Radical Virus, or?

[Lionheart]

Hey all,


My brother seemed to have had his computer crash. Black screen. Reboot, black screen. Nothing.... The motors run, the lights come on, but nothing on the screen.

I figured it was his MoBo. I got my mothers old computer out and got it going. Did a wipe of her HD and put a fresh XP on it so he would have a computer to work on. I set up a HD jumper through USB to his old HD so his work files would be on it.

He turns it on tonight, and bing.. The keyboard and mouse stop working. Frozen screen. I force a reboot via holding down the case power button. Reboots, black screen. Lights come on, motors running, nothing... You can see the HD light flickering yellow for a bit, then goes silent. I reboot again, turn off the extra HD jumper, nothing....

I havent seen anything like this....

I had figured it was the MoBo having burned out. This thing seems cooked.. But it was just running fine!

What I am thinking is he had a virus in it that went off and did something to his BIOS and shut down the MoBo.

Is there a way to save these 2 computers? Any ideas?


He had left this thing on for perhaps 2 weeks.. I tell him over and over, shut it down when you are not using it. He goes away for the weekend with it running, yahoo IM on, and bing!!! This happens.


I would be interested to hear any ideas. Has anyone heard of this happening before?


Bill

[wiltzei]

I reckon the PSU might be the culprit. Have you connected the extra power connector close to the CPU-socket, in addition to the normal 24-pin ATX connector?

[Lionheart]

But this is two computers in 24 hours doing the exact same thing.

Can one reset a MoBo? Especially if the keyboard is rendered invisible..



Bill

[Gdavis101]

Is it connected to a Backup power unit? There is a jumper on the MOBO to blank the CMOS, remove jumper.. Power on.. Power off.. Set jumper back. Does it beep at all when powering up?

[Lionheart]

Hey Gene,

Nope. No beeps.

I'll look for the jumper. Many thanks for the info.


Bill

[hey_moe]

Bill, first remove all USB devices,including key board and mouse and reboot, if still no screen, hook up only the key board and reboot and hit the F8 key...it should go into safe mode. When you reboot can you get into the BIOS settings at all...if not have you tried a different monitor.

[cheezyflier]

when i saw the title of this thread, it make me think of a book i read recently, about the ebola virus.
scary stuff

[Lionheart]

Bill, first remove all USB devices,including key board and mouse and reboot, if still no screen, hook up only the key board and reboot and hit the F8 key...it should go into safe mode. When you reboot can you get into the BIOS settings at all...if not have you tried a different monitor.


Hey Mike,

I'll give that a try on the USB equipment.

We did swap out monitors also. That wasnt it either. I also took out the graphics card and tried the regular graphics plug. When the second computer got the same thing, I realised it must have been a virus from the original HD which I had linked into the second computer. The second computer was fine till I had linked the second older HD to it. Then it went as well.



Bill

[Lionheart]

Is it connected to a Backup power unit? There is a jumper on the MOBO to blank the CMOS, remove jumper.. Power on.. Power off.. Set jumper back. Does it beep at all when powering up?


Gene,

That didnt work. and no beeps..

[Snuffy]

Did he install any new equipment?

This may be a power supply problem in not being able to provide enough juice to all the components now cuz the new piece likes to gobble up watts. :)

Recommended cure ... buy a bigger power supply. Nothing under 250 ... mebbe 300.

[gigabyte]

Bill, the problem does sound very much like power, it might be strange to have 2 so close together but that is exactaly what a fried PSU will do, did you use the same electrical outlet for both?

Probably the best test you could do is to strip the system down to bare essentials, as in disconnect the HD and all other perferials and see if you can boot with a CD, (I would use Ultimate Boot CD 4 windows) and if that gets you some life then you are looking at one of the connected components, if you can't boot to the CD or the BIOS with the HDD disconnected, and you are getting no POST test beeps it has to be PSU or mother board.

Best of luck...

[Lionheart]

Ok...

Went to BestBuy and the gentleman tested both computers for me. To him it did sound like PSU as well, so he literally hooked one up to one and nope, didnt work. So my theory was right. The motherboards were shot.

Both...

Oddly, the caps of the diodes were all intact and flat. We tried testing the 'reset BIOS' theory, which did nothing. So I have no idea why they went. The GS tech said that it 'could' have been power related spikes from the same plugin.

He tested the HD that I thought had a virus on it. I told him he shouldnt unless its a junk computer. He said their stuff has high securities on them. So he checked it and sure enough, it was all fine. I could swear there is a virus on there, but thats my imagination, lolol.. (conspiracy theories... I guess).




So......... Two fried MoBo's, no reason why. Probably power bar.

He purchased a new Gateway laptop with Win7 64, colored case (top cover), with reddish illuminated keyboard. Nice looking rig. Now he can go mobile and take his biz work with him..

Oh.. I got him a nice, powerful powerbar to plug his stuff into.. Dont want this nightmare happening again.. (2 computers in one day is too toooooo much.. )



Bill

[hey_moe]

Bill I have one question for you. How come you didn't give him your Apple pooter. Now stop being such a puss and get this >> http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/shop_mac/family/mac_pro?mco=MTAyNTQzNDQ and this three of these for FSX >> http://store.apple.com/us/product/M9179LL/A Then you will be happy and set up for a while :jump::ernae:

[Lionheart]

LOLOL....

Oh man.. If I had the money.. Could you imagine such a monster? That would chew up FSX and spit out the CD, sending it to the deserts of New Mexico....

I think they are fading out the 32". A shame. One 32" would be mind blowing.. 3 Would be sensory overload.. My eyes would grow 3 times their size to compensate the data input to the brain....