posted
One of my housemates was complaining that his computer was too slow, so I offered to have a look at it. And it was in that horrible state that people who are silly cause. The systray was full of useless crap, he had a billion things loading up at the start, and it was a horrible swollen mess.
He wouldn't let me do a clean install, so I went through it uninstalling everything useless, as well as getting rid of all the stuff that was loading at startup. I also ran some registry cleaners through it, and some other things. It worked. It loaded up a lot quicker, and things were nice. But he also wanted to put in a large hard drive, so I checked to see if he'd need a BIOS update. Which he did. So I downloaded it, made a boot disk, reset the computer and...nothing. Nothing at all. The hard drive whirs up, the floppy and CD drives light up and go off, but nothing appears on the screen, and there's no bleeping at all.
I checked the CPU by putting it in my computer, and the hard drive, and they both work. But his computer refuses to even POST. I'd think that I'd mucked up the BIOS, but I hadn't even gotten to the stage of flashing it.
Anyone any ideas at all? It's an AWARD Bios for an old Gigabyte 440BX motherboard. Is it likely to be fried?
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
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Cartman
just made by the Presbyterian Church
Member # 256
posted
Flowsheet time!
Seriously. The thing died after a reset? Before you even touched the BIOS? Then you're in luck. Old age probably did it in. Slip away quietly and don't look back.
Registered: Nov 1999
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-------------------- “Those people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do.” — Isaac Asimov Star Trek Minutiae | Memory Alpha
Registered: Nov 2000
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Silly question, but, are all the cables fully contected, I've had some that were rough to plug in and I thought that they were.
-------------------- "You are a terrible human, Ritten." Magnus "Urgh, you are a sick sick person..." Austin Powers A leek too, pretty much a negi.....
Registered: Sep 2000
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posted
Yeah, I checked all the cables and stuff. He's taken it to be repaired, but considering that the repair job is likely to be at least �25 minimum, and that it's only a 350 PII, he's probably going to just replace the motherboard, since the repair shop will stick in a new motherboard, Athalon 1700+ and memory for �150.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Tell him to upgrade to a new graphics card while he's at it. I know I'm pissed off that I can't use my No One Lives Forever 2 since I have integrated graphics in my laptop.
-------------------- "It speaks to some basic human needs: that there is a tomorrow, it's not all going to be over with a big splash and a bomb, that the human race is improving, that we have things to be proud of as humans." -Gene Roddenberry about Star Trek
Registered: May 1999
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posted
Students. Poor. He's going to cope with his TNT2 for a while, and see what his money's like at the end of the term.
I'll probably end up doing the upgrade as well, as I only have a 450 PII.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
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Saltah'na
Chinese Canadian, or 75% Commie Bastard.
Member # 33
posted
There are many better cards out there which are reasonably priced. You could get a Radeon 7500 or a GeForce 4 MX 440 for $50 US nowadays.
Riva Sucks.
-------------------- "And slowly, you come to realize, it's all as it should be, you can only do so much. If you're game enough, you could place your trust in me. For the love of life, there's a tradeoff, we could lose it all but we'll go down fighting...." - David Sylvian FreeSpace 2, the greatest space sim of all time, now remastered!
Registered: Mar 1999
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Charles Capps
We appreciate your concern. It is noted and stupid.
Member # 9
posted
Hell, he'd be better off with a Matrox at this point...
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Yeah, I know it's not much good, but my suggestion to him was that there's not much point forking out for a cheap graphics card when you'll just have to replace it in a year or so. So I suggested waiting a bit and then getting a proper GeForce 4, or whichever of the ATI cards is reasonable priced (the 9200, I think). They're still only �100 or so, and they'll last a lot longer.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
On this topic, does anyone remember the registry alteration you have to do to get the overclocking option to come up on nVidia cards? I vaguely remember it was something involving the word "coolbits", but not much beyond that.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Just get Powerstrip or something. But I hope you aren't planning to overclock the TNT2. Thats a little less than productive.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
No, I wanted it for my only-slightly-less-shit GeForce 2 MX.
And I found out anyway, because I rule.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
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![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
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