Trouble with Rebooting and F Keys Not Working

I am currently using an Acer Aspire 5050 XP SP3 and after having a power failure do to Irene my computer is behaving oddly. I do have a heavy duty surge protector that all my electronics get plugged into but I will let one of the experts tell me if you think that is the cause of my grief.

Here is what has been happening. When I returned home from dropping my daughter off to college and being away during the hurricane, my hubby told me we had had about a 24 hr power outage. I turned on my computer and it booted up fine but my external HD would not mount. I was troubleshooting that issue and doing reboot after reboot and suddenly my computer would only boot to a white screen with ACER on it and in the far left corner it said Press F2 to go to setup. I pressed F2 and changed the config of what I wanted to boot from, from CD to HD. Computer booted up fine. I continued working on external HD and did another reboot, same white screen but now pressing F2 just changed the "Press F2..." message to a "Please wait..." so I waited and folded a load of laundry when I came back nothing had changed.

Next I did another reboot while pressing F8. Blue instruction screen came up and I chose to boot up in the last good configuration and bingo I was up and running. But I still wanted my external HD to mount so I fiddle some more with that and then did another reboot and YUP you guessed it, now pressing the F8 key yielded no results except the white screen with the Acer Logo on it.

I did a reboot and this time I used the F12 button and the machine just booted up and has been running fine. I ran CCleaner, MalBytes and SpyBot on it and found nothing alarming. I am really perplexed as to what could be causing me to a) have difficulties booting up b) why I am losing the ability to use my F keys. If anyone has any suggestions, I am willing to try them.

Thanks for your time, expertise and patience in reading through my description of my prblem. Brenda:cool

 

The first thing to check is being sure all USB drives are disconnected (and, if the PC has a memory card reader, all memory cards are removed) before starting the PC. In some cases, the PC may be trying to boot from these devices first, causing the PC to freeze up.

If the PC still freezes at start-up, try to access the setup (BIOS) menu (the initial screen should tell you which button to push - "DEL" or one of the "F" keys to get into it). As soon as you turn on the PC, start tapping this key immediately before the PC attempts to access the hard drive to load Windows.

If you can get into the setup screen but still have startup issues, my guess is your internal hard drive has tanked. If so, you'll need to purchase a new one and reinstall Windows.

If you cannot access the BIOS/setup screen at startup, I suspect it's an internal problem with the motherboard. If this is the case, I'd give the PC its last rites and start shopping for a new one.

Hope this helps.

 

Thanks for the info. I will try all of the F keys and the del key to see if I can get into the Bios. And I will make sure all USB drives/devices are unattached. I know as of right now both F2 and F8 are toast but F12 still seems to allow me to boot up.

I was afraid it was something major, actually hoping it was since I want a Mac!

In your opinion should I try to upgrade the Bios or is it not worth the effort?
I figure if this thing is on it's last legs I might as well use it to experiment on and maybe learn something as well.

Thanks again for your help. I know I can always count on MajorGeeks to help me out! Brenda

 

Attempting to update the BIOS isn't that dangerous (especially if you think the PC is on its last legs). Just be sure the PC is running on AC power (not the battery; having power die during a BIOS update may do irreversible damage).

 

Well in all of my delving into this problem I discovered that I do have the most updated Bios (Yay for me) and I also have decided I either have a possessed PC or a PC that "understands" what is going on around it. Not sure which is scarier.

Here is what has happened. The following day after posting about my F keys problems and getting a response back that it sounded like my computer was headed for replacement, my computer booted up just fine. All F keys are functional and everything is back to "normal".

Not being a trusting soul, I am making sure to do daily backups just in case my Acer does the Ole HaHa Just Kidding on me and dies but for now we are good.

Thanks again for always being there when I need you. I would send you a batch of brownies if I know where you were located!
Brenda