Older computer continually restarting/freezing

[KingScarlet]

Hey all, hope you could help me with a bit of a problem I'm having
lately.

The other day, my brother's PC started to randomly freeze and/or
restart itself at random intervals. This escalated and became a 15
minute recurring procedure. It is now to the point where it will not
even make it as far as the Windows Loading screen, usually it stops
after the Compaq label pops up and either freezes, restarts, or says
"Boot disk error, please insert system disk." We made absolutely no
hardware or software changes (besides adding quicktime and itunes) and
nothing strange had happened to the PC beforehand.

This is a Win XP machine, and I have tried a few things. I have tried
to boot from a second hard drive with the same symptoms. There are
two sticks of ram in the PC (both 512) and I have tried booting with
each stick separately with no results. I have tried a second PSU with
no results at all. The only other thing I think I could try is taking
out the ATI video card and booting with onboard video. I am at a loss
right now.

If you could suggest anything else I may try I'd be grateful. Keep in
mind that what I can do on the computer in terms of commands or
loading things is basically non-existant. Running a memtest on the
sticks for instance is impossible. Thank you.

 

[Bjarke Andersen]

(e-mail address removed) crashed Echelon writing (e-mail address removed):

The other day, my brother's PC started to randomly freeze and/or
restart itself at random intervals. This escalated and became a 15
minute recurring procedure. It is now to the point where it will not
even make it as far as the Windows Loading screen, usually it stops
after the Compaq label pops up and either freezes, restarts, or says
"Boot disk error, please insert system disk." We made absolutely no
hardware or software changes (besides adding quicktime and itunes) and
nothing strange had happened to the PC beforehand.

This seems to be hardware related as since you mention it freeze up during
Post.

This could be related to several things like, motherboard, ram, power
supply and so forth.

My best advice for now would be to open up the case, check if motherboard
has any bad caps, http://www.badcaps.net/

Check if fans are clean and run troublefree.

Check memory, though this is a microsoft group I recommend downloading
ultimate boot cd and run Memtest86.
http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

If none of the above results in finding the error, try installing speedfan
and hopefully it can read temparature data (however old motherboards may
not have this feature). Maybe your cpu needs some fresh therm grease.
http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php

 

[KingScarlet]

(e-mail address removed) crashed Echelon writing (e-mail address removed):


This seems to be hardware related as since you mention it freeze up during
Post.

This could be related to several things like, motherboard, ram, power
supply and so forth.

My best advice for now would be to open up the case, check if motherboard
has any bad caps,http://www.badcaps.net/

Check if fans are clean and run troublefree.

Check memory, though this is a microsoft group I recommend downloading
ultimate boot cd and run Memtest86.http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

If none of the above results in finding the error, try installing speedfan
and hopefully it can read temparature data (however old motherboards may
not have this feature). Maybe your cpu needs some fresh therm grease.http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php

Thank you. Well I have tried a new PSU which did not alleviate any of
the problems. I have taken out the videocard and booted running
onboard video again with no solution coming from that.

The problem with running UBCD is that I now cannot even get the
computer to boot into the Compaq starting logo. It went from an alive
computer to now a completely dead one.

Not sure where to go from here.

 

[Bjarke Andersen]

(e-mail address removed) crashed Echelon writing

Thank you. Well I have tried a new PSU which did not alleviate any of
the problems. I have taken out the videocard and booted running
onboard video again with no solution coming from that.

Not sure where to go from here.

What about the motherboard, does it look healthy or does it have leaky or
bulging caps?

One last idea I have it to disconnect the harddrive. In case it has gone
bad, the freezing after BIOS Post might be the due to this.

 

[KingScarlet]

(e-mail address removed) crashed Echelon writing

What about the motherboard, does it look healthy or does it have leaky or
bulging caps?

One last idea I have it to disconnect the harddrive. In case it has gone
bad, the freezing after BIOS Post might be the due to this.

Well... looks like some of the caps are actually bad. This is
something I would've never guessed had you not suggested it. The tops
of the cap have a bit of brown stuff coming out the top of them, about
7 of the caps around the CPU. Could this be the cause of this
problem? Any way to know for sure, or do I just replace them (or the
mobo) to find out?

 

[KingScarlet]

(e-mail address removed) crashed Echelon writing

What about the motherboard, does it look healthy or does it have leaky or
bulging caps?

One last idea I have it to disconnect the harddrive. In case it has gone
bad, the freezing after BIOS Post might be the due to this.

Well... looks like some of the caps are actually bad. This is
something I would've never guessed had you not suggested it. The tops
of the cap have a bit of brown stuff coming out the top of them, about
7 of the caps around the CPU. Could this be the cause of this
problem? Any way to know for sure, or do I just replace them (or the
mobo) to find out?

 

[KingScarlet]

(e-mail address removed) crashed Echelon writing

What about the motherboard, does it look healthy or does it have leaky or
bulging caps?

One last idea I have it to disconnect the harddrive. In case it has gone
bad, the freezing after BIOS Post might be the due to this.

Well... looks like some of the caps are actually bad. This is
something I would've never guessed had you not suggested it. The tops
of the cap have a bit of brown stuff coming out the top of them, about
7 of the caps around the CPU. Could this be the cause of this
problem? Any way to know for sure, or do I just replace them (or the
mobo) to find out?

 

[Colin Barnhorst]

If you are using a web-based reader and are seeing error messages about your
post not posting, it is a bug. Wait to see whether or not your post shows
up anyway before resending. It is a frequent problem. OE does not do this.

 

[KingScarlet]

Actually for whatever reason when I refreshed the page it resent the
data twice.. not sure why, sorry about that though.

I guess for now my brother is considering the computer dead and buying
a new laptop for school.

Appreciate the help in identifying the bad caps though. That's
something I never thought of and something I can add to my memory bank
for later times.

 

[Bjarke Andersen]

(e-mail address removed) crashed Echelon writing (e-mail address removed):

Well... looks like some of the caps are actually bad. This is
something I would've never guessed had you not suggested it. The tops
of the cap have a bit of brown stuff coming out the top of them, about
7 of the caps around the CPU. Could this be the cause of this
problem? Any way to know for sure, or do I just replace them (or the
mobo) to find out?

Yes, bad caps can and will eventually make the computer act up weird,
including constant freezes and reboots.

You can replace the bad caps if you are keen with soldering, but it is no
guarantee that the other components have taken damage by this.

I think the best would be to buy a new motherboard, perhaps you can get a
used really cheap.

Furthermore, bad caps can be forced on by a bad PSU. Myself have
experienced a brand new ThermalTake PSU which caused my motherboard and
even the replacement motherboard to get bad caps (just in case you changed
PSU lately).