JShrum
professor emeritus
Reged: 08/14/07
Posts: 734
Loc: Bay City, MI, USA
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I have a Dell Optiplex GX270 that has the oddest symptoms occurring. It locks up when it gets to a "XP graphical screen".
Symptoms:
Locks up whenever a XP graphical screen appears...like the Windows desktop. Immediately. It locks the whole system since shared folders on the box become inaccessible immediately also.
What I've tried so far:
Changing video from the AGP to a PCI card to eliminate the card or the memory on the card and the bus structure at the same time.
Removing RAM so that every chip has been eliminated at times although I don't have "extra" chips. I'd like to believe that all four would not go bad at once.
Removed all external devices except keyboard, mouse and monitor (even have replaced the keyboard and mouse with different types...PS2 rather than USB since I have plenty of extras in that area).
Reformatted the hard disk and started again...it goes through the formatting of the hard disk, copying of files, yet when it gets to the part where Windows is launched, with 39 minutes remaining (not really 39 minutes but that's where it starts) it immediately locks.
Replaced the hard disk (it's 40GB) with a 20GB hard disk to ensure there isn't something funny going on there.
Looked for any capacitor issues since that is something I'm well aware of and is a known problem with this model. No trace of any problems like bulges, corrosion or fluid.
Have booted to the Dell Utility partition (it's a small partition of approximately 8mb run with a Win95 environment) and run 999 tests of all components without fail.
I'm truly at a loss...and I do this for a living!
Any suggestions from anybody out there would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you in advance.
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Jeff Shrum
Bay City, MI
CPC 1100 XLT
WO 2" Crayford 2-speed Focuser
OPT 2" Dielectric Diagonal
Sunset Astronomical Society
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JShrum
professor emeritus
Reged: 08/14/07
Posts: 734
Loc: Bay City, MI, USA
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Something I've overlooked and am looking at now is integrated sound...I rarely turn on the speakers so it could well be the beginning sound that is locking it up if that component is faulty. I don't remember if there is a sound played when you reinstall though when if first gets to that graphical screen but it is entirely possible. The tests produce their sound via the PC speaker. I've got my fingers crossed and will update when I've finished attempting a reinstall with the onboard sound disabled.
Jeff
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Jeff Shrum
Bay City, MI
CPC 1100 XLT
WO 2" Crayford 2-speed Focuser
OPT 2" Dielectric Diagonal
Sunset Astronomical Society
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JShrum
professor emeritus
Reged: 08/14/07
Posts: 734
Loc: Bay City, MI, USA
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Nope...disabled sound and it still hangs in the same spot on a new install. I'm doing full formats to ensure that there isn't anything residual there also. Will move from here to reflashing the bios and see what that gets me. This is one of the strangest things I've ever seen.
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Jeff Shrum
Bay City, MI
CPC 1100 XLT
WO 2" Crayford 2-speed Focuser
OPT 2" Dielectric Diagonal
Sunset Astronomical Society
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JShrum
professor emeritus
Reged: 08/14/07
Posts: 734
Loc: Bay City, MI, USA
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Nope...bios update didn't do it. I'm getting pretty tired of seeing that "An exciting new look" setup screen of XP where it locks.
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Jeff Shrum
Bay City, MI
CPC 1100 XLT
WO 2" Crayford 2-speed Focuser
OPT 2" Dielectric Diagonal
Sunset Astronomical Society
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D_talley
professor emeritus
Reged: 07/07/05
Posts: 705
Loc: Richmond VA
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Have you turned off letting the system search for a floppy drive. You said you removed all external devices, just want to make sure that the system is not looking for something that is dead or not there.
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Dwight
TEC 140 APO
Meade LX200 14 OTA
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JShrum
professor emeritus
Reged: 08/14/07
Posts: 734
Loc: Bay City, MI, USA
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I have not turned it off. But I'm sure it's good. That's how I flashed the bios. I'm currently running all tests again set for 999 times. It's on it's third pass (a single pass of all devices/components takes a while) with still no errors. So weird...this box has run XP for a long time. It started locking up two days ago. First at the login screen that morning when I got called away for a while and it had sat there. Then later that same day it locked again and then locked on reboot. I did a system restore from a week before just to be safe when it came back up next. It came back up and I quickly enabled the "shared folders" on it and attached with my laptop and began pulling files from it (I backup monthly anyway to an external drive and don't create / modify that much on that box anyway but wanted to make sure I got everything). It locked up during the transfer and I had to do it several times to get it completed. I then started in on XP type repairs and turning things off with MSConfig. No help. Decided to do just a fresh install and this is where I'm stuck. Really weird. You'd think if it were a heat issue that all the testing would definately show it. If it were power that it would also show in testing with at least a glitch. Nothing...tests are still running and probably will take all night...we'll see.
Thank you for the suggestion though...
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Jeff Shrum
Bay City, MI
CPC 1100 XLT
WO 2" Crayford 2-speed Focuser
OPT 2" Dielectric Diagonal
Sunset Astronomical Society
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Joe Lalumia
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 01/24/07
Posts: 2573
Loc: Rockwall, Texas, USA
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Are you running a virus checker at startup-- like AVG or Norton??
