Gateway Profile 4 won't boot up fully

[fcjones]

Hi
7 year old Gateway Profile 4 won't boot up fully. Get only a mous
cursor on the monitor. Monitor is known good. No beep during POST.
Harddrive was removed and booted another PC properly. Hard drive i
believed good. Peripherals light up on power up. WinXP Home Edition.
Power supply is external on this model and is known good. The CPU fa
runs all the time but the CPU doesn't seem as warm as it should be.
have tried re-seating all the boards and the RAM. If I power up the P
and let it sit for awhile, the Windows XP home logo appears on th
monitor as if the screen saver is starting. There is a little gree
light on inside, normal I believe. Any ideas as to whats going on?
Thanks,Fre

[BillW50]

Hi
7 year old Gateway Profile 4 won't boot up fully. Get only a mouse
cursor on the monitor. Monitor is known good. No beep during POST.
Harddrive was removed and booted another PC properly. Hard drive is
believed good. Peripherals light up on power up. WinXP Home Edition.
Power supply is external on this model and is known good. The CPU fan
runs all the time but the CPU doesn't seem as warm as it should be. I
have tried re-seating all the boards and the RAM. If I power up the
PC and let it sit for awhile, the Windows XP home logo appears on the
monitor as if the screen saver is starting. There is a little green
light on inside, normal I believe. Any ideas as to whats going on?
Thanks,Fred

Fred, what was this other machine that booted this Windows XP? Unless
they are virtually identical, that wouldn't work too well. If you
installed Windows XP on that other machine and now trying to boot it off
of this machine... well that is your problem.

[Ben Myers]

Post by BillW50

Hi
7 year old Gateway Profile 4 won't boot up fully. Get only a mouse
cursor on the monitor. Monitor is known good. No beep during POST.
Harddrive was removed and booted another PC properly. Hard drive is
believed good. Peripherals light up on power up. WinXP Home Edition.
Power supply is external on this model and is known good. The CPU fan
runs all the time but the CPU doesn't seem as warm as it should be. I
have tried re-seating all the boards and the RAM. If I power up the
PC and let it sit for awhile, the Windows XP home logo appears on the
monitor as if the screen saver is starting. There is a little green
light on inside, normal I believe. Any ideas as to whats going on?
Thanks,Fred

Fred, what was this other machine that booted this Windows XP? Unless
they are virtually identical, that wouldn't work too well. If you
installed Windows XP on that other machine and now trying to boot it off
of this machine... well that is your problem.

To be more precise, Microsoft does not want you and me to go around
switching hard drives from one computer to another, so they've built in
some safeguards to keep this from happening very much. The bottom line
is that if the motherboard chipsets are absolutely identical between two
systems, a hard drive that boots up on one is 99% probable to boot up on
the other. For Intel chipset motherboards, at least, there is a little
bit of tolerance for chipsets that are almost identical. Anything else,
and a drive that boots up on one computer will give a BSOD on the other
most of the time. The rest of the time, the system will simply hang, as
has apparently happened with the Profile 4.

In short, Microsoft has inserted some chipset specific instructions
early on into the system bootstrap process, unlike most versions of
Linux that do not care what motherboard and other chips are in the
system. Linux adjusts itself to the system chips while booting up.

The only other thing I can suggest is to boot up the Profile 4 into the
system CMOS setup, make sure that the hard drive and its true capacity
are recognized, and make sure that none of the other BIOS settings are
out of whack... Ben Myers

[fcjones]

Thank you Gentlemen,
Well, my boss let me attach the HDD in question to a approx. 10 yea
old Dell desktop, as a secondary harddrive. The HD appeared to b
completely accessible, I could see my folders/files. Our 2nd test wa
to boot from my HDD, not the Dell's (Dell HDD taken off the bus). Th
result was I could see my login icons and I logged in. It gave
message something like "this copy of windows needs to be activated
would like to activate..." and I clicked "No" then shut the Dell dow
and removed my HDD from it.

Ben Myers, I have tried to access the CMOS settings with F1, but n
luck. Of course I have also tried F8 to get to Safe mode, no luck.
just get no display, can't see what is going on...NO POST BEEP EVER.
Zero beeps. I THINK it used to give one beep.

Could it be the CMOS battery? It has never been replaced. It is
2032, does it need to be rechargeable type or just regular?

