DESPERATE! PC won't go past POST.

[kwhitney]

Hi! I'm desperately hoping someone can help me out. I went over to a lady's house yesterday because after installing XP she couldn't burn cds. She has a Dell Dimension 4100.

There was an error that kept popping up on her on booting XP that said the burner software could cause a system error so it was being disabled (or something similar to that). It suggested installing updated drivers, updating Real Player's Jukebox or updating Windows Media Player. I searched and didn't find any burning software on the machine so I removed Media Player and the error was still there. I found a driver from the burner manufacturer and installed that instead of the one XP installed. I installed Roxio Easy CD Burner for XP and restarted as called for but then the system wouldn't start. It was stuck on the www.dell.com logo screen. I restarted and tried F8 to get into Safe Mode and nothing. I still got the Dell logo screen. I restarted and hit Delete to enter Setup. It says "Entering Setup" but just hangs there. I've removed the battery to reset cmos nothing. I've left it out for an hour even. I used the jumper setting called for to put the BIOS in maintence mode and nothing. It starts like it's going to go into setup, but just hangs. Once it starts to hang, I notice I loose the keyboard...the NUM Lock light goes out. I'm stumped at what to do from here. Her daughter is a full-time college student and needs it by Monday for her summer online classes. I can't think of a single thing to do. HELP!!!

Thanks!

[kwhitney]

I wanted to add that I removed the memory and booted to see if I would get any beeps to indicate if the MB was bad. There were beeps telling me no RAM was installed so that led me to think it wasn't the MB.

[kwhitney]

UPDATE!

I found a thread online somewhere that suggested removing all the components and adding them back one by one starting with the memory. I did that and it worked. YEE HAW!! The DVD Rom was the culprit. I don't know how and I don't know why. I just swapped it out with an equivalent DVD Rom and she's good to go.

Happy July 4th!

[anton muzic]

Hi,
good onya!!
I was wondering if you would not mind sharing that thread?
:p

thankss
anton

[pop pop]

I couldn't find the actual thread but way way back, I did copy the important part of the post. Here it is:

Initial Start Up – Minimal Componets

Check to make sure the case speaker is properly installed and working (try it on another computer or use another computer's case speaker to be sure). Then with only the mobo, PSU, CPU, and case speaker, apply power. If you don't hear any beeps, then either your CPU or mobo is bad. Or perhaps both, but that's rare.

If you do hear the standard "no RAM" continuous beep, add a stick of RAM.

At this point, the beep code should change to the "no video adapter" beep code (which is different, consult your mobo manual). If you don't hear the proper beep code, your RAM is bad. Try the other one, repeat.

If you do hear the "no video adapter" beep code, add the video card.

Now you should be able to see things on the monitor, and you can get into the BIOS and mess around. If not, your video card is bad.

Add more components, one at a time, and see how far you can get. If it makes it all the way, good! If not, keep track of which component you add each time, and the last one you added that made your system fail to POST is the culprit. Add more components after your video card like this: other stick of RAM (if the first one was good), floppy drive (if you have one), hard drive, optical drive.

[Sylvander]

Download a copy of my diagnostic flowcharts from here
www.erniek.eclipse.co.uk/downloads/sylvanderdiags.zip
and print them to leaf through.
Begin on the STARTUP chart.

Have you tried hitting "Esc" to see what's behind the Dell Logo splash-screen?
You should see a display by the BIOS of the results of its tests on the system, and how far it gets.
How far does it get in the following?

A typical and successful startup sequence
1. Start of Boot Troubleshooting Walkthrough
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/index.htm
2. Yes: The system power supply is functioning
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/power1.htm
3. Yes: Something is being written to the screen during boot up [This may be only a flashing cursor]
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/video1.htm
4. The video BIOS message is displayed on the screen for a few seconds and then clears from the screen, or more messages display under it
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/vbios1.htm
5. Yes: The system BIOS startup screen is appearing
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/bios1.htm
6. The memory test completes successfully
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/ram1.htm
7. The BIOS accesses the floppy drives and the boot continues
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/seek1.htm
8. The system is able to autodetect IDE devices successfully
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/auto1.htm
9. The system is not Plug and Play compatible, has no Plug and Play devices, or has PnP devices but identifies them properly
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/pnp1.htm
10. Boot sequence is A: before C: (floppy disk first)
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/seqAC.htm
11. The floppy disk makes a noise and the light comes on
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/fd1.htm
12. The floppy disk light goes off and the hard disk light comes on as it starts booting
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/fd1hdd.htm
13. The hard disk boot process will continue here, if you want to follow it.
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/hd1.htm
14. The system continues booting from the hard disk and the message "Starting MS-DOS" or "Starting Windows 95" is displayed
http://www.pcguide.com/ts/x/boot/walk/hd1os.htm
15. Operating System Loaded From Hard Disk. The system has found a boot sector on the hard disk and is now starting the load of the operating system. The hard disk is working. You have successfully completed the hardware part of the boot process. Any problems encountered after this point should be diagnosed by looking for a more specific problem with a component, or under the section that contains run-time error messages.

Your description suggested it should be a software problem and yet it's not getting to the point where the BIOS hands over to DOS and booting Windows.
It seems to be freezing during the POST [not completing POST].

Just noticed you fixed it somwhere about the middle of this thread. :confused: