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Valorie *~ wrote:
> When I put my XP PC away a year ago it booted and ran fine. It was
> stored in the house, not an outbuilding. I took it out and tried to use
> it and it wouldn't boot. It wouldn't boot to the CDs that came with it
> from HP either. I took it to Staples and the tech there said he THINKS
> it's the motherboard.

What did the tech do? Did he use another monitor? Did he check the
CMOS battery? It would be very useful to know what troubleshooting was
done at Staples.

> The fans spin. The mouse lights up

What kind of mouse lights up? A USB optical mouse?

Does the computer beep?

> but the
> keyboard and monitor stay dark.

What kind of keyboard stays dark - no lights? A PS/2 or USB?

> Anyone have any ideas what can cause
> this? Dead battery? Bad video card?

Were you watching while the Staples person did what he did?

--
Mike Easter

Valorie splat-tail <> writes and having writ moves on.

>"Mike Easter" <> wrote in message
>news:...
>> Valorie *~ wrote:
>>> When I put my XP PC away a year ago it booted and ran fine. It was
>>> stored in the house, not an outbuilding. I took it out and tried to use
>>> it and it wouldn't boot. It wouldn't boot to the CDs that came with it
>>> from HP either. I took it to Staples and the tech there said he THINKS
>>> it's the motherboard.
>>
>> What did the tech do? Did he use another monitor? Did he check the CMOS
>> battery? It would be very useful to know what troubleshooting was done at
>> Staples.

>I can't bleive that place (Staples) Mike. The guy who called me back didn't
>seem to be sure about anything. He said they couldn't get it to boot and
>would talk to me when I came in. That they think it's the motherboard and
>will change it for $150, no guarantees the PC will boot. All he would say
>was they ran "every test" which I think is pure BS. I have a list of
>questions to ask him when I get there. Something doesn't feel or sound
>right about the whole thing. I used to take my PCs to CompUSA and never a
>problem. The techs were great there but they closed. I'm stuck now. It's
>the techs at Staples or Best-Buy. :*(

He wasn't sure because a PC that will not start can't be tested.
If the motherboard is bad the PC doesn't even try to start. Have
you ever tried to calculate the mpg of a car with no battery?
The mpg value is undefined in that case, as is the status of
any subsystem of the PC.

>>
>>> The fans spin. The mouse lights up
>>
>> What kind of mouse lights up? A USB optical mouse?

>Yes.

>>
>> Does the computer beep?

>No. She doesn't beep. All we can hear are the fans running and maybe the
>HD. That PC has a HD that was almost silent.

The bios never had a chance to report an error using a beep code,
which is a hint that the bios never started.

>>
>>> but the keyboard and monitor stay dark.
>>
>> What kind of keyboard stays dark - no lights? A PS/2 or USB?

>It's a PS/2 and a small light would light on it when the PC was on/running.

>>
>>> Anyone have any ideas what can cause this? Dead battery? Bad video
>>> card?
>>
>> Were you watching while the Staples person did what he did?

>No. He only works part time. We dropped the PC off and someone called us
>back but he didn't seem sure about anything. We're both pretty ticked off
>about how Staples handled this. I have to call them tomorrow and see when
>that Tech himself will be there. I don't want to have to deal with the
>know-nothing salesperson again.

He knew enough to avoid bullshitting you with a promise he might
not be able to keep. He also knew enough to tell that he
couldn't determine anything else without replacing the
motherboard just to see if that was the problem.

Mike "did CompUSA miss this problem?" Yetto
--
In theory, theory and practice are the same.
In practice they are not.

