Hi, recently I put my computer back to its original settings (it's a packard bell, 40gig, 1500 processer (P4), 318 ram, running XP SP2). What made me reformat was that once it was turned off or put into stand-by it wouldn't come back on again. Id have to switch it off and hit the start button, at which Id hear a small eletric whining noise for about half a second, the lights on the h/d and the speakers lights will flash but thats all. I have to keep on switching it off, wait for 5 seconds and then try again (I wait for 5 secs because if I don't then i dont hear the eletric sound or see the lights flash). This process can last up to 7 hours!!

Any help, is it a hard ware problem. I mean its just been put back to factory settings and completely updated with sp 2 norton etc. I looked at the wires from the start button to the the circut board and they all in place, well soldered.

I know I need to turn it off soon as its been consistently for 2 weeks, just dont like the thought of it not going for hours. please help.

Could be a PSU problem and / or a overheating problem. If your CPU is over heating, problem it will automatically shut the PC down to presever the CPU.

Otherwise I'm not sure.

If you can explain what happens directly after you switching it on. Once from cold and once straight aftert its shut down on you.


Regards
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Meckanix

Hi, thanks for replying. Firstly what does PSU mean (I know cpu!). Ok what happen is that if i have turned it off for the night and then try to start it in the morning it won't do anything, thats when i have to go through the whole procedure of waiting 5 secs and trying again after i pull the plug out. It hasn't shut itself down in ages whilst running.

Before i put it back to factort settings, it was doing this only there was something else is was doing but isn't doing now after the format. What is did was this: when after hours of trying to start it, it would wind up and get me to the password screen, the it would simply reboot it self, the 2 rom drives would makes clicking sounds and the lights would flash for about 7 mins then it would go into a series of reboots for about 5 mins, THEN is get a black and white error screen telling me windows was sorry for the inconvience that it couldnt start up. After that it ran ok.


I hope this helps, and thanks again, look forward to your response.

It is a hardware problem.

PSU means Power Supply Unit. Sounds to me like a power supply or motherboard problem. When you have a problem with one of these, it's normally very hard to tell which one is at fault. As the PSU is the cheapest and easiest to replace (doesn't really require any technical skills other than knowing how to use a screwdriver), I would suggest changing this first.

When you say you put the PC "back to factory settings", what did you do? Did you run a restore CD that wiped the hard disk and reloaded the factory-installed software or did you go into the BIOS screen and reset the factory defaults in there?