Trouble-shooting 5.2 mboards, CPU, RAM & power

Question 1

power light on your monitor doesn’t turn on (3 things)

Answer 1

monitor itself, the power cord, or your power source

Question 2

grinding noise (3 things)

Answer 2

Things that move:
hard drives have motors that spin, platters have crashed
Power supply fans needs cleaning (whining)
Optical drives spin the discs

Question 3

Fan louder & quieter

Answer 3

Speed changing due to failing power supplies

Question 4

fingernails on a chalkboard (2 things)

Answer 4

heads in a mechanical hard drive have crashed into the platter
Or
power supply fan’s motor binding up

Question 5

rhythmic ticking sound is also likely to be caused by

Answer 5

mechanical hard drive

Question 6

So what do you do if you hear a terrible noise from the computer?

Answer 6

If it’s still responsive, shut it down normally as soon as possible. If it’s not responsive, then shut off the power as quickly as you can. Examine the power supply to see if there are any obvious problems such as excessive dust, and clean it as needed. Power the system back on. If the noise was caused by the hard drive, odds are that the drive has failed and the system won’t boot normally. You may need to replace some parts.

Question 7

two common ways to reduce heat-related problems in computers:

Answer 7

heat sinks and cooling systems, such as case fans

Question 8

chip creep

Answer 8

open the case and reseat the devices. It’s surprising how often this is the solution to phantom problems of all sorts, particularly intermittent device failures, random reboots, and unexpected shutdowns.

Question 9

intermittent shutdowns

Answer 9

Components that overheat a lot or fan heat sink not working
Eg CPUs (most common), video cards are also quite susceptible, especially for those with high-end graphics needs such as video producers, graphics designers, and gamers. Occasionally other chips on the motherboard—such as the chipset or chips on other devices—may also overheat. Extra heat sinks, fans, or higher-end cooling systems may be installed to cool these chips.

Question 10

Overclocking

Answer 10

running the processor faster than it was designed to run—causes the CPU to produce more heat. In many cases, this voids the manufacturer’s warranty

Question 11

burning smell or smoke

Answer 11

shut it down immediately. Open the case and start looking for visible signs of damage. Things to look for include melted plastic components and burn marks on circuit boards.

Question 12

In situations in which the power light doesn’t come on and the device has no power, always obey the first rule of troubleshooting:

Answer 12

check your connections first

Question 13

BIOS/UEFI

Answer 13

interface (firmware) between the computer’s hardware and any operating system installed on that hardware - controls the boot process: power-on self-test (POST).

Question 14

Flashing the BIOS

Answer 14

Updating it so it can support newer installations eg virtualisation

Question 15

CMOS battery

Answer 15

If this battery fails, the BIOS won’t retain its settings eg date & time, hard drive settings.

Question 16

POST

Answer 16

diagnostic program built into its BIOS/UEFI eg checking CPU, RAM, vid card, basic functionality etc. if it encounters a problem, the boot process stops. successful POST generally produces a single beep. If there’s more than one beep, the number, duration, and pattern of the beeps can sometimes tell you what component is causing the problem.

Question 17

POST card

Answer 17

a circuit board that fits into an expansion slot (PCIe, PCI, or USB) in the system and reports numeric codes as the boot process progresses. Each code corresponds to a particular component being checked. If the POST card stops at a certain number, you can look up that number in the manual

Question 18

black screen

Answer 18

Check: video card, cable, and a screen, and the screen may have several components such as the screen itself, inverter, backlight, etc
Plug into the new expansion vid card rather than the motherboard
Last resort: replace motherboard

Question 19

Capacitor swelling (distended)

Answer 19

motherboards have capacitors on them, which store electricity. They are short cylindrical tubes. Sometimes, when capacitors fail, they will swell and brownish-red electrolyte residue may seep out of the vents in the top.
Replace motherboard
Can only replace capacitor w safety training b/c chemical burn & electric shock

Question 20

Memory issues can cause a fatal error in your operating system, producing proprietary crash screens such as

Answer 20

Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) in Windows or the rotating pinwheel in macOS
Memory issues: app crashes and system lockups, unexpected shutdowns or reboots
Sometimes switching the slot that the RAM is in will help, but more often than not the RAM needs to be

Question 21

Sluggish performance can be caused by a variety of different issues ….

Answer 21

Low physical or virtual memory

Low available space on the primary hard drive

Failing motherboard, CPU, or hard drive

Poorly coded software apps

Too many apps open at once (causing low memory)

Malware on the computer

• check memory usage in task manager
• try updating device drivers
• expanding the available RAM
• check the integrity/updating OS files
• Edit the size of the paging file in the OS
• close background applications

Question 22

What would cause the reported memory to be lower than the actual physical memory?

Answer 22

Shared video memory / memory that was not seated properly.

Question 23

Things to consider when replacing motherboard

Answer 23

• physical size and the power supply supported
• placement of mounting holes and the physical layout of the motherboard
• discern if the motherboard you are replacing has any integrated components eg video adapter, wireless adapter, network interface card.
• either need to ensure that the new motherboard also has the integrated adapters or you will need to purchase separate adapter cards for these functions
• confirm the central processing unit (CPU) socket to ensure that the new motherboard will accept it
• may also require you to install different hardware drivers
• After you physically install a new motherboard, you should install the chipset driver and the hardware drivers.

Question 24

Motherboard form factor largely defines (2 things)

Answer 24

physical size and the power supply supported on a motherboard
* The number of PCI slots and the amount of memory supported on the motherboard are not considered as part of the form factor

Question 25

You purchase a new hard drive and install it in your computer. What should you do first?

Answer 25

If your hard drive is not configured appropriately in the system BIOS, the computer will not recognize the hard drive.
*In most cases, the hard drive settings are automatically configured using CMOS autodetection

You cannot partition or format the hard drive until the hard drive is recognized by the computer’s BIOS program.

Question 26

Power supply problems (doesn’t respond when turned on), Check:

Answer 26

• voltage
• is outlet functional?
• cables?
• motherboard short? (check for improperly seated expansion card, memory stick, CPU, and the like)
• still no = open case, replace power supply

Question 27

virtual memory is an area of the…

Answer 27

hard drive set aside to emulate memory. The operating system creates and manages a paging file (in Windows, it’s called PAGEFILE.SYS)

Question 28

Only fan works - can be power supply or …

Answer 28

a motherboard issue
* the power supply plugs into the motherboard, and several devices don’t have a power cable but power themselves from the motherboard
* different cases have different on/off switches

Question 29

You can test power supply with:

Answer 29

• Power supply tester
• multimeter

Question 30

Steps for blank screen

Answer 30

• monitor power light on
• monitor getting a signal/hibernating (check connections & vid card)
• system POST properly? If yes, try a diff monitor; if no it’s a bigger problem than monitor or video card
• “What is the last thing that worked as it was supposed to?” What did you last see on screen? BIOS? OS not finish loading?

Question 31

An IBM computer is giving one long beep and one short beep when turned on. The computer does not boot up. What should you check?

Answer 31

One long and one short beep indicates a problem with the motherboard.
Replace motherboard = antistatic wrist guard

Question 32

In case of a CPU failure, the computer will not

Answer 32

generate any beep
If you want to test to see if a motherboard is faulty, you should take the hardware down to the bare minimum