BleepingComputer.com: Fan Turns On And Off When I Try To Start Up My Computer

Hello,

I have an hp pavillion a 744 x desktop with windows xp home edition. Last week, I shut it down and left. When I came back several hours later, it was still displaying the "windows is shutting down screen." I held down the power button to shut it off and turned it back on. I then started to notice throughout the week that whenever I tried to restart or shut down my computer, it would freeze when it got to that screen. Sometimes, it also would not boot up. When I try to turn it on, the fan would turn on and off, as if it's struggling to start up. The usual hp logo would appear on the screen and on the bottom it would say to press esc for the boot menu, and a couple other things. Nothing happens when I press any of these keys and the computer won't start up. This happened a couple times and I was able to turn it off by holding the power button down, and then it managed to start up when I turned it on. However, the other day, I installed some updates from microsoft. 'The computer prompted me to restart it so I clicked yes. It froze at the "windows is shutting down screen" so I held down the button to shut it off. Since then, I have not been able to get it to start up again. The fan turns on and off and the screen just displays the hp logo. There was quite a bit of dust in my tower, which I tried to get out with some canned air. It still does not work. Any ideas?

Thanks in advance,
Rango

Of the top of my head I can answer one question. The fan on your computer is designed to operate only when needed, well most HP's are yours may be different. So it will turn on during booting and then turn off and only turn back on when its needed. This helps the computer remain quiet under light loads. Your computer may be overheating but I suspect a windows problem since it gets past the P.O.S.T screen and you mentioned problems with shutting down. You should try a windows repair install here is a tutorial.

Well, actually, what I was trying to say is that now I can't even boot up into windows. It does not get past the very first screen (the one that displays the HP logo. I can't get into the boot menu, recovery console or BIOS or anything. Basically, I can't do anything on the computer.

How well did you clean with the canned air? Try removing the fan from the heatsink and get between the fins real good. Do you even hear a POST beep when you first start the computer?
Mark

After following marks suggestion. If the computer doesn't pass the post test and If you can't get into the bios menu, I would start with the basics. unplug all of the drives from the motherboard, remove all the add-on cards. Leave only the processor and the ram installed, ( according to the system specs your video is on the motherboard) try and boot the system this way and see if you can enter the bios menu. Post back your results and we can go from there.

System specs found on Hp.Com

Come to find out the motherboard is messed up and probably not worth fixing at this point. Thanks both for your help, though.

This post has been edited by RangoTheClown: 21 October 2007 - 05:40 PM

That sucks, if you have any questions on upgrading or choosing a new PC let us know.