PC wont start up. Any ideas?

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Hey Karen...I have been looking at your post and I would agree 100% with Harry here...I am currently in the middle of doing a friends PC...they got given it by someone..its like 6-7yrs old...had Win 98 running on it...so when I opened it I was amazed at what I saw....but like u when I plugged it into my LCD nothing happened...so I located the CMOS short the pins...placed them back again but no joy...in the end I asked my friend to bring the monitor it was with...when that arrived again same problem...so I opened the case and tried again and then it worked...eventually I was getting a message about the CMOS battery being low and also checksum error...anyway after all that...I decided what it really needed was a re-format and re-install...since I have a copy of Win 98 SE I used that instead (oh incidentally if u set the boot device to CD-ROM and it dont boot its cos the BIOS was not set to auto detect the CD-ROM drive which took me about 10min to figure out!!) so now it has a new Win 98 SE on it...all I need to do now is check what sound card its using and get the drivers for that...but I did tell my friend that the machine has the potential to be upgraded and we're talking no more than £130 for a decent mobo, graphics and CPU and RAM and Win 98 SE will fly on it or of course they can have XP...


So what I am saying is Karen, check to see if the machine can be upgraded in other places...if not then see what u can do...but also I would say go for XP as opposed to ME or better yet Win 98 SE will do the trick...hope it all goes well... and apologies for the hijack peeps...

 

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I think I'm on fairly safe grounds in saying that the video card you have been using is an additional one. Neither your list, nor the list I found on Dell's site mention that a video card is fitted in the add-on slots, and the fact that it has two apparant video sockets also suggests this.

Putting the model number into Crucial's site should get you compatable memory.

Harry.

 

Thanks for all the advice. I have the recovery discs from my friend so should be able move forward now!

Im off on holiday for a few weeks tomorrow, so will come back on when Im back for advice on the best way to proceed.

Thanks again

Karen

 

Evening all,

Im now back from holiday with 300 things to do, but must get this computer sorted so I can get it out of my spare room!

I have the following discs:

Operating System (Windows ME) Reinstallation CD
Applications Reinstallation of Dell Installed Software CD
Device Drivers and Using Diagnostics, Utilities and System Documentation Reinstallation CD
Modem software Reinstallation CD
Dell Colour Monitor Setup CD
Microsoft Works x 7


My plan is to wipe the machine clean and start from scratch.

I have no time to source/buy/install more memory, so Im going to leave that for now. If I can give it back to her without all the crap on it, I think that will be a good start!

So.....where do I start?!


Thanks lots

 

At a guess - without the manual - I'd say that the OS CD will be the first one.

Rereading the thread reminds me that this may not work, as I suspect the machine is not in its original configuration. (You appear to have an extra VGA card).

Check with your friend to see if it was upgraded at some point.

Harry.