Ed said:
Malke.......I was just surfing around for tooling and it just froze
up. I could not click on anything at the time, had to maually shut
down . I waited about 30 sec. before restarting and could not open up
anything so I maually shut down once again. Tried two more times and
nothing. Since I did not have hardly nothing saved I figured that I
would do a factory restore. It started restoring to this point
*WINDOWS XP HOME EDIION SEUP* you have three choices to pick from. At
this point, my mouse could not click on ENER to setup or the other
two, nothing, once again, I had to manually shut down. Waited for 30
sec. and restarted it up, got to this same spot and still nothing
happened. Removed the cd and shut down. Restarted it and open with a
blue window saying * setup is being restarted......* and then it just
stays at this point, nothing.
This definitely sounds like hardware failure. I'll give you general
hardware troubleshooting steps but if the computer is under warranty
I'd just call the OEM's tech support.
1) Open the computer and run it open after cleaning out all dust
bunnies. Observe all fans (overheating will cause system freezing
and/or crashing). This includes the fan on your video card if you have
one. Obviously you can't do this with a laptop, but you can hear if the
fan is running and feel if the laptop is getting too hot. For a
desktop, without touching anything hold your hand close to the inside
of the case and feel how hot things are getting.
2) Test the RAM - I like Memtest86+ from
www.memtest.org. Obviously, you
have to get the program from a working machine. You will either
download the precompiled Windows binary to make a bootable floppy or
the .iso to make a bootable cd. If you want to use the latter, you'll
need to have third-party burning software on the machine where you
download the file - XP's built-in burning capability won't do the job.
In either case, boot with the media you made. The test will run
immediately. Let the test run for an hour or two - unless errors are
seen immediately. If you get any errors, replace the RAM.
3) Test the hard drive with a diagnostic utility from the mftr. Download
the file and make a bootable floppy or cd with it. Boot with the media
and do a thorough test. If the drive has physical errors, replace it.
4) The power supply may be going bad or be inadequate for the devices
you have in the system. The adequacy issue doesn't really apply to a
laptop, although of course the power supply can be faulty. For a
desktop, test by swapping the psu out for a known-working one. If you
have one of the higher-end video cards that requires a separate power
supply connector, make sure it is in place.
5) Test the motherboard with something like TuffTest from
www.tufftest.com. Sometimes this is useful, and sometimes it isn't.
Testing hardware failures often involves swapping out suspected parts
with known-good parts. If you can't do the testing yourself and/or are
uncomfortable opening your computer, take the machine to a professional
computer repair shop (not your local equivalent of BigStoreUSA).
Malke