Thank you very much.
Fre

[Ben Myers]

Post by fcjones
Thank you Gentlemen,
Well, my boss let me attach the HDD in question to a approx. 10 year
old Dell desktop, as a secondary harddrive. The HD appeared to be
completely accessible, I could see my folders/files. Our 2nd test was
to boot from my HDD, not the Dell's (Dell HDD taken off the bus). The
result was I could see my login icons and I logged in. It gave a
message something like "this copy of windows needs to be activated,
would like to activate..." and I clicked "No" then shut the Dell down
and removed my HDD from it.
Ben Myers, I have tried to access the CMOS settings with F1, but no
luck. Of course I have also tried F8 to get to Safe mode, no luck. I
just get no display, can't see what is going on...NO POST BEEP EVER.
Zero beeps. I THINK it used to give one beep.
Could it be the CMOS battery? It has never been replaced. It is a
2032, does it need to be rechargeable type or just regular?
Thank you very much.
Fred

The Dell apparently has the same motherboard chipset as the Profile 4,
so Windows did not complain with a BSOD. (I did something similar
recently, taking a hard drive from a dead Gateway laptop and putting
into a Dell Latitude 100L, which I know had the same chipset as the
Gateway.)

With CMOS batteries being fairly inexpensive, replacing the one in the
Profile 4 might be worth a try. Replacing it also wipes out the CMOS
settings, which could be corrupted and the cause of the problem.

If you see nothing at all on the screen when you power it up, then F1
for setup and F8 for safe mode won't do any good... Ben Myers

[SC Tom]

Post by fcjones
Thank you Gentlemen,
Well, my boss let me attach the HDD in question to a approx. 10 year
old Dell desktop, as a secondary harddrive. The HD appeared to be
completely accessible, I could see my folders/files. Our 2nd test was
to boot from my HDD, not the Dell's (Dell HDD taken off the bus). The
result was I could see my login icons and I logged in. It gave a
message something like "this copy of windows needs to be activated,
would like to activate..." and I clicked "No" then shut the Dell down
and removed my HDD from it.
Ben Myers, I have tried to access the CMOS settings with F1, but no
luck. Of course I have also tried F8 to get to Safe mode, no luck. I
just get no display, can't see what is going on...NO POST BEEP EVER.
Zero beeps. I THINK it used to give one beep.
Could it be the CMOS battery? It has never been replaced. It is a
2032, does it need to be rechargeable type or just regular?
Thank you very much.
Fred

Do you maybe have another power supply? I know you said this one is good,
but. . . no video, no beep, no keyboard. Sounds like it could be a bad PS.

[fcjones]

I actually get only a mouse cursor on the monitor which moves with th
mouse as it should. I have 2 power supplies, both give the sam
results.
Out of desperation, I tried booting with my emergency start u
diskette. I hear the floppy spin up and I get completely dark monitor.
I then hit the enter key and the floppy clicks and spins up. Then
ejected the floppy and turned off the computer by hitting the star
button.
Another experiment: I removed one of the 2 RAM modules and started th
PC. I then got 2 beeps.
Thanks,Fre

[SC Tom]

I actually get only a mouse cursor on the monitor which moves with the
mouse as it should. I have 2 power supplies, both give the same
results.
Out of desperation, I tried booting with my emergency start up
diskette. I hear the floppy spin up and I get completely dark monitor.
I then hit the enter key and the floppy clicks and spins up. Then I
ejected the floppy and turned off the computer by hitting the start
button.
Another experiment: I removed one of the 2 RAM modules and started the
PC. I then got 2 beeps.
Thanks,Fred

Have you swapped the RAM with the other one? 2 beeps on an AMI BIOS is a
parity error, which would be a memory problem (I don't know who made your
BIOS).
Have you taken everything out that's not needed to boot, like a NIC, a
modem, etc.? Also disconnect any external drives and printers and see what
happens.

[fcjones]

Thank you Sir.
This is a big dump of experiments I did on New Years Eve...
Removed individual RAM modules-->2 Beeps on boot.
Swapped RAM modules-->2 Beeps on boot.
Remove both RAM modules-->2 Beeps on boot.
All devices in place, remove CD-ROM player-->0 Beeps on boot.
",remove floppy drive-->0 Beeps on boot.
Replace CMOS battery-->0 Beeps on boot, no change, same state (displa
backlight, live mouse cursor only).
F1 on boot-->Black screen (no backlight, no mouse cursor).
F8 on boot-->Black screen (no backlight, no mouse cursor).
Insert Emergency Startup Diskette, boot-->black screen (no backlight
no mouse cursor).
All in place (zero state), boot-->live display (backlight, live mous
cursor only).

In this nominal state, perform "tab,tab, and enter"-->Windows WELCOM
SOUND PLAYS, PROPER WALLPAPER APPEARS!!!-->
No Windows shortcuts visible.
No Windows taskbar visible.
Right-click desktop, get Menu, select properties-->no response.
Right-click desktop, get Menu, able to create shortcuts on desktop
right click on shortcuts, 'save as', and see folders.
No programs run (such as Word, Paint, Desktop Properties) EXCEP
NOTEPAD!!! I was
able to create, edit and save a text file with notepad.

