[clue] [hardware] Erratic boot behavior

[chris fedde]

Try a new power supply.  If that does not solve it then you're pretty
much on target for a new system,  If you have to go for a new
motherboard/cpu/ram you'll need a new power supply anyway.

JMHO
chris

On Thu, Jul 7, 2011 at 3:23 PM, Matt Gushee <matt at gushee.net> wrote:
> Hi all--
>
> Hope everybody is well!
>
> I am having an issue with my desktop Linux box--though I think it is
> really strictly a hardware or firmware problem. Anyway, before I go out
> and spend a bunch of money based on my guesses, I thought I'd check with
> you knowledgeable folks and see if anyone has encountered this before.
>
> First of all, the computer in question is, hmm, less than
> top-of-the-line. And it's quite old. The case is a Gateway mid-tower
> that I bought used about 7 years ago, and I think it was made in about
> 1998. AFAIK the power supply is original equipment. The motherboard is
> an ECS model that I got for cheap (closeout, I think) at MicroCenter.
> Cheap, but the reviews I read said it was good for the money. AMD Athlon
> 1.8Gig CPU, SiS chipset (forget the model #). So maybe it's time to
> upgrade anyway. But if there's reason to believe that the problem is
> something else, then I'd like to take care of that something else first.
>
> So anyway: the machine is now having serious trouble booting up after
> being powered off. This started a long time ago, but it was just a mild
> nuisance at first, gradually developing into a major problem. The
> behavior has also been very inconsistent: sometimes the system will boot
> on the first try. But when it doesn't, here's how it goes, more or less:
>
>  * I hit the power button.
>
>  * LEDs light up on the front of the case. The power-on LED will be
>  steadily lit, and the CD-RW drive LED
>   starts to flicker, as does the hard drive LED. Sometimes the DVD-RW
>   drive LED will start to flash
>   and/or there will be disk-spinning noises. These are good signs,
>   usually predicting a successful
>   bootup.
>
>  * Usually, the ViewSonic parrots appear at the upper left of the
>  monitor, then disappear--followed by
>   the words "No Signal" at the center of the monitor.
>
>  * Sometimes the keyboard LEDs flash. That's also a good sign.
>
>  * After a period of time (maybe 10 seconds, maybe 5 minutes), the POST
>  screen appears. Then, if I'm
>   lucky, the 2 hard drives are listed on screen. Often, the POST screen
>   will just flash on and off,
>   and it all starts again. The general trend is that it is taking
>   longer to get to the POST screen,
>   and it flashes on and off more times before a successful boot.
>   Sometimes it won't POST at all. In
>   those cases the CD-RW LED and the hard drive LED just keep steadily
>   flickering, there are no sounds
>   of moving parts, and pressing and holding the power switch fails to
>   turn the machine off. So my only
>   recourse is to cut off the power by switching off the power strip or
>   pulling the plug (yikes!).
>
> Now, a couple of facts that seems significant here are that (a) once
> Linux is booted, the system runs very reliably, with no random failures;
> and (b) as far as I can remember the system has never failed to boot
> once the hard drives are detected. At least, I am assuming that when the
> POST screen displays the hard drive info, that means that the drives
> have just been detected. If that is the case, it seems likely that the
> problem has nothing whatever to do with the OS.
>
> BTW, In case it matters, I have upgraded the primary hard drive at least
> once, probably twice, or maybe even thrice. As far as I can remember
> those upgrades had no effect on this problem.
>
> So, anybody have an idea about this? Any clues greatly appreciated.
>
> --
> Matt Gushee
> matt at gushee.net
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