On 11/21/2010 02:59 PM, Valorie *~ wrote:
>
> "Mike Easter" <> wrote in message
> news:...
>> Valorie *~ wrote:
>>> When I put my XP PC away a year ago it booted and ran fine. It was
>>> stored in the house, not an outbuilding. I took it out and tried to
>>> use it and it wouldn't boot. It wouldn't boot to the CDs that came
>>> with it from HP either. I took it to Staples and the tech there said
>>> he THINKS it's the motherboard.
>>
>
> Brevity snipped.
>
> We just picked up the XP PC from Staples. I asked him a lot of questions
> and it turns out the PC wont boot with their boot disks. From the form
> they gave me:
> ~~~~~~~~~~
> *Service Report: Tests show motherboard is dead. Possible corrupt BIOS.
> *Service Report part 2: Can't complete. Motherboard is dead. Service
> Cannot Be Completed
> ~~~~~~~~~~
> That was it. For this I paid $34.99. He said he had no way to check the
> battery to see if it was dead. The HD itself was good. We broght it back
> home and aren't sure where to go from here. Replace the Motherboard,
> replace the battery...........
>



You got ripped off for sure

it would have taken all of ten seconds to replace the cmos battey
or to test it.

I'd put in a new battery
and reset the bios to default.

You could have done that yourself for $3


sheesh

Valorie wrote:

> We just picked up the XP PC from Staples. I asked him a lot of
> questions and it turns out the PC wont boot with their boot disks.

It would be nice if you knew a little more so that you would get your
$35 worth. I guess/ would assume/ they would connect another monitor and
try to boot some kind of live CD and they got nothing out of the
combination of your existing PS, mobo (w/ BIOS & batt), and vid - but
from the report you can't even tell if they used another monitor and you
know they didn't check the CMOS batt.

Some shops will even use their own PS to substitute for yours.

> That was it. For this I paid $34.99. He said he had no way to check
> the battery to see if it was dead. The HD itself was good.

I wonder how he figured that out. That sounds like an assumption based
on it spinning. If he didn't/ couldn't/ check the CMOS battery because
it was too much trouble, I am doubtful that he isolated the hdd and
checked it with something else.

> We broght
> it back home and aren't sure where to go from here. Replace the
> Motherboard, replace the battery...........

Here's the problem, or at least the way I look at it as a salvager of my
own old computers. And sometimes those that someone else gives me and I
give to someone else.

A working old computer, even with very low resources has value and can
do a lot of things. A non-working/ broken/ old computer that needs
troubleshooting and trial and error replacement of parts doesn't have
value 'as is' because the cost of fixing it exceeds its worth. People
are giving away working computers in better shape than some broken old
computer.

A broken old computer only deserves troubleshooting to the degree that
it tells you which parts are apparently good and which parts are
apparently bad. That way you can salvage parts off of one old computer
to use in testing another old computer's problems.

In the state of having a broken computer of unknown age and resources
(you haven't described its name and modelno yet) and if you don't have
extra pieces and parts lying around to use to diagnose things and if
your inclination of self diagnosis is to take it to a shop which doesn't
have an astute and communicative tech, then you cannot possibly come out
on top.

In order to come out on top, you have to be able to do some of your own
disassembly and wise troubleshooting and it has to be 'for the fun of
it' because you aren't saving/ making/ any money (or useful gain) for
your trouble.

First tell us exactly what the name and modelno of this computer is. If
it is so old and so low in resources that you wouldn't be able to give
it away if it *were* working, it is barely worth disassembling for
parts. You could take the hdd out and put it into another machine --
there's a little bit of salvage.

If it is too old and has an AT type PS, it isn't worth salvaging the PS.
You could probably salvage the optical. You might keep the floppy for
some unknown purpose. You could keep the ram in case someone else has a
mobo which could use the same species.

Some old mobos have bad caps that make the mobo worthless except for
salvaging its ram or some other attachment.


--
Mike Easter

Valorie wrote:
> "Mike Easter"


>> A working old computer, even with very low resources has value and can
>> do a lot of things.

> I don't disagree with you. We wont replace the motherboard if it's
> dead. We'll salvage the HD and maybe the RAM, plus the burners. It's a
> HP Pavilion. Model # a250n. What gets me is how perfectly it was
> working when I put it away about 18 months ago. And it's the only PC
> here that can read the floppy disks we have.

