M
motanulincaltat
Hi.
For the past 2-3 years, I have been putting my computer on standby (I
would later find out it was S3) instead of turning it off. My mobo is
Soyo KT333 Dragon Plus and I used to have a 300W Enermax PSU. Recently,
I got a third hard drive and after a short while of using it, I started
having problems with my computer.
The first thing which was went wrong was that (1) the computer failed
to wake up from S3. It would start the fans (CPU&PSU) and the hard
drives, but it would not wake up the monitor, and it would not respond
to keyboard or mouse. This happened occasionally but not all the time.
Another symptom was that sometimes, after turning the computer off - S5
now, when I pressed the power button to turn the computer on, either
(2) there would be 3-4 short beeps followed by a shutdown, or (3) the
fans and the hard drives would start up but not the monitor, and the
system wouldn't get as far the POST beeps, it would just hang.
I dug up my mobo manual and realized that scenario (2) was caused by
the mobo not detecting a CPU fan and shutting the computer off. I
disabled that check from the BIOS and (2) disappeared. However, (1) and
(3) persisted.
As I said earlier, I have 3 hard drives inside the box, and I figured
that's too much for my PSU. I disconencted them all, but (3) persisted
even with no drives attached. I reconected 1 drive and after many
tries, the computer finally boot up. I then used the computer for a
while by putting it to sleep in S3, never turning it off to S5. For
some reason, (1) didn't occur.
This became annoying because I wanted to use my other drives. About a
week ago I tried reconnecting them but I couldn't start the computer
because of (3). I decided to go out and buy another PSU, and I got a
535W Enermax. I plugged it in, fired the computer up, and (3) didn't
occur. Happy, I tried to put the computer to sleep as before to S3, but
now (1) recurred and I couldn't wake it up. Grrr.
After some more digging, I realized that my mobo supports S1 and S3. I
disabled S3 from the BIOS and now the computer goes to S1 on standby.
It works fine, but it's annoying as it leaves the fans on. So currently
I'm only using S1 and S5, but I miss S3.
Apart from the obvious "what should I try before spending money on
another mobo/CPU?", here are some more specific questions:
- Could something have inadvertently happened to some registry settings
about how XP deals with S3? What should I check? I searched the web and
found some stuff about USB devices waking the computer from S3 but both
my mouse and keyboard are PS/2.
- What is the relation between (1) and (3)? Is it true that if the PSU
detects some bad current, it will block some power output until the PSU
is completely reset? So, is it possible that (1) followed by manual
reset could result in (3)?
- Does the fact that the monitor is not taken out of standby during (1)
suggest anything to do with VGA re-initialization after S3?
- Is there any kind of a log I could look at, either XP- or
hardware-specific, which could give me some info about what's going
bad?
Thanks!
M
For the past 2-3 years, I have been putting my computer on standby (I
would later find out it was S3) instead of turning it off. My mobo is
Soyo KT333 Dragon Plus and I used to have a 300W Enermax PSU. Recently,
I got a third hard drive and after a short while of using it, I started
having problems with my computer.
The first thing which was went wrong was that (1) the computer failed
to wake up from S3. It would start the fans (CPU&PSU) and the hard
drives, but it would not wake up the monitor, and it would not respond
to keyboard or mouse. This happened occasionally but not all the time.
Another symptom was that sometimes, after turning the computer off - S5
now, when I pressed the power button to turn the computer on, either
(2) there would be 3-4 short beeps followed by a shutdown, or (3) the
fans and the hard drives would start up but not the monitor, and the
system wouldn't get as far the POST beeps, it would just hang.
I dug up my mobo manual and realized that scenario (2) was caused by
the mobo not detecting a CPU fan and shutting the computer off. I
disabled that check from the BIOS and (2) disappeared. However, (1) and
(3) persisted.
As I said earlier, I have 3 hard drives inside the box, and I figured
that's too much for my PSU. I disconencted them all, but (3) persisted
even with no drives attached. I reconected 1 drive and after many
tries, the computer finally boot up. I then used the computer for a
while by putting it to sleep in S3, never turning it off to S5. For
some reason, (1) didn't occur.
This became annoying because I wanted to use my other drives. About a
week ago I tried reconnecting them but I couldn't start the computer
because of (3). I decided to go out and buy another PSU, and I got a
535W Enermax. I plugged it in, fired the computer up, and (3) didn't
occur. Happy, I tried to put the computer to sleep as before to S3, but
now (1) recurred and I couldn't wake it up. Grrr.
After some more digging, I realized that my mobo supports S1 and S3. I
disabled S3 from the BIOS and now the computer goes to S1 on standby.
It works fine, but it's annoying as it leaves the fans on. So currently
I'm only using S1 and S5, but I miss S3.
Apart from the obvious "what should I try before spending money on
another mobo/CPU?", here are some more specific questions:
- Could something have inadvertently happened to some registry settings
about how XP deals with S3? What should I check? I searched the web and
found some stuff about USB devices waking the computer from S3 but both
my mouse and keyboard are PS/2.
- What is the relation between (1) and (3)? Is it true that if the PSU
detects some bad current, it will block some power output until the PSU
is completely reset? So, is it possible that (1) followed by manual
reset could result in (3)?
- Does the fact that the monitor is not taken out of standby during (1)
suggest anything to do with VGA re-initialization after S3?
- Is there any kind of a log I could look at, either XP- or
hardware-specific, which could give me some info about what's going
bad?
Thanks!
M