[NBLUG/talk] [CPLUG] Weirdness: BIOS POST lockups

Jimson Xu jxu at calpoly.edu
Mon May 21 23:36:26 PDT 2007


Just throwing out crazy ideas since I've never seen this problem 
before...  Could it be faulty RAM?  Since it seems to die around the 
time it starts to check the RAM.  Maybe run a memory test (when your 
computer decides to boot for once) or replacing your RAM modules.

-Jimson

William Tracy wrote:

>(Sorry this email got so long, but I've been fighting this for a while
>without getting a resolution.)
>
>
>Hello,
>
>I've got a weird issue that has me stumped. :-) My computer randomly
>locks up on boot during the POST.
>
>Normally, when I first power on the machine I see a screen from my
>video card's firmware, then the screen for the Award BIOS. It checks
>my CPU and displays the CPU name, then checks the RAM, and I see the
>numbers rapidly count count off the amount of memory, followed by a
>brief pause before my bootloader launches.
>
>However, recently it has started locking up somewhere between the CPU
>detection and RAM detection. When this happens, I see the CPU name
>displayed, but the line where I normally see the memory count is
>completely blank. At the bottom of the screen I can see the notice to
>press delete to enter set up, but the computer doesn't respond to
>this--its completely locked up.
>
>Now, here's where things get really weird. :-)
>
>I first noticed the problem about a month and a half ago. It steadily
>got worse--sometimes I would have to power-cycle the machine half a
>dozen times to get to the bootloader (turn it on, see it lock up,
>power off, ...two ...three ...four, power it up, it locks up, power it
>off, go organize some books, power it up, it locks up...)--until it
>reached the point where I couldn't boot the machine at all. I pulled
>out the power supply (an Antec) and replaced it with a Dynex one. The
>problem magically went away, and I chalked it up to capacitor plague
>in the power supply.
>
>Then, three weeks ago, I left the machine running continuously for a
>week while seeding some torrents. At the end, I powered the machine
>down for the night (I normally turn off my computer at night or when
>I'm at class), and when I powered it up again the POST locked up as I
>described before.
>
>My first guess was that my new power supply was defective, and just
>hadn't failed until I stress tested it. I used the system normally for
>the next week, and found that the POST locked up more or less
>randomly, again as described before.
>
>However, before I returned the Dynex, I opted to test the old Antec
>one more time. Lo and behold, it booted. Again, over the next week, I
>found that it failed randomly on maybe every other boot. When I had
>stopped using it before, it had not been booting at all.
>
>So, now I'm wondering if the problem is really the power supply at
>all. I can't imagine what else it could be, though, unless maybe it's
>something in the motherboard. (I really don't want to replace the
>motherboard!)
>
>So, at this point I'm trolling for ideas. I've run out of keywords to
>throw at Google, and I've resorted to just leaving the machine on all
>the time because I don't know if I'll be able to power it up again.
>I've started panicking every time I think I smell smoke (happened
>twice so far, but it wasn't actually coming from the
>computer--probably from someone's microwave). :-(
>
>Any thoughts?
>
>(Trying to stay on topic, the machine in question *is* running Debian Etch...)
>
>  
>



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