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PC won't boot, Help needed

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I recently purchased a new computer and it worked fine for a month. Last night while I was surfing the web, the computer shut itself down. This has happened once before, but a simple reboot worked in the past. However, this time the PC would not boot. I did a few tests and tweaks but I'm scratching my head right now.

This is what I'm dealing with: There are two 'beep', but not the typical beeps in a normal booting process. It goes sorta like 'dun dun'. This sound happens twice. The monitor display remains the 'No Signal' message. The front, rear and PSU fan will turn on. However the fan on the motherboard will attempt to spin but fail. The HDD light will remain yellow. At first, I thought this might have been a faulty power supply but I did the paper clip test on the 20/24 pin and it worked. I eliminated the PSU as the source of the problem and I went on with the RAM. I removed the RAM, and the same sounds occurred. I read online, the motherboard should have made a constant beeping noise to indicate no RAM but that did not occur. I'm thinking this might be a motherboard problem but I have no idea what to do next. Thanks for your help.

Computer's Specs:
Processor: AMD Athlon II X2 245(2.9GHz)
Memory: Kingston 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 800
Graphics: ATI Radeon HD 4350 512MB PCI Express Video Card (Fanless)
Motherboard: MSI GeForce 6100
Hard Drive: Western Digital 500GB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 7200RPM HDD

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Motherboard Master

You didn't list the power supply. A cheap unit could have caused the board to fail suddenly; I would replace it just to be safe, especially if you invest in a new motherboard. If you want to avoid a fresh windows install, get a board with the same chipset or as close as possible. Newegg has a biostar 6150se for only $44.99 shipped. I have used this board, and it works well. Meanwhile, request an rma from MSI and send your board in (will take about 2 weeks to get a replacement); you can use the replacement as a spare or sell it.

The power supply is a 600W by CyberPowerPC. Of course, it's nothing compared to Corsair or other namebrands, but 600W should be more than enough to cover a 4350 graphics card. I'm definitely looking at the RMA as a last resort as I am going back up to college tomorrow and I'll be needing this system asap. I could get a replacement motherboard but I don't want to do that until I'm positive it is a motherboard problem that can't be fixed. Thanks for your reply o1die!

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Motherboard Master

aznelf23 said:
The power supply is a 600W by CyberPowerPC.
The power rating of the PSU isn't the problem. The quality of the PSU (poor) is.

The paperclip trick is not really that helpful. All it will tell you is whether or not the PSU can produce a little 12 volt power. You do not know if the 3.3 and 5 volt rails are working, you do not know if the PSU can function under load, and you do not know if the PowerOK control line to motherboard is working.

Try to borrow a known good PSU. Or better yet, see if you can test your PSU in another working system. If you cannot do that, try to borrow a DMM to measure the voltages. Yellow wires should be 12 volts. Red wires - +5 volts, orange wires - +3.3 volts, blue wire - -12 volts, violet wire - 5 volts alway, on. The gray wire is really important. It should go from 0 to +5 volts when you turn the PSU on. CPU needs this to boot.


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This board uses the AMI bios...
forget the PSU for now. before you go spending money on that:
2 Beeps on an AMI bios usually indicated either graphics not working/not seated properly, or RAM not working/not seated properly.
Take the side off, take out and reseat the graphics card and RAM, make sure they're both properly in.
Then get back to us if the situation has changed :) 

Bad Ram or Ram not Seated correctly
Bad Cpu or a Bad Heatsink Fan
some connections could have loosened to the hard drive
Bad PATA or SATA Cable
Finally: try swapping a new HD and see if the problem disappears.
Bon Courage...
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