Help me troubleshoot my pc?

Phillip Bromley · 2013-12-28 06:53:03

I recently got a new case for Christmas, and I have been trying to move all of my hardware into the new case since it has more room for extra hard drives (I plan to use it for storage).

However, the original case had this integrated CPU cooler/bracket deal, where the cooler and case are both attached. I thought I could simply put on a new cooler to allow my motherboard to fit in the case. I was wrong, I suppose.

When I tried to remve the heat sink, the processor came out with it! neutral Turns out that it was stuck on there real good, with thermal tape instead of paste. I figured in any case, I need to remove this heat sink from the processor. However, even a razor was insufficient to remove the doggone tape. Searching online, I found the only two real options were mineral spirits/alchohol/acetone, or a heat gun. I tried the heat gun, but I had to heat it very hot and still barely got the processor off of the heat sink.

Upon reassembly and testing (with nothing on the motherboard other than the CPU and RAM), the BIOS speaker threw out an error beep. I presume that this was telling me I had fried my CPU with the heat gun. ops I removed the RAM, and it gave a different error beep (meaning no RAM, of course).

Therefore, I'm 99% sure that the CPU is the problem, but I wanted to confirm my diagnosis before I buy a new CPU. Granted, this was a 2.0 GH/z Pentium 4, and you can get a 3.0 GH/z Pentium 4 for $10 on EBay, but I wanted to make sure regardless.

Thanks in advance!

chillicampari · 2013-12-28 09:49:41

Some bios will beep if there's no video card/drives detected (or for misc other reasons), so it may be a good idea to look up the beep codes for your bios/mobo to make sure it's actually complaining about the CPU.

And this is probably a dumb question, but when you first fired it back up you did re-attach a/the heatsink with fresh thermal compound and fan to the CPU? I couldn't quite tell from the post and I'm not familiar with actual attachments to the case itself (your prior setup). But if not, it's probably fried. If you did re-attach, redo your mount fully (fresh compound and everything) after checking your pins* and try again. There shouldn't be any play whatsoever in your final mount.

Yep, the thermal tape on the stock P4's is pretty nasty. What I do when working with them is plan on removing it as a whole stuck together unit and then use a high heat blow dryer to loosen it back apart. The remaining residue can then later be worked off with a coffee filter and some iso alcohol > 90% or butane (lighter refill type) and then iso after that to clean it up (like you mention) but that's more of an after separation kind of thing.

$10 on eBay isn't bad for a replacement.

* A bent pin isn't *always* a write-off but a broken one is.

KrunchTime · 2013-12-28 09:56:00

Wow, chillicampari. I've never met a female who could talk tech like you do in your response. That's a compliment, by the way. wink

chillicampari · 2013-12-28 10:08:00

Haha, there's actually quite a few of us out there! Thank you. smile I've been building my own since the late-ish '90's and I was a repair tech at my old job for a while.

Phillip Bromley · 2013-12-28 18:17:32

chillicampari wrote:

Some bios will beep if there's no video card/drives detected (or for misc other reasons), so it may be a good idea to look up the beep codes for your bios/mobo to make sure it's actually complaining about the CPU.

I couldn't find a list of beep codes anywhere. It's a Gateway Lexington 3 motherboard that I took from an old Gateway workstation that was getting thrown away. I can't however, find any documentation on it whatsoever. Even on Gateway's site, I can only find specs, but not a manual or anything that would explain the beep codes. That is why I assumed that if everything but the CPU and RAM were removed and it beeped, and then removing the RAM gave a different beep, then it had to be the RAM. But you are suggesting that it may have a no video beep as well? Thing is, when I tried to start it up with my video card installed, it gives the same beep as when only the CPU and RAM are installed, and nothing shows up on the monitor. There is no onboard graphics, so I'll have to try a different graphics card.

Until then, it seems I at least have it narrowed to the CPU or graphics. However the CPU seems the likely culprit since I didn't blast my graphics card with the heat gun. ops

chillicampari wrote:

And this is probably a dumb question, but when you first fired it back up you did re-attach a/the heatsink with fresh thermal compound and fan to the CPU? I couldn't quite tell from the post and I'm not familiar with actual attachments to the case itself (your prior setup). But if not, it's probably fried. If you did re-attach, redo your mount fully (fresh compound and everything) after checking your pins* and try again. There shouldn't be any play whatsoever in your final mount.

