Gateway PC Problem HELP!!!

[Dan Gett]

Hello,

I am in posession of a Gateway Essential 633C. When powered up the
hard drive spins but there is no video or beeps...any ideas???

Thanks,
Dan

 

[Angel's Dad]

Its probably bad memory or maybe one of the DIMMS has gotten loose from the
slot, is the video card proprietary or is it in a PCI or AGP slot??
if not, either your board is toast or the processor may be bad...lemme know
and I wil try to help ya Dan....

 

[Henry Mydlarz]

Heres the procedure I use -

Do a "minimum system checkout" - remove the RAM module/s, video card, any
other card; unplug the hard disk/s and the floppy drive. Basically leave
only the processor/heat sink and the power supply and on/off switch plugged
in. Note that the motherboard will not give any signals with the processor
removed.

Plug it into the power. You should hear a sequence of beeps indication the
absence of RAM modules. If so, then plug in the RAM modules, one at a time,
and try it again - do you get a single beep indicatiog an OK? If so, then
plug in the monitor. Try it again - do you get the main screen come up? If
so, progressively plug in the hard disk/s floppy drive and any other
adapters, till you find the one that's causing the problem.

If you don't get any response with only the processor and power supply on
the motherboard, it is either the motherboard, processor or even power
supply that's faulty.

Henry

 

[John Gill]

Take a good close look at the electrolytic capacitors on the motherboard.
If the top of them are pushed up a little, the capacitor is bad.
I had three Gateway's with MSI motherboards that had the bad capacitor
problem. Not too hard to replace the capacitors.
Search the web for "low ESR capacitors" for a discussion on the problem.
Hope this helps....
John

 

[Dan Gett]

Thanks for the info so far! The video is proprietary. I will try the
other diagnositic info offered in the other posting.

Any other info or tips is appreciated.

Thanks,
Dan

 

[Chaos Master]

I found ancient runes from Dan Gett[[email protected]] in the floor of
sci.electronics.repair:

Thanks for the info so far! The video is proprietary. I will try the
other diagnositic info offered in the other posting.

Do you have access to an ISA video card (assuming this board has ISA slots)? If
you can use an ISA video card, you can determine BIOS faults.