HP Pavilion and no POST

[skyblue]

a friend has an HP XL754 Pavilion.
randomly, and they say since it was new, it will fail to boot.

i saw this happen a few times, usually 1 out of 3 times.
shutdown the PC, hit the power button, hard drive light comes on, no POST, no beep codes, no video display, light on monitor remains yellow(indicating no video signal i believe).

HP had a new BIOS that was supposed to fix a "won't boot from standby" problem.. not exactly the problem here, but i upgraded the BIOS with no improvement.

i reseated the powersupply connector, no improvement.

i'm thinking it is a bad power supply... one of the signal leads that is supposed to tell the Mobo to boot is not sending the signal.

any ideas? should i try another power supply and see if that fixes it?

thanks....... eric

 

[nubi]

problem = he bought a hp. lol. thats the only thing i can think i can think of.

 

[skyblue]

yep, HP is a bad choice for a PC, of course so is Compaq, Dell, and all the rest of the propriety designs.

since the POST never shows up, no beeps, and i was able to upgrade the BIOS, i think that rules out:
1. the Windows ME, it hasn't even started to boot yet.
2. the CMOS/BIOS chip since i was able to upgrade it.
3. the BIOS itself, since the POST never starts and i get no error beep codes.
4. the power connection to the MOBO, since i unplugged it and checked all the wires.

that leaves me with the PowerSupply itself or the power switch. i don't see what could go wrong with the power switch and it seems to turn on the power supply ok, the hard disk does its inital spin up... so i'm suspicious of the power supply itself or maybe some chip on the MOBO that is supposed to start the boot.

a new HP powersupply is about $70.. does anyone know if a generic PS will fit? or do i have to buy from HP?

 

[Daveyboy2]

Get rid of the power saving function altogether on the BIOS. Diable it, if you can. If you have ME, get rid of it if you can. Too many problems with ME and power functions. Actually too many ME problems and actually getting it to work.

The best thing to do is to take your power supply to a CompUSA or something like that for comparison. You normally want the same wattage for the power supply, and you can compare it to the standard units there. It depends on the make and model - some have the proprietary design of insanely small power supplies - they can run 50-70 each.



I've got the same problem on my whitebox - if I leave it for more than 24 hours without being tunrned on, the thing won't boot and I have to power cycle it. It's a heck of a lot better than trying to buy a new board, (if it is the board) and all that jazz. I'd rather take an extra 5 seconds and reboot the thing on Monday mornings.... But that' sme and my situation.

 

[ANFPS26]

Try reseating the RAM or move it to another slot. I've seen bad RAM or a bad RAM slot preventing it to post. "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing....."

 

[skyblue]

ok, thanks for all the advice..
the memory is a possibility i guess, since he did add a memory stick right after he bought it, so i'll find out if he thinks that the problem started about the same time as the new memory stick.

 

[WaltS]

I own an HP Pavilion 8860 which is(was?) having the exact same problem. Over the weekend, I picked up a bunch of computer parts from a friend to try to swap out the power supply. His ATX p/s had the on/off switch which HP does not accomodate on the back of the case so it wouldn't fit. While I had my machine apart though, I swapped out the video cards. I put in an ATI Radeon 7500. Also, since I have set the computer back up, I haven't plugged in my USB hub which has my printer, scanner, and zip drive connected to it. It has been booting up consistently since then. I'd be interested to know if it was the USB that was causing the problem.

 

[nightowl17]

My second PC{back up] Had a problem similiar to that.I could only get to the splash screen and it would not go into the OS, Had to go into the BIOS and reset all the defaults and thin it booted fine , Come to findout the MS Optical mouse is not compatable with the HP>