computer will not boot, tried everything

ok here is the story

HP SR1500NX

someone jammed the keyboard and mouse into the ports breaking off all the pins inside the orgional motherboard... customer opted to replace.

go to the local computer shop, buy a replacement motherboard. ASrock... my friend down there explained it as an off brand ASUS.

replaced the motherboard, added a chip of ram.

the board will boot to the point where it loads an operating system.. then it stops... but it doesnt freeze because control alt delete still reboots.

try the IDE... dont even get the win xp splash... try xp install... says "inspecting hardware configuration" and then the screen goes black but no loss of video signal

checked all ide cables, checked ram, checked jumper settings, removed cmos battery and flashed it, removed all extra devices so only hard drive, cpu, ram, and onboard video were in use... still no boot

tried a different hard drive, no boot, tried usb and network boot... no good.

do you think it could be either
A> lack of power *250watt psu*
B>bad motherboard although its new

i called the place i bought it, i should be able to replace it no problem.

has anyone ran into this before??

perhaps HP has something blocking it?.. but i dont know where they would

Hi hexadecimal

A couple of interesting bits of information you left out (don't worry mate, everyone does :D )

1. Do you get any BIOS beeps?, if so, how many?
2. What lights flicker when you boot, and which ones remain on?

My first move would be to check that the RAM you transferred from the old machine is supported by the new MoBo.

I would test the board with just the new RAM (assuming it is enough to load XP) and with just the old RAM.

If you get to loading the operating system, then I would say that the box had booted. The fact that you can do a warm reboot would seem to confirm this?

That leaves me thinking that the operating system is failing to kick in for some reason.

Now, with the DRM on Windows XP it will want to check the hardware to create a reference for the box. That means that you have to reinstall Windows XP. If you did this from a retail or retail OEM CD, I would not expect a problem.

With the "Brand Name OEMs" you don't quite get the full product, so I would suspect (as I think you do) that there may be a problem with the HP version of the reinstallation disk/partition.

Possibly it cannot recognise the hardware and stalls there?

The OEMs have supported MS because they have no choice, and because they WANT to , you see, it stops guys like ourselves doing the work, and forces people to go back to the OEM and pay their exorbitant prices :mad:

Please respond to my questions and send me a PM, so that we can keep the thread size down ;)

Cheers,

Johnno

First of all, I don't see the need to keep the thread size down... :confused:...

Now onto your problem, the first thing that came to mind was the ram since you said you added a stick... Follow Nihil's advice on this...

Quote:

---

do you think it could be either
A> lack of power *250watt psu*
B>bad motherboard although its new

---

A - You failed to mention the important info, like CPU and video card :p, but I doubt it's a PSU issue...

B - I doubt the mobo is bad but I am extremely against buying no name hardware brands, especially mobo's...

Then we have the obvious windows DRM issue...

Let's do one thing at a time though and check ram according to nihil's instructions, to get the hardware aspect out of the way...

**Edit**
Instead of replacing the whole mobo I would have recommended the client to buy a USB keyboard and mouse... Assuming that the mobo has USB ports...

i told them about the usb keyboard option when i diagnosed the problem... they opted with the motherboard... the old one was pretty shitty as it was... not only did the person screw up both ps/2 the board around the ports was cracked...

replace was the better option and they had no objection

So... Did you try using the old ram and new ram by themselves?

not yet, im not at home

i cant use the old ram, the old ram is 3200 and the new board supports 2700 max

ASrock K7S41GX

fully compatiable with that processor, sempron 3000+ socket A out of the box

Pull out everything you can, and try to boot it, then add one peripheral at a time and see how it behaves. If that fails, you have a problem with one of the 4 main parts....MB/CPU/VB/RAM....

done that.

the only thing i havent tested yet is the ram. plan on doing that in afew min...


when ever it trys to load an operating system it fails... POST no problems, bios doesnt freeze
sees all the hardware when i have it installed. but if it goes into any software apps, it will just stop

3 finger salute works... this is exactly what it will say



looking for boot record on cdrom... found one
booting from cdrom... ok
[nothing]

looking for boot record from IDE0... found one
booting from IDE0...ok
[nothing]

Try booting from a bootable CD, if that works then it's most likely a windows DRM issue...

memtest x86 :) google it, it'll confirm your ram

I think that we need to eliminate the RAM issue. TheDuck has a good idea as well, I use an Ubuntu CD as a test.

Also, set the BIOS to boot Floppy, CD, HDD and turn off all the power saving, snooze and screensavers.

The PSU is on the low side, but the symptoms don't really match that sort of issue..............I would expect you to get a little bit further.

I have used ASRock MoBos with no problems in the past. In fact I have a K7VM2 and a 2400+ Athlon about 3 feet from me right now :D They are the "economy" version of ASUS and belong to the same company.

It is possible to get a defective MoBo out of the box. I have never had this happen to me, but my mate has had three this year....................confirmed by the supplier.

Good luck

:)

Noia has a good suggestion. I keep it on a bootable floppy (several!)

I have it in my bookmarks: http://www.memtest86.com/

WARNING: it does take a while to run :)

have a copy of memtest on usb drive, floppy, and cd

have knx-std, multiple other bootable distros used for recovery etc...

it was the ram guys. my stick was bad... it was preventing ANY software boot from cd, floppy, usb, network, or harddrive.

took a stick out of my current box... threw it in there... tada!!


thanks for your help.