Trouble-shooting 5.2 mboards, CPU, RAM & power Flashcards
power light on your monitor doesn’t turn on (3 things)
monitor itself, the power cord, or your power source
grinding noise (3 things)
Things that move:
hard drives have motors that spin, platters have crashed
Power supply fans needs cleaning (whining)
Optical drives spin the discs
Fan louder & quieter
Speed changing due to failing power supplies
fingernails on a chalkboard (2 things)
heads in a mechanical hard drive have crashed into the platter
Or
power supply fan’s motor binding up
rhythmic ticking sound is also likely to be caused by
mechanical hard drive
So what do you do if you hear a terrible noise from the computer?
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.
two common ways to reduce heat-related problems in computers:
heat sinks and cooling systems, such as case fans
chip creep
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.
intermittent shutdowns
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.
Overclocking
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
burning smell or smoke
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.
In situations in which the power light doesn’t come on and the device has no power, always obey the first rule of troubleshooting:
check your connections first
BIOS/UEFI
interface (firmware) between the computer’s hardware and any operating system installed on that hardware - controls the boot process: power-on self-test (POST).
Flashing the BIOS
Updating it so it can support newer installations eg virtualisation
CMOS battery
If this battery fails, the BIOS won’t retain its settings eg date & time, hard drive settings.
POST
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.
POST card
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
black screen
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
Capacitor swelling (distended)
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
Memory issues can cause a fatal error in your operating system, producing proprietary crash screens such as
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
Sluggish performance can be caused by a variety of different issues ….
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
What would cause the reported memory to be lower than the actual physical memory?
Shared video memory / memory that was not seated properly.
Things to consider when replacing motherboard
- 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.
Motherboard form factor largely defines (2 things)
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
You purchase a new hard drive and install it in your computer. What should you do first?
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.
Power supply problems (doesn’t respond when turned on), Check:
- 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
virtual memory is an area of the…
hard drive set aside to emulate memory. The operating system creates and manages a paging file (in Windows, it’s called PAGEFILE.SYS)
Only fan works - can be power supply or …
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
You can test power supply with:
- Power supply tester
- multimeter
Steps for blank screen
- 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?
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?
One long and one short beep indicates a problem with the motherboard.
Replace motherboard = antistatic wrist guard
In case of a CPU failure, the computer will not
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
