Hi All,

Please could someone help with a problem I have.

I have an Windows XP machine and recently was attempting to create a
slide-show for XMas. Suddenly I lost all photos the screen
went blank. I had to reboot the machine but when it powered up the only
showing was all "Gobly-Gook". All attempts to rectify the
problem were in vein.

I replaced the video card with another one from my previous computer. It now
shows the BIOS etc ok but stops after loading the
memory and BIOS programs with a blanking cursor on the top left of the screen.

I have attempted to boot with a windows 98 boot disk this did not work.

Appreciate any comments on how to resolve this problem.

Regards.
--
Flinty

Peter F wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> Please could someone help with a problem I have.
>
> I have an Windows XP machine and recently was attempting to create a
> slide-show for XMas. Suddenly I lost all photos the screen
> went blank. I had to reboot the machine but when it powered up the only
> showing was all "Gobly-Gook". All attempts to rectify the
> problem were in vein.
>
> I replaced the video card with another one from my previous computer. It now
> shows the BIOS etc ok but stops after loading the
> memory and BIOS programs with a blanking cursor on the top left of the screen.
>
> I have attempted to boot with a windows 98 boot disk this did not work.
>
> Appreciate any comments on how to resolve this problem.
>
> Regards.

What kind of computer is it (make and model) ?

I'm just curious as to whether it has a Bestec 250W power supply,
such as ATX-250-12E or something similar.

It almost sounds to me, like the computer cannot access the hard
drive. Maybe the hard drive was damaged by the same event that
did something to the video card ? I'm asking about the power supply,
to see if it might have killed something.

If this was my problem, I'd pull the hard drive from the computer
with the blinking cursor, and slave it to a working computer.
I'd record the jumper position used on the drive (could be Cable
Select), and then change the jumper position, to something suitable
for adding the drive to another working computer. For IDE, you need
to understand how jumpering works, to make a successful transplant.

An alternative, is to get a USB to IDE adapter or USB 3.5" enclosure,
and slave up the hard drive that way. I prefer the more direct
approach, of just putting the drive inside the other computer.

So there are a few different ways of connecting a hard drive to
another computer.

Once the drive is in the other computer, you can either attempt to
access it from Windows. Or, depending on the brand, run the disk
manufacturer diagnostic. For example, for Seagate drives, you
could download SeaTools for DOS (floppy or CD versions). Then
boot the working computer with that diagnostic, and run a check
on the questionable hard drive.

If you could manage to boot the affected computer with something,
that would also be an alternative. You could make the Seatools for
DOS floppy or CD, and try to boot the affected computer with that.
But if you can't convince the computer to boot (it gets stuck
trying to access that hard drive), then moving the hard drive
to another computer, may allow you to inspect its condition.

Paul

If it won't boot from anything, the motherboard was likely damaged also.

Peter F wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> Please could someone help with a problem I have.
>
> I have an Windows XP machine and recently was attempting to create a
> slide-show for XMas. Suddenly I lost all photos the screen
> went blank. I had to reboot the machine but when it powered up the only
> showing was all "Gobly-Gook". All attempts to rectify the
> problem were in vein.
>
> I replaced the video card with another one from my previous computer. It now
> shows the BIOS etc ok but stops after loading the
> memory and BIOS programs with a blanking cursor on the top left of the screen.
>
> I have attempted to boot with a windows 98 boot disk this did not work.
>
> Appreciate any comments on how to resolve this problem.
>
> Regards.

Peter F wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> Please could someone help with a problem I have.
>
> I have an Windows XP machine and recently was attempting to create a
> slide-show for XMas. Suddenly I lost all photos the screen
> went blank. I had to reboot the machine but when it powered up the only
> showing was all "Gobly-Gook". All attempts to rectify the
> problem were in vein.
>
> I replaced the video card with another one from my previous computer. It now
> shows the BIOS etc ok but stops after loading the
> memory and BIOS programs with a blanking cursor on the top left of the screen.
>
> I have attempted to boot with a windows 98 boot disk this did not work.
>
> Appreciate any comments on how to resolve this problem.

Did you set the boot option in the BIOS so that the diskette drive would
be at the top of the booting order? Booting to a blinking cursor on the
upper left screen usually indicates that the MBR code cannot find an
active partition, the suggested fix would usually be to boot with a
Windows 98 startup diskette and use FDISK to verify and set the active
flag on the system partition. If you can't boot with a floppy diskette
or a bootable CD-ROM them there is more to this than just the hard drive.

John

Peter F wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> Please could someone help with a problem I have.
>
> I have an Windows XP machine and recently was attempting to create a
> slide-show for XMas. Suddenly I lost all photos the screen
> went blank. I had to reboot the machine but when it powered up the only
> showing was all "Gobly-Gook". All attempts to rectify the
> problem were in vein.
>
> I replaced the video card with another one from my previous computer. It now
> shows the BIOS etc ok but stops after loading the
> memory and BIOS programs with a blanking cursor on the top left of the screen.
>
> I have attempted to boot with a windows 98 boot disk this did not work.
>
> Appreciate any comments on how to resolve this problem.
>
> Regards.


Looks like your original video card was bad...and if so you did the
right thing when you replaced it.

It looks like the system is "hanging" as it's trying to load the drivers
for your old card...

So right after the bios messages hit F8 and see if you can get to safe
mode...
If so...uninstall your video adaptor in the control panel

reboot and let windows reinstall it.

If it comes up as "generic vga" you will need to install the drivers for
that specific card.