OK I have a long story so sit back, make a drink and be prepared to be bored! lol (I don't want this to be long, I just want to make sure I cover everything!)
Note: The spec of my PC in trouble will follow when I get home and post them in here, but for now.
I bought a Compaq PC In April 2006 (just outside warranty huh?!) and some point in December, I needed to reinstall windows due to a problem with my shell/kernal or whatever. I didn't have the Compaq Windows XP (because they neglected to tell me i had to pay £35 for the privilege when i bought the pc) so I used a Dell XP Home edition and just stuck in my windows key.
All was great (aside from a few driver problems which took a little while to sort).
In April this year, I upgraded my psu from 350W to 450W within view to adding a new hard-drive (7200rpm). Both new componants are installed and all is well.
Up until about 6-8 weeks later, my system freezes. I am forced to turn the power off at the mains, then rebooting I got as far as the windows boot screen, then it freezes again. The third manual reboot has the pc starting up, fans whirring, but nothing other than a blank screen. The fourth reboot (and consequently every reboot after this) shows the monitor as not having 'any source' - essentially it stays off - as the fans whirr!
After trial and error I remove the PCI-E graphics card and use the onboard ATI 200 Express and that works fine. I presume the graphics card is dead and wait to buy a new one.
This weekend I finally get the money together and get myself a 8600GT (checking first of all that my PSU was equipped enough to take this) but when i install it, I get the same problem! I (somehow) stop myself from kicking the box
The monitor doesn't come on and the fans whirr.
I went to Compaq/HP and asked them, they asked me to go to the BIOS and diasble the onboard graphics etc. I did all this to no avail. Even uninstalled the graphics driver, etc.
They then said to put the graphics card in, then to go to the bios screen... despite me telling them approx 5 times that I couldn't even get to the bios screen with a graphics card in!!
Everything else works fine. Do I have knackered PCI-E slot in my motherboard??
Note: The spec of my PC in trouble will follow when I get home and post them in here, but for now.
I bought a Compaq PC In April 2006 (just outside warranty huh?!) and some point in December, I needed to reinstall windows due to a problem with my shell/kernal or whatever. I didn't have the Compaq Windows XP (because they neglected to tell me i had to pay £35 for the privilege when i bought the pc) so I used a Dell XP Home edition and just stuck in my windows key.
All was great (aside from a few driver problems which took a little while to sort).
In April this year, I upgraded my psu from 350W to 450W within view to adding a new hard-drive (7200rpm). Both new componants are installed and all is well.
Up until about 6-8 weeks later, my system freezes. I am forced to turn the power off at the mains, then rebooting I got as far as the windows boot screen, then it freezes again. The third manual reboot has the pc starting up, fans whirring, but nothing other than a blank screen. The fourth reboot (and consequently every reboot after this) shows the monitor as not having 'any source' - essentially it stays off - as the fans whirr!
After trial and error I remove the PCI-E graphics card and use the onboard ATI 200 Express and that works fine. I presume the graphics card is dead and wait to buy a new one.
This weekend I finally get the money together and get myself a 8600GT (checking first of all that my PSU was equipped enough to take this) but when i install it, I get the same problem! I (somehow) stop myself from kicking the box
The monitor doesn't come on and the fans whirr.
I went to Compaq/HP and asked them, they asked me to go to the BIOS and diasble the onboard graphics etc. I did all this to no avail. Even uninstalled the graphics driver, etc.
They then said to put the graphics card in, then to go to the bios screen... despite me telling them approx 5 times that I couldn't even get to the bios screen with a graphics card in!!
Everything else works fine. Do I have knackered PCI-E slot in my motherboard??
