Weird Power Problem

Sort of an odd one....

When the PC booted it was going to the safe mode selection screen. Any option at all would start to engage and then the screen would go black, but the power light would still be on, and the fans running. I swapped power cords and monitors without any change. After the screen would go dark the CD ROM drive drawer would not open, almost like it wasn't getting any power, but as I said, the fans and power lights were still functioning.

After holding down the power button until it turned off and then restarting, I could easily open the CD drawer, and I put my XP CD in, and restarted again. I went to the bios screen and checked the boot sequence, and then just let it there. It never went dark. An hour later I continued, pressed any key to boot from CD and then hit 'R' fro repair. When it got to the screen where it said it was loading windows, it again went dark.

Doing it a second time, it went past the loading windows screen, I entered a '1' for the installation I wanted to repair, entered the administration password (actually, I just pressed enter) , and got to the DOS screen. I ran chkdsk /r. I t indicated that it had repaired some sectors. I exited, DID NOT press a key to boot from CD, and the machine booted normally to the desktop. I ran Malwarebytes, corrected 28 errors, and then allowed MWB to reboot the PC.
Once again I did not hit a key to boot from CD, but shortly after the splash screen, right before the welcome, the screen went dark. And stayed dark. Just as it did before.

I now started it again with the CD, and again got to the DOS screen with its limited command functions. I let it sit there for 8 hours. No dark screen.
I again, typed in exit, and allowed the PC to boot normally, and it got to the desktop. But after about 3 minutes it went dark. When it goes dark it doesn't just gradually fade to black. It goes to black like a switch was just turned off, and makes an almost inaudible 'pop'.

I have started it with last good configuration, VGA mode, and even directory services restore. They all seem to go just so far, and then there's the almost inaudible pop, and the screen goes dark.

Since there was a problem with the date/time, I installed a new CMOS battery, and entered the correct setting in the setup. No difference.

During the time when I've been able to access the PC (before going dark), I checked out the system event viewer. Nothing....

I've toggled through the BIOS screens, and have loaded the defaults. In fact I've left the PC on one of the BIOS screens for hours without it going dark. Then I hit F10 to save and exit, hear the pop and there's the darkness.

 

Don't think its a XP issue. Seems more like a hardware issue most probably with power supply. Can you switch your power supply with one of your friend's to see how it goes ?

 

Hi and welcome to the WindowsBBS community.

Once you get bad sectors on the HDD, consider that it is failing. CHHDSK will try to move the data to a good sector, but some of the data might have been lost. Damage to the disk surface is irreversible, CHKDSK can mark the sectors as bad, but they cannot be repaired.

Have you tried a repair reinstallation of Windows? It is after you accept the Eula (by pressing F8). If I was to make a guess, I would say the files that run the graphics are damaged. Once the screen goes black, the system has crashed, that's why the DVD drive won't open.

A power problem sounds just as plausible to me, especially from the "pops ", but if you have bad sectors, the HDD is damaged.

Matt