Increased Display rez then CPU/Monitor Not Work?

Yes, the fact that it started when you moved it seems to point to things like the reseating of cables or the change in it's enviroment (maybe a possibility from what sparrow is saying: the PSU cannot dissipate it's own heated air and it alone may be getting heat stressed).

If the hardware manufacturers have seen this problem and solved it, you may get a direct solution, otherwise you should try and rule out all the basics, like connections, dust and air flows. You can then say "yes, it is component problem" and troubleshoot from there.

These machines do some very wierd things sometimes (probably because so many parts interract with others).

It may have even been a "glitch" and may never occur again (hope so).

Matt

 

If it hasn't been done yet, grab a new battery for it.

Matt

 

Check it out!

RexB,

I'm sure you can recall the appearance of your mobo. I count a dozen or more chips the temperatures of which aren't measured, and I think one or more could easily be hot without heating the whole computer. You might run the machine for a while and carefully touch each chip to see how hot it is.

My next suggestion, if your problem recurs, is to replace the power supply, also not based on proveable facts, but it's not very expensive, and an itermittant power supply could cause an intermittant led and failure to boot. There isn't any good test of a power supply either in my opinion.

 

Sparrow, patronizing generalities are not helpful. Nor is a link to the mobo photo saying there's a dozen chips that could be a problem. No Kidding.

Don't be generous spending my money to replace a two year-old Athlon approved PSU that has not shown a problem. The computer has been running fine again for 3 days and several shutdowns/powerups to test its functionality.

The heat fixation is a flogged horse not borne out by fact here.
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Thanks mattman, the real-life results supported the fix as the reseating of cables/components when it was moved, opened and closed. Now they've been cleaned and reseated.

As usual, the PSU fan exhausts its heat directly out of the case. My shin and forearm are next to the open bay; it will take heat exceeding 60C (140F!) to harm/jitterbug these components, very easy to feel coming out of this well ventilated case.

The CMOS battery is about 2 years old, good for a couple more.
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Finally, it's been nice hearing from the helpful contributors to my thread. But- the useless repetition of baseless remedies is wasted bandwidth, and circular reasoning without absorbing the information in previous posts is annoying. If you've something meaningful to add, go for it.

 

flog a dead thread?

RexB,

I think you have done the right things installing the new fan and following all mattman’s advice. I would really like to make an effort to answer your complaints and questions.

“Specifics, as in facts, please.â€

You’re miffed, and I did not mean to put you down. You and I go back to the days of vacuum tubes. In those days, troubleshooting (TS) was straightforward, testing individual components. It’s hard to get any facts. It used to be that we could replace a chip to test whether it’s faulty, but now-a-days one has to replace a board at a time, and sometimes a motherboard! We now live in a throwaway economy, as you’re well aware. It’s a lot of guesswork.

“The heat fixation is a flogged horse not borne out by fact here.â€

You’ve seen that we try to start simply and inexpensively here, and work up, and what is easier, and cheaper than cooling, especially if the story suggests a cooling problem, as I think yours did? Of course, experience helps; I studied electronics and computer science at our local U. and I’ve built and repaired computers as a hobby for almost 20 years, and before that, radios. I tell my friends to experiment with their computers (customize them), and tell them I will get them going again if necessary. So far (knocking wood atop neck) I have 100% success. It’s a lot easier than trying to do the same remotely as we do here. There’s no substitute for ‘hands on’.

Here, we seldom get the whole story, and that makes diagnosis difficult. For example:
â€This SysteMax 'puter/mobo/HDD & monitor are 3 yrs old, and{edit} 400w PSU†is “<2 yrs old.â€
I’d like to know the reason for the new psu. There could be a connection, so please post a reply, at least for general interest.

“The blinking power light at startup, about every second, {was} the CPU case front panel power-button.â€
If it happens again, I still think the psu is suspect if XP and BIOS power settings can be ruled out (mattman’s suggestion). It isn’t necessarily related to overheating, just ageing components. I know of no chip on the mobo that will do that. As you know, it costs less to buy a psu than to have an old one repaired, so I just replace. I have several on hand for testing and replacement; it’s a fairly common problem as computers age. Like yours, my box is on the second psu in 3-4 years (can’t recall which). I’m putting in an UPS now (again; had one for years ‘till it died). That’s another thought for you, especially if your mains voltage varies.

“I've got a volt-ohm-amp meter and some electro-mechanical knowledge after 50 years, what should I be checking?â€
In my opinion, nothing, unless you’re qualified to test your mains voltage when things are acting up; I have put my meters and oscilloscope in mothballs; I haven’t found a need for them around computers for years.

Because the computer is running now without a glitch, I don’t think further TS is called for. Just run the computer normally for now. That’s TS too.

 

You da' Man, mattman. A coupla' days ago Windows sent me a message went something like this "The system has stopped responding during Hibernation several times. Do you want to disable the Hibernation feature? "
Yes,Yes,Yes disable it. sheesh.

I googled for a cause of this failure, a link took me to the Norton/Symantec/whoeverownsitnow site: their KB said that one of their virus updates corrupted the Hibernate feature on some machines, and they had not yet developed a fix.

Well I don't know exactly what they were talking about, no details.

Maybe send a warning out with that update! It didn't affect the Win98 machine like that, so lucky it was just a 50 per-center.

Thanks for the h'ep guyz.

 

I steer clear of "hibernation" (and Standby) settings because they seem to be aimed at power saving for laptops.

Maybe(?) trying to tell the monitor to go into (the wrong) hibernation threw your monitor into confusion (why it gave you the "settings" screen) and the system could not reset until you moved it. A lot of if's.

"You da' Man "... I've been following hardware problems for 10 years and might(?) be "da' Male Adolescent" . I get a lot from the guys that answer on the forums here, giving their time and experience. Maybe I can pass on something of what I have learned.

Matt

 

Save electricity and money with hibernate or supsend, whether it's a battery or our power grid. Athlon T-Bird 1.4 power cost at AMD's spec 'typical' 65W consumption- doesn't include peripherals:
24hrs x 365days x 65W per hour x 7 cents KWH= $398.58.. Use Hibernate or Suspend 12 hours a day, save ~$200.00. Don't live on the machine, though sometimes my butt gets sore sitting here at the keyboard.

Used the hibernate mode with Windows. Nothing 'wrong' or thrown into confusion. It's not up to a 3rd party anti-virus update to ***** up an OS function.

That's pretty nice, you help a lot, but don't change your sig to mattkid!

Thanks for the efforts.