My to that wer pc is not working right. A couple of days ago I turned it on and it booted up ok but I could not get the mouse to work. I turned it off waited a bit & when it came back on the computer was "bleeping" & would not boot up at all. Friday I opened it up & cleaned all the dust out etc & had a look around to see anything obvious. Once I powered it back up the bleeping has stopped but all it does is gives me the option to boot into another mode (safe,safe mode with command prompt, last known good configuration) etc, hopefully u get that idea. I am unable to boot into any other mode as it still does not respond to the keyboard or mouse. I am using a real new logichtech/mouse/keyboard, the batteries in both are new & the "base" is plugged in directly into a usb port. I went through all thge cables to check they were good & made sure that the usb was plugged directly in & not through a 4 way adapter. There are 2 green lights on the base that as part of the boot process should come on & sometimes they do, so that tells me its not a connection issue. I have also tries to loiad the software disc for the keyboard etc as well as my windows disc but the pc still does nothing new. Its a homebuilt pc with a p4 processor, has lots of ram, twin hard drives & an external h/d. It runs XP pro, any ideas, thanks!!!

 

Did you recently do an update? It could have corrupted a file. Also depending how old it is the hard drive could be on its way out.

 

no, I did not do any updates, I did try to do a driver update though. The h/d is few years old

 

So you can't select anything to boot into at all? So does it just make you sit at that select screen? Possibly if that driver update was related to usb, the mouse, or keyboard it may not have gone right. If you can I'd test it with a keyboard and mouse that doesn't go through the usb but those other ports on the mobo, they're purple and green iirc. If it works then, boot into last known good config. Test the mouse/keyboard and if they work it could have been the driver update.

 

Disconnect secondaries (hardrives), just keep the boot hd connected. Disconnect all peripherals as well.

Have you tried a direct boot from CD, -force cd boot? If it wouldn't boot from safe mode or known good config, you need a boot CD.

Since it's home-built, do you have a bootable recovery CD ? Not the xp cd, but a tools cd, such as a UBCD4Win (the best one out there). If you don't have one of these for XP, get one, it's free and WILL boot.

 

I tried plugging it into a non USB & it makes no difference . It is a cordless keyboard etc & I do get some lights illuminate during boot up attempts so I don't think the USB is the problem

 

But you can get the key board to work in boot options correct ? Other wise you would not be able to boot into "last know good configuration". Or are you saying that your comp went to the F9 boot options just once,- and now you can't get to the boot options screen ?

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Yea , I was just suggesting to disconnect all non essentials before attempting boot. If you were even referring to my post (?) not sure, you didn't quote anyone..

 

XP pro was one of my fav systems. Sounds like your registry may be infected, which affects your drivers. If it were me, Id use that external and save what I wanted, wipe everything clean and do a fresh install. Then update all drivers.

 

Pressing F9 has no effect nor does pressing ny other buttons, it went today to my pc guy, have not heard back as yet

 

Got it back it was the video card, whats weird is there is some kind of substance on the back of where the heatsink/fan is on the card. My pc guy had never seen anything like it, nothing could be spilt on the case (ie into the pc) because u can't put anything on top of the pc to get tipped over. Will try to post a pic shortly so u can see what I mean. Real weird!!!

 

The beeps you were getting were post beep codes. Depends on how many beeps and if they are short or long ones tells you what the issue is. LIke 8 beeps normally is memory issue. From what you are saying the substance sounds like thermal paste. It helps transfer the heat from the chip on the vidoe card to the heat sync.