I've been having issues with my desktop PC that have been getting progressively worse. It started when my computer would freeze on me. When I attempted to reboot, my system would begin to beep and display this error message:
[b]Award BootBlock BIOS v1.0
BIOS ROM Checksum error
detecting IDE ATAPI device...
detecting CD ROM, attempting to boot from it... Fail
detecting floppy drive A media...
drive A error. system halt[/b]
And that's it. I couldn't access BIOS from there, or do anything. There was only that error message, and all I could do was reset the machine. Occasionally, the computer would actually start to boot, but would only do so for a few seconds before freezing.
This happened for a while. Now, whenever I try to run the machine, instead of the error message I get literally nothing. The computer is on, the fans are spinning, but the hard drive isn't making noise and no output is going to the monitor. It's essentially bricked.
Things I have tried:
-Replacing the CMOS battery on the motherboard
-Placing support CD that came with motherboard in CD drive (it won't read it)
Is the problem with the BIOS? The motherboard? The power supply? And is there any hope for my computer? Any help is greatly appreciated.
The Award BootBlock BIOS means one of two things and both aren't good.
1) The RAM in the system is so bad that it's corrupting stored BIOS information at boot, causing the boot process to fail.
2) The BIOS image in the EEPROM on the motherboard is corrupted.
For the first option, take all RAM out of the system and put in one stick of known good working RAM. If you don't have any available, pull out all RAM sticks and put one in at a time and see if the system boots. I have a feeling it may be bad RAM since the problem was intermittent at first and progressively got worse. BIOS corruption wouldn't let the machine work period.
For the second option, your options are very limited. The tiny area where the Award BootBlock BIOS is stored only has drivers for floppy and basic IDE booting. If you have neither a floppy drive or a IDE controller (SATA isn't supported) you're stuck. If changing the RAM doesn't help, I'll get back to you for help with trying to re-flash the BIOS.
I tried switching around the RAM sticks, and it turns out one of them was the culprit. With only one RAM stick in there I can get to BIOS and Windows is booting.
Unfortunately it's running slow as molasses (it takes ~10 minutes for Windows to load, the mouse is laggy, the task manager says the CPU is running at ~50% when it is idle). I'm not sure if this is caused by the new CMOS battery I put in or something else, but at least it's booting.
It still has problems, but I'm a hell of a lot closer to where I was before. Thanks dude!
Windows is going to load much slower due to the lack of RAM. As for the CPU usage, you can search the process list for the process that's using so much CPU time, which is most likely some sort of virus.
For the RAM, if you have a reputable brand of memory like Kingston, Crucial, Corsair, G.Skill, OCZ, etc. they have lifetime warranties on the memory sticks so you can RMA the bad ones for replacements. I'd recommend running memtest ([url]www.memtest.org[/url]) on each stick of RAM (bar the one that makes the computer fail to boot, you know its bad) to see which sticks are bad. If all sticks are the same, i'd recommend RMAing all of them at the same time because the manufacturer often replaces bad memory with a slightly different model that has different voltage requirements or CAS latencies.
I don't think it's the amount of RAM that's causing slowdowns; it still has 2GB of RAM in it (it was a 1GB stick that was bad), and I'm getting slow, skipping sound in addition to the general slowness. And in system properties it reads the computer as having 2.0 GB of memory, so as far as I can tell the RAM that's in there is working. I also didn't see any suspicious or overly taxing programs in the process list.
Sounds like the 2 GB stick might be bad too, or you're having other hardware failure. I'd check the hard drive S.M.A.R.T. data with HD Tune. I'd also check the motherboard and power supply for leaking/blown capacitors.
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