I then can shut down the machine as I used to by doing "windows log
key", 'u', and 'u'

Through these experiments I have drawn some conclusions.
I need to see what others say first.
Thanks for you help with my (expensive) old Betsy.
Fre

[SC Tom]

Post by fcjones
Thank you Sir.
This is a big dump of experiments I did on New Years Eve...
Removed individual RAM modules-->2 Beeps on boot.
Swapped RAM modules-->2 Beeps on boot.
Remove both RAM modules-->2 Beeps on boot.
All devices in place, remove CD-ROM player-->0 Beeps on boot.
",remove floppy drive-->0 Beeps on boot.
Replace CMOS battery-->0 Beeps on boot, no change, same state (display
backlight, live mouse cursor only).
F1 on boot-->Black screen (no backlight, no mouse cursor).
F8 on boot-->Black screen (no backlight, no mouse cursor).
Insert Emergency Startup Diskette, boot-->black screen (no backlight,
no mouse cursor).
All in place (zero state), boot-->live display (backlight, live mouse
cursor only).
In this nominal state, perform "tab,tab, and enter"-->Windows WELCOME
SOUND PLAYS, PROPER WALLPAPER APPEARS!!!-->
No Windows shortcuts visible.
No Windows taskbar visible.
Right-click desktop, get Menu, select properties-->no response.
Right-click desktop, get Menu, able to create shortcuts on desktop,
right click on shortcuts, 'save as', and see folders.
No programs run (such as Word, Paint, Desktop Properties) EXCEPT
NOTEPAD!!! I was
able to create, edit and save a text file with notepad.
I then can shut down the machine as I used to by doing "windows logo
key", 'u', and 'u'
Through these experiments I have drawn some conclusions.
I need to see what others say first.
Thanks for you help with my (expensive) old Betsy.
Fred

Do you have another video card you could put in? I had a similar problem
with an old Digital workstation- it wouldn't display anything until the
login screen came up. It seemed that all the lower displays wouldn't work,
like 640x480, so I could get into BIOS and adjust my settings. That's not
all that's going on with yours, I don't think, but it could be a start.
If you hit the key you need to hit to get into BIOS and let it sit for a
while, does the BIOS screen or anything ever come up? If you unplug the
keyboard and boot it, do you get a keyboard error message, or a different
number of beeps?

[fcjones]

I am trying to get another board on ebay. I don't recall this machin
ever giving a single beep during normal operation. The only time i
beeped was when I removed RAM modules and booted up. I think I trie
removing various peripherals and booting with no beeps.
The thing is, I can't tell if windows is hosed-up or its just the vide
hardware. No visible damage to the video board.
Thanks, Fre

[SC Tom]

I am trying to get another board on ebay. I don't recall this machine
ever giving a single beep during normal operation. The only time it
beeped was when I removed RAM modules and booted up. I think I tried
removing various peripherals and booting with no beeps.
The thing is, I can't tell if windows is hosed-up or its just the video
hardware. No visible damage to the video board.
Thanks, Fred

Windows may be hosed by now, but if the POST screen doesn't show on boot-up
and you can see to get into BIOS, then that is before Windows even loads.
There's something else going on with it other than Windows.

[SC Tom]

Post by SC Tom

I am trying to get another board on ebay. I don't recall this machine
ever giving a single beep during normal operation. The only time it
beeped was when I removed RAM modules and booted up. I think I tried
removing various peripherals and booting with no beeps.
The thing is, I can't tell if windows is hosed-up or its just the video
hardware. No visible damage to the video board.
Thanks, Fred

Windows may be hosed by now, but if the POST screen doesn't show on
boot-up and you can see to get into BIOS, then that is before Windows even
loads. There's something else going on with it other than Windows.
--
SC Tom

That should be "CAN'T see to get into BIOS."

[fcjones]

Sirs,
I am still awaiting the new video hardware card for my machine. In th
mean time I have purchased a "CablesToGo" IDE to USB with 4 pin power t
see and back up the hard drive. Its a great device, hero of the day.
got all music and photos of my 2yr old daughter all backed up now. An
if I get a new PC, I can purchase a new HDD and use this device for bac
ups. Of course, the hosting PC used needs Admin rights to tak
ownership of the Owner folders. When I first tried it, it said "acces
is denied" and I almost vomited. But since I have admin rights, n
worries, just right click and go to advanced stuff and before long
could see all my familiar files, internet links and backed 'em up.
Fre