Problem with PC booting up

Hi, I just got a pc from a friend. I built him a new system so he gave me his old one. First off here's the problem:

The pc will cut on and both the motherboard fan and the power supply fan will come on but the machine will not boot up. I changed the hardrive, checked all my connections and cleaned it up a bit but no results.

The inside was very nasty and dusty (smokers PC) So I cleaned it up very good. Here is the specs on it:

Pentium 3 1.0 ghz
512 sdram2x256
20 gig hd

any suggestions?



thanks

 

Actually replaced the ide cables, cant get to bios, doesn't boot up or even come on. Processor temp is about 72 degrees, pulled out ram and placed back in, I guess I can dig up an old stick of 128 and see.

 

72 degrees...celcius?

That sounds pretty toasty.

 

i had a very similar problem with my p3 sony vaio; it would boot up and last about 10minutes...then shut down alone... apon inspection the thermal paste was completly broken down and the heatsink was separated from the actuall processor....

 

How are you getting a temp reading if you can't even get into BIOS?


Try removing/disconnecting everything but the CPU, 1 stick of RAM and video card (and PSU of course). No hard drive or CD, no PCI cards. Then try the other stick of RAM.

Any video on screen?
Can you get into BIOS then?
Do you get any beeps?

 

lol...72 degrees farinhieght. just going by my thermostat in my house since I cant get it to do anything...lol

 

ok, so at this point you're to tearing the whole machine down to find the problem. Disconnect all the drives from the mainboard, pull out all of the cards, pull the CPU from the mainboard.
Put the CPU back in the mainboard, reapply the thermal paste after you scrape off the thermal pad. Put just the video card and memory back in the mainboard and try to get it to post. If it posts then it's a peripheral card, if it doesn't then get out a multimeter and verify that the PSU is putting out the right voltages. If the PSU checks out then you're down to Mainboard, video card, ram and CPU. Pull the video card, power it up again and listen for beeps. If it beeps then it's probably the video card, if not proceed to remove the ram and power it up. If it beeps now then it's probably the ram. If it still doesn't give you any post code then you're down to mainboard and CPU, if you have another socket 370 mainboard to test the CPU in then do it, if not, you'll have to take a guess as to whether it's the mainboard or the CPU. 85% of the time it's the mainboard and that's what I would replace first.

 

i'm thinking its either the mobo or the ram...all I could find was ddr and it will not work on this mobo. Video card and drives are good I tested on another machine. Looks like I got a weekend project ahead of me.


Thanks