Always have difficulty starting my pc, only gets to the BIOS screen with the version No. and hangs there. It does start sometimes after a few minutes, it will also start after I reboot it a few times but it's getting to be very annoying to say the least. I removed the battery for a few minutes but that didn't make any difference, can someone please help.

Asus P5N32-SLI
Win XP PRO
2x1 GB OCZ Golds

I can try.

In BIOS what is your boot sequence, perhaps listed under "advanced settings"?

(usually three boot devices ... a first, second & third)

When it is successful at booting,
does windows message anything about "scanning due to improper shutdown'?

Have you tried booting into safe mode?

You say "always difficulty".
This a brand new PC thats never booted right?
"New to you" one that you've never seen boot right?
Been doing this how long?

Here's a blurb on reseating a video card, do this to all your plug in cards and to the RAM sticks and see if that helps:

If you have a plug-in video card (aka Display/Graphics adaptor or GPU) then here is a step by step to reseat it:

• Shutdown and switch off but do not remove the power cord.
• Take off the cover.
• Hold on to a metal part of the case now and as often as you can during the entire process.
• Pull out the power cord.
• Undo the screw holding the video card in place and unplug any cables going to the card.
• Unplug the card by pulling firmly upward. There may be a latch at the back of the card, press down on this to help eject it.
• If there is a lot of dust around use a can of compressed air to blow out the card slot.
• If the edge connectors of the card look tarnished clean them lightly with a pencil erasor.
• Firmly plug the card back in and secure it with the screw.
• Put the case cover back on.
• Check in the end of the monitor cable that there are no broken or bent pins (some pins are missing - that is normal).
• Connect the monitor cable, turn the securing screws finger tight only, reconnect the power cable, switch the monitor on and reboot.

Hi phawgg,

Boot seq. Floppy - CD - HDD. No Windows message.

Had this PC from new last Nov. worked with no problems until about 3 weeks ago when this started.


Hi Rimmer,

Will reseat the vid card when I get a few minutes tomorrow and let you know.

Did you add any hardware or software just before the problem started?

Try one of these free, floppy-based memory testers:

http://www.simmtester.com/page/products/doc/download.asp
http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp
http://www.memtest.org/
http://www.memtest86.com/

Run for at least 2 hours (overnight is best) - any errors means bad RAM, and you can stop the test then.