That computer has a lot of resources. Here are its specs at HP.

http://snipr.com/1i6edz [h10025_www1_hp_com] HP Customer Care > HP
Pavilion a250n Desktop PC > Product information

That's an Asus P4 socket 478 mobo that can have/use PC DDR sdram
PC2100-3200 (266-400 mhz) and has 4 slots which can handle up to 4G. The
hdd is ATA, the USBs are 2.0, it has no PCI-E slot, but 3 PCIs and an AGP.

Some people would have an old AGP vid card lying around to troubleshoot
with.

The mobo will support integrated graphics -- so if it has an AGP card,
you also have the option to move the VGA from the AGP to the integrated;
and/but if it is already running on the integrated vid, if you could get
your hands on an old AGP vid, you could try that.

The problem is that AGP cards are lying around in scrap boxes somewhere,
but if you have to buy one, it isn't cheap; especially since you only
need it for troubleshooting. If it doesn't solve anything, it is
worthless to you.

> We ordered a cable to attach the XP's HD externally to one of these
> PCs.

Personally I would probably mount it in an extra drive bay in a desktop,
but the gizmos to make it external have more flexibility.

> I want the PC as a back-up and to burn
> CDs/DVDs.

I definitely understand the concept. I like to burn my CD/DVDs on a
nearby separate machine while I'm doing something else over here.

> And we have all those Floppies that only this PC can read.
> Maybe I can move the floppy drive (externally) to one of the other PCs?
> Is that possible?

Yes, but, that's not the way I would do that either. I would mount the
floppy into some other desktop that had a little external bay for that.

>> Some old mobos have bad caps that make the mobo worthless except for
>> salvaging its ram or some other attachment.
>
> :*( I think this XP will end up at the recycle center in the
> end......... we'll salvage whatever is useful and let it go. *sob!*

It would be nice to be able to figure out whether it is the mobo or the
video.

Sometimes you can visually diagnose a bad cap because of its appearance.
I'll have to find some nice pictures so that you can look at your mobo
to see if you see any cap badness.

The other thing you should look at is to see if you have an AGP card in
your system. If you did, there would be two VGA connectors on the rear;
one for the mobo's integrated graphic function and one for the AGP vid
card's.

Then you would test a known good monitor on the other VGA. In a big
town, there are computer stores that sell recycled parts which would be
a good source of that old AGP, since that has now been phased out in
favor of PCI-E cards for vid.


--
Mike Easter

On 11/22/2010 12:35 PM, Valorie *~ wrote:
>
> "Evan Platt" <evan@*******************************> wrote in message
> news:...
>> On Sun, 21 Nov 2010 14:59:03 -0600, "Valorie *~"
>> <> wrote:
>>
>>> We just picked up the XP PC from Staples. I asked him a lot of questions
>>> and it turns out the PC wont boot with their boot disks. From the
>>> form they
>>> gave me:
>>> ~~~~~~~~~~
>>> *Service Report: Tests show motherboard is dead. Possible corrupt BIOS.
>>> *Service Report part 2: Can't complete. Motherboard is dead. Service
>>> Cannot
>>> Be Completed
>>> ~~~~~~~~~~
>>> That was it. For this I paid $34.99. He said he had no way to check the
>>> battery to see if it was dead. The HD itself was good. We broght it back
>>> home and aren't sure where to go from here. Replace the Motherboard,
>>> replace the battery...........
>>
>> Wow, serious? They can't test a CMOS battery?
>
> I feel we got ripped off by Staples. My husband checked the battery with
> a multimeter and the 3v battery was at 2.9v. The battery isn't the
> problem. Testing the motherboard is another problem alltogether.
>


Try re-setting the bios

there should be a jumper near the cmos battery that you move over
then back. Power should be off when you do that

On Tue, 23 Nov 2010 12:59:50 -0600, Valorie *~ wrote:

> There are 2 cards but I don't know what they are and there isn't room to
> read what they say...........

Well, don't try getting in there with them. You can remove them and have
all the room in the world to read what's on them.



--
"En un lugar de la Mancha, de cuyo nombre no quiero acordarme,
no hace mucho tiempo que vivÃ*a un hidalgo de los de lanza en
astillero, adarga antigua, rocÃ*n flaco y galgo corredor."
-Cervantes, 'Don Quixote'