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LX90 8" LNT, SV Nighthawk & TelePOD, SV 80/9D & M4 mount, ETX 90, Orion XT10i, 20x80 binoculars, SV-BV3s.
"The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax." - Albert Einstein
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JShrum
professor emeritus
Reged: 08/14/07
Posts: 734
Loc: Bay City, MI, USA
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I run McAfee. It is not anywhere on the new install however, because it never finishes loading XP. I also have the NIC disconnected for the install and it sits behind a firewall that I monitor anyway, so there's no outside intrusion.
Thank you for the idea though...
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Jeff Shrum
Bay City, MI
CPC 1100 XLT
WO 2" Crayford 2-speed Focuser
OPT 2" Dielectric Diagonal
Sunset Astronomical Society
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btb
super member
Reged: 07/07/06
Posts: 147
Loc: Indiana
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Do you use 2 internal hard drives with one being a backup? I had the same problem awhile back, the second hard drive failed and the system would freeze.
Just a guess.
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Les
US Navy Veteran
Celestron 114mm
Zhumell "10"
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JShrum
professor emeritus
Reged: 08/14/07
Posts: 734
Loc: Bay City, MI, USA
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No...but thank you for the thought. I'm back to the original hard disk (40GB) since changing to a new drive didn't help. The CD/CDRW/DVD drive seems to be fine as it boots to it fine and seems to not have issue loading the files to the HD when I run an install. Just checking it during testing right now it is on pass 108 of 999 and no errors to be found. I'm tempted to try to load 2000 on it as just a test to see if it will tomorrow after I let it run it's course overnight. Doesn't seem to be the system board, or for that matter anything else that gets tested. Still extremely weird to me... 
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Jeff Shrum
Bay City, MI
CPC 1100 XLT
WO 2" Crayford 2-speed Focuser
OPT 2" Dielectric Diagonal
Sunset Astronomical Society
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Skywatchr
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 06/03/06
Posts: 1588
Loc: North-Central Pa.
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Open the case and look at the capacitors on the power regulator section on the motherboard. They should be flat on top. You might have to remove the green air shroud from around the CPU to see them. You'll probably find that at least 4 of the capacitors have popped and are "domed" on top. Possibly all 8 have popped too. That will cause your lockup symptoms.
Jeff
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18" F/5 Home-Built Dob. with Mike Dudley Mirror
Highly Modified Meade DS-16 in Roll Off Roof
6" F/15 Brass w/ D&G Lens on DS-16 Mount
DS-10 10" F/4.5 Newtonian
LXD650, LX200 Classic
Orange Tube C11
DayStar 0.45 with multiple ERFs
Vixen ED80sf
10" LX200 GPS SMT
11x80 Meade, 20x80 Celestron binocs (Japan Made).
Lots of Naglers and 8mm and 13mm Ethos.
Gadgets and parts everywhere.
And a Wife that loves it as much as me!
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Skywatchr
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 06/03/06
Posts: 1588
Loc: North-Central Pa.
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Oh, the capacitors look like little beer cans.. 
Jeff
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18" F/5 Home-Built Dob. with Mike Dudley Mirror
Highly Modified Meade DS-16 in Roll Off Roof
6" F/15 Brass w/ D&G Lens on DS-16 Mount
DS-10 10" F/4.5 Newtonian
LXD650, LX200 Classic
Orange Tube C11
DayStar 0.45 with multiple ERFs
Vixen ED80sf
10" LX200 GPS SMT
11x80 Meade, 20x80 Celestron binocs (Japan Made).
Lots of Naglers and 8mm and 13mm Ethos.
Gadgets and parts everywhere.
And a Wife that loves it as much as me!
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Rusty
Postmaster
Reged: 08/06/03
Posts: 16410
Loc: Brooker, FL
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Assuming that has 2 IDE controllers, have you switched the hard drives to a different controller?
I assume there's not an onboard graphics chip...
The only problem I ever ran across remotely resembling this was bad capacitors. I know you've looked at 'em, but I've run across several boards with bad capacitors (only that one mobo had an actual failure) and some bad ones can be sneaky - I had to look with a magnifying glass for some.
BTW, if you need some, I have a few dozen left over.
I'm sure you've checked the obvious things like a loose heatsink (a hot Northbridge could do this, I believe).
And so could a bad PSU - Dell always used marginal ones, anyway. Adaptors are available to mate a standard PSU to Dell mobos.
I feel your pain...in another thread I recounted how the new peecee I built for me was within an hour's config of being placed into service, when the DFI mobo took a dive.
I'm afraid I have
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N11GPS Fastar
TOA-130S
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Sometimes I think we're alone in the universe, and sometimes I think we're not. In either case the idea is quite staggering. - Arthur C. Clarke
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astrotrf
sage
Reged: 09/30/07
Posts: 287
Loc: Rodeo, NM
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You didn't mention trying a different *monitor* ... just a thought.
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Terry (astrotrf)
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Skywatchr
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 06/03/06
Posts: 1588
Loc: North-Central Pa.