I did indeed use fresh thermal compound. I used the fan that was originally on the heat sink, since it has been working fine for the past year or two that I've had it.

chillicampari wrote:

Yep, the thermal tape on the stock P4's is pretty nasty. What I do when working with them is plan on removing it as a whole stuck together unit and then use a high heat blow dryer to loosen it back apart. The remaining residue can then later be worked off with a coffee filter and some iso alcohol > 90% or butane (lighter refill type) and then iso after that to clean it up (like you mention) but that's more of an after separation kind of thing.
$10 on eBay isn't bad for a replacement.
* A bent pin isn't *always* a write-off but a broken one is.

That's exactly what I did, when I tried to pull off the heat sink, the processor came out of the socket with it! It kind of worried me, but none of the pins are bent/broken. At least when I used the heat gun, I only fried the CPU, since it was separate from the motherboard.

Wow. As I was typing this, I found this Intel page that says my beep code (one long beep, followed by two short, under the "legacy" section) is a video error. Figures! I'll see if I can dig up another graphics card and try this again.

Thanks so much for your help! I never would of guessed it was a video error, since I was so worried I cooked my processor. But I've benefited from this a lot, since I now know all of the beep codes for my motherboard! Plus I learned that a 3.06 GH/z P4 is only $10, so I might still upgrade after all. I also hadn't known that this thing supports 2GB of RAM, which sounds like a nice upgrade since I've been getting along with only 512mb on it so far.

In case you were wondering why I use such an old machine, it is because it was free, for one. And even though I now have a modern PC, I use it for retro gaming, for games that will only run on Windows 98, which likes to run on an IDE hard drive formatted FAT32. Plus, old games don't usually like newer graphics cards, so I have an old NVidia GeForce 2 in there right now, but I'll put in my (also old) Matrox G450 to finish troubleshooting this thing.

Again, I am very appreciative of your help, chillicampari. Thanks!

chillicampari · 2013-12-28 21:36:19

Glad to help! I lot of us are running older PCs here. Oh! Your old machine was a Gateway, they do things a bit different. tongue

I have a couple of P4 machines but they're all down right now (blown or bulging caps, one has a wonky agp port) but I've dual booted Win98/#! on them fine. If you end up upgrading the CPU to the 3.06 and it's a Prescott core it may be worth it at some point to look into aftermarket cooling if you notice your temps are high.

Yep, separating the old P4's is an exercise in patience. If you ever end up doing it again and you have a good blow dryer and a concentrator attachment it's a lot safer though it can be a slower process. It also works for video cards that use tape if you need to remove/replace the fan/heatsink. Mine's a really old salon grade Remington 1875 from a beauty supply store, but I'm not sure the newer ones get as hot.

Phillip Bromley · 2013-12-29 18:15:00

I probably will upgrade the cooler when I upgrade the CPU, especially since I use it for gaming, and also simply for the longevity of the hardware. Do the Prescott cores run especially hot though? I knew in general Pentium 4s run hotter than Intel originally intended, but not Prescott in particular.

It's funny that your hair dryer is a Remington 1875, because I thought immediately of the Remington model 1875 revolver. I didn't know Remington made hair dryers too. roll

Anyways, turns out that the video error was because the card wasn't fully seated in the slot. I thought it had been, but I blew the dust out the slot and cleaned the contacts on the card, and it boots up fine now! I guess I didn't cook the CPU after all!

Thanks again for the help!

chillicampari · 2013-12-30 02:23:14

Yay! I'm glad it's all sorted out and that it was simple and glad to help!

Yep! Prescott cores do run a bit hotter than Northwoods. Even Northwoods were pretty warm for what I was doing on my PCs (video rendering) and my replacement P4 fan/heatsink is a budget Rosewill aftermarket
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a … 6835200029
which got the job done (I used Arctic Silver instead of the pre-applied thermal paste), but if you use that you really want fan control since it whines at higher rpm and you probably don't want that all of the time (also, it's a PITA to mount). The price on Zalman coolers isn't that bad right now though.

The Remington 1875 thing *is* confusing! big_smile

Phillip Bromley · 2013-12-30 04:47:07

Good to know, I'll be sure to upgrade the cooler when I upgrade the processor. Thanks for the advice!

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#1 2013-12-28 06:53:03

Help me troubleshoot my pc?

#2 2013-12-28 09:49:41

Re: Help me troubleshoot my pc?

#3 2013-12-28 09:56:00

Re: Help me troubleshoot my pc?

#4 2013-12-28 10:08:00

Re: Help me troubleshoot my pc?

#5 2013-12-28 18:17:32

Re: Help me troubleshoot my pc?

#6 2013-12-28 21:36:19

Re: Help me troubleshoot my pc?

#7 2013-12-29 18:15:00

Re: Help me troubleshoot my pc?

#8 2013-12-30 02:23:14

Re: Help me troubleshoot my pc?

#9 2013-12-30 04:47:07

Re: Help me troubleshoot my pc?

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