going to be borken…

{Jeopardy Music plays while we wait…}

Loni

On Mon, 11 Aug 2008, biosol wrote:

> Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2008 17:56:04 GMT
> From: biosol <biosol@no-mx.forums.opensuse.org>
> Newsgroups: opensuse.org.no-support.general-chit-chat
> Subject: General hardware troubleshooting on a system that won’t boot
>
>
> Thanks to my Linux box I’m still up and running, but I’m looking for a
> little help troubleshooting hardware on bootup of my WinVista box. Any
> help greatly appreciated.
>
> My just over a year old system froze this morning and now won’t boot
> up. What’s happening is the system tries to start and maybe 2 seconds
> later shuts down and then maybe 10 seconds later tries to start again.
> A couple of times it has gone past this point, but my monitor doesn’t
> get a signal so I can’t see if it’s really booting up. I’ve reseated
> the video card, pulled out the TV tuner and firewire cards. But the
> same thing is happening.
>
> All help appreciated in advance.
>
> System:
> MB - Gigabyte GA-P35C-DS3R
> CPU - E6750 - overclocked to 3 Ghz most of the time
> PSU - 600W - the one with the blue light in it
> HD - (1) 320 SATA, (2) 250 UATA, (3) 500 SATA
> DVD - Pioneer Bluray Rom
> RAM - 4GB Ballistix DDR2 800
> Video - 8600 GTS 512MB
>
>
> –
> biosol
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> biosol’s Profile: http://forums.opensuse.org/member.php?userid=1769
> View this thread: http://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php?t=392466
>

#4

L R Nix wrote:

>
> Hang on… waiting for the admins to move this thread… no point posting
> to it if it’s going to be borken…
>
> {Jeopardy Music plays while we wait…}
>
> Loni
>
>
>
>
> On Mon, 11 Aug 2008, biosol wrote:
>
>> Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2008 17:56:04 GMT
>> From: biosol <biosol@no-mx.forums.opensuse.org>
>> Newsgroups: opensuse.org.no-support.general-chit-chat
>> Subject: General hardware troubleshooting on a system that won’t boot
>>
>>
>> Thanks to my Linux box I’m still up and running, but I’m looking for a
>> little help troubleshooting hardware on bootup of my WinVista box. Any
>> help greatly appreciated.
>>
>> My just over a year old system froze this morning and now won’t boot
>> up. What’s happening is the system tries to start and maybe 2 seconds
>> later shuts down and then maybe 10 seconds later tries to start again.
>> A couple of times it has gone past this point, but my monitor doesn’t
>> get a signal so I can’t see if it’s really booting up. I’ve reseated
>> the video card, pulled out the TV tuner and firewire cards. But the
>> same thing is happening.
>>
>> All help appreciated in advance.
>>
>> System:
>> MB - Gigabyte GA-P35C-DS3R
>> CPU - E6750 - overclocked to 3 Ghz most of the time
>> PSU - 600W - the one with the blue light in it
>> HD - (1) 320 SATA, (2) 250 UATA, (3) 500 SATA
>> DVD - Pioneer Bluray Rom
>> RAM - 4GB Ballistix DDR2 800
>> Video - 8600 GTS 512MB
>>
>>
>> –
>> biosol
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> biosol’s Profile: http://forums.opensuse.org/member.php?userid=1769
>> View this thread: http://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php?t=392466
>>

My apologies… that was mean… but don’t worry… “they” will move it.
Doesn’t affect the web users though. {Sigh}

If the system is only getting “about 2 seconds” into booting, it’s something
in the bootstrap code of windows.

Have you tried ‘Safe mode’? Pressing F8 (repeatedly!) just before it
begins to boot should bring up the menu, allowing you to choose Safe mode.

Another option is to reinstall windows. No, not talking about wiping and
reinstalling… just reinstalling windows over windows, which usually fixes
issues like these.

If you’ll boot your windows install CD, and pretend you’re going to install
it… there is an option, JUST at the ‘use and/or format this partition’
screen which allows you to press ‘R’ to reinstall windows on top of your
current system.

It does NOT destroy anything, only ‘reconnects’ all the dots for windows.
New boot loader, fixes missing ntldr, boot.ini files, some registry issues,
etc.

Existing installed software will be preserved and will remain working as
usual.

Pretty handy, but not well known.

Remember… not the FIRST ‘Repair’ option you’re offered. That one sucks.
Pretend you’re installing… and when it gets to the ‘choose a partition’
screen… THAT 'R’epair option.

Hope this helps

Loni

–
L R Nix
lornix@lornix.com

#5

Sorry… I looked for a general/non OS specific type hardware forum but didn’t see one so I put it in here.

It looks like bad RAM, the system runs with 1 pair of RAM, but when the other is in the system by itself or with the other pair, it doesn’t boot. It’s Crucial Ballistix DDR2 800 and is about a year old. I bought it from Newegg.com. Anyone know about warranty info or who best to contact to try and get a replacement?

#6

FYI for future reference, if you go to http://forums.opensuse.org, in the “openSUSE Help” section the third forum down is called “Hardware” which also has two sub-forums for laptop and 64 bit specific questions.

#7

Did you try switching position or trying each ram if you can boot your machine to find out if one is really faulty. Maybe ram is bad or one slot is not functional

#8

Sure. Go to the egg, find the item’s page; the warranty info is on a link bottom-left. There is always a newegg warranty and then the manufacturer’s warranty thereafter. Terms vary; I think with some sticks you can get a replacement from the egg within a year, so if you’re close to that, hurry! (Actually, I got nailed by that only a few months ago; the stick failed 2 wks past 1 yr!). Crucial has a good warranty, good RMA process; I’ve used it twice. If you have a matched pair, you may have to return the whole pair. (I’m using G.Skill now, better perf, lifetime warranty even if you o’clock.)

Have you run memtest against the sticks? It works on a boot floppy and, albeit more work, you can put it on a CD, too. Good idea to do that, as Crucial will do it to validate your RMA.

Good luck.

#9

Thanks for the info. I have narrowed it down to 1 DIMM in different slots that doesn’t let the system boot. I checked with Newegg, I bought it a couple days ago last year, however they said they only had a 90 day warranty on it. So I contacted Crucial and they said it’s covered and to send an RMA request.

Good news. Only thing is will this affect the match pair for dual channel memory theories of less performance when mixing and matching???

#10

Since you bought it only a year ago, they’ll likely send an exact replacement. There’s very little magic about a “matched pair” other than both sticks are guaranteed to meet the same timings and present similar loading on a channel.

#11

@biosol -

@incognito9 is exactly correct. You’ll notice the part numbering is slightly different between what is sold thru newegg vs what Crucial sells online and ships. The only diff is the former is for resale thru the distribution channel. I had the same question as yours and the nice Crucial folks explained the diff to me. What is important is number of devices, single vs dual-sided, timings, and specific devices mounted. IIRC Crucial only uses their own Micron (Crucial is the retail arm of Micron) chips, so you should get exactly the same in all respects.

#12

Great info guys. Thanks for replying!