[Bumbledor]

Got a dell compter here, 4100.
Was working 2 hours ago.
nephew came home and turned it on, and we get a "previous fan error" or something like that.

It will not boot up to xp.
Ran f12 system options,.
Had it run diagnosticks on HD, it sees the HD. But will not boot.
We get just a blank blinking "-" cursor in the upper left corner.


Any suggestions?

Thanks.

[rfgg]

i had this happen once you might need fan replaced cause dells (even though they are the worse possible computer and costumer support suck) will run with all OS that i know of (ive run most myself) so its most likly the fan and btw if the all the fans connected to the motherbord are working (which means that they are spinning) it might be the one in the power supply.....but of ourse this is just a guess

is its not the fans then its whats setup to boot what you need to do is going to setup (most likly f2) and go tosomthing along the lings of boot devices or boot somthing or other and make sure you hard drive is set to be booted from and that its the first boot option for it

if this helped you welcome if not then just ignore this post.......

[Bumbledor]

ok..ignoring.
LOL

[TerryNet]

Well, don't ignore it completely. If a fan failed you will need a replacement, and it may have caused damage to something.

You said "Had it run diagnosticks on HD, it sees the HD" but didn't tell us anything about the results. Any errors found on the hard drive or memory or anything?

[Bumbledor]

Originally Posted by TerryNet

Well, don't ignore it completely. If a fan failed you will need a replacement, and it may have caused damage to something.

You said "Had it run diagnosticks on HD, it sees the HD" but didn't tell us anything about the results. Any errors found on the hard drive or memory or anything?

The dell diagnostics said the drive was there, and how big it was, did not say if it was good or bad, nor did it show any errors.

[TerryNet]

So much for Dell diagnostics!

Can you get to the Windows boot menu (tapping F8)? If so, can you boot to Safe Mode or any of the choices?

[Bumbledor]

Originally Posted by TerryNet

So much for Dell diagnostics!

Can you get to the Windows boot menu (tapping F8)? If so, can you boot to Safe Mode or any of the choices?

Nope.

I pulled the HD from the unit and attached it to my asus MB. My system saw it, but then my system would not boot up.
The HD is an IDE drive, and my system is running SATA drives for 2 HD's and 2 CD drives (one is a burner).
even telling my system to boot up on the sata drive, it would not do so with sis's crashed drive connected.

Therefore it has been decided that her drive is toast. and I can see why. That Dell 4550 Insprion case is like fort knox, and has little if any air flow thru it. Shes fried 2 drives in 4 years, so this is about avarage. Like a normal person, she rarly does maintance to her system. and keeps it in a covy hole type computer desk where no clean cool air can get in and around the system.

So I figure the drive is just plain fried.

[TerryNet]

I agree with your analysis.