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I doubt the monitor will cause a lockup. It's probably the caps, the Dell 270 is known for it. I've seen a lot of it anyways.
Quote:
You didn't mention trying a different *monitor* ... just a thought.
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18" F/5 Home-Built Dob. with Mike Dudley Mirror
Highly Modified Meade DS-16 in Roll Off Roof
6" F/15 Brass w/ D&G Lens on DS-16 Mount
DS-10 10" F/4.5 Newtonian
LXD650, LX200 Classic
Orange Tube C11
DayStar 0.45 with multiple ERFs
Vixen ED80sf
10" LX200 GPS SMT
11x80 Meade, 20x80 Celestron binocs (Japan Made).
Lots of Naglers and 8mm and 13mm Ethos.
Gadgets and parts everywhere.
And a Wife that loves it as much as me!
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JShrum
professor emeritus
Reged: 08/14/07
Posts: 734
Loc: Bay City, MI, USA
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Well Jeff, you get the gold star here and thank you. 
It was the first thing I checked but couldn't see the ones that were affected. I've run into the bad capacitor problem before, but they were always evident from just looking. Although I really still can't see the bulges very well on this one, by removing the processor fan I can feel them. There are 4 that are definately bulged and 2 more that are borderline (none are leaking fluid)...I'm going to send the board to badcaps.net to get it repaired. I'm not as handy with a soldering iron as I was back in my younger days and I've still got the laptop to work from for the 2-3 weeks it'll be gone.
Thank you to all that have replied...good grief, to think how cheap a capacitor actually is. 
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Jeff Shrum
Bay City, MI
CPC 1100 XLT
WO 2" Crayford 2-speed Focuser
OPT 2" Dielectric Diagonal
Sunset Astronomical Society
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ace50252
Pooh-Bah
Reged: 09/10/06
Posts: 1104
Loc: Pleasantville Iowa way out in ...
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I ran into the same type of problem while installing WHS 2003. I started with all hardware add ons. The os would lock up wihile loading the OS. I then worked wit bthe ram, I put one stick of 512 and then no problems. I put all the ram back in an works perfect. It was strange and XP OS never had this problem, WHS 2003 must be a bit touchier. I did order up some new RAM to replace the ram that is in there. This os set up was 1 hour and it would lock up in the last 16 minutes, I did this 5 times!!! And it really sucks when you can't figure out what is going on!
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Celestron ASGT 9.25"
Celestron 6SE
Orion ST 100
Astro Tech 80 Doublet converted to 80 Triplet
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Welcome back my friends to the show that never ends, come inside, come inside. John
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Skywatchr
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 06/03/06
Posts: 1588
Loc: North-Central Pa.
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You are welcome! I've seen that symptom too many times and it boils down to voltage. With the caps popped, the voltage regulator isn't doing it's job.
Now keep in mind that just replacing the caps may not cure the problem. Your power supply in the case could be sending higher voltages than it's supposed to. And the individual regulator chips on the mobo could also be bad as well. The caps blowing could be just a symptom of a deeper problem. After all, something caused the caps to blow!
If it were me, I'd be looking for a replacement motherboard from a reputable person. I might be able to find you one Monday or Tuesday if you want to go that route.
Jeff
Quote:
Well Jeff, you get the gold star here and thank you.
It was the first thing I checked but couldn't see the ones that were affected. I've run into the bad capacitor problem before, but they were always evident from just looking. Although I really still can't see the bulges very well on this one, by removing the processor fan I can feel them. There are 4 that are definately bulged and 2 more that are borderline (none are leaking fluid)...I'm going to send the board to badcaps.net to get it repaired. I'm not as handy with a soldering iron as I was back in my younger days and I've still got the laptop to work from for the 2-3 weeks it'll be gone.
Thank you to all that have replied...good grief, to think how cheap a capacitor actually is.
--------------------
18" F/5 Home-Built Dob. with Mike Dudley Mirror
Highly Modified Meade DS-16 in Roll Off Roof
6" F/15 Brass w/ D&G Lens on DS-16 Mount
DS-10 10" F/4.5 Newtonian
LXD650, LX200 Classic
Orange Tube C11
DayStar 0.45 with multiple ERFs
Vixen ED80sf
10" LX200 GPS SMT
11x80 Meade, 20x80 Celestron binocs (Japan Made).
Lots of Naglers and 8mm and 13mm Ethos.
Gadgets and parts everywhere.
And a Wife that loves it as much as me!
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astrotrf
sage
Reged: 09/30/07
Posts: 287
Loc: Rodeo, NM
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Quote:
I doubt the monitor will cause a lockup.
I quite agree that it wouldn't be my first thought, either. But he'd tried lotsa stuff and it was suspicious that it happened right at the point of switching to graphics mode -- and with different video cards, besides.
Bad caps forced me into a system rebuild last month, too. But the 3x speed boost makes up for it. 
(I'm running an emulator of a 1980's-era computer -- at 25 times the speed of the actual hardware when it was brand new!)
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Terry (astrotrf)
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