Computer keeps shutting down! (1 Viewer)

[Emily.]

OK COMPUTER PEOPLE!!! major problem

my computer...yes compaq presario (i know shit but its what i have so id like it to work)
well it keeps randomly shutting down after flashing some blue screen with white writing (not for long enough so i can see)
it will only stay on for about 10 or 20 minutes at a time....well did...until i formatted it tonight (followed all the steps on the windows website, did it thru windows setup) and it all worked fine until i tried to install the service pack 2 off the cd we have...then it did the random blue screen shut down thingy and now it wont turn on at all

i mean it turns on to the compaq screen and then asks if i wanna boot from the cd (windows xp disk in drive) but it wont start windows
it half starts then says that theres some error with a file it cant load...the file is different every time but alot of times ive seen a file called NTFS i forget what the extension is tho, i think its .sav....it used to do this before the format too if i ever walked away from the computer long enough for it to go to auto standby and id come back and itd b on that screen

now my file format system is NTFS...is it anything to do with that?


also, one time it froze on the blue screen so i was able to read it and it said that my BIOS was not ASCI compliant and that i had to repair it or turn asci off or something and i tried to follow the instructions but it wont let me change anything

ive had my computer since the middle of year 10 and it only started doin this crazy stuff this year...can anyone tell me what is wrong with it and preferably how to fix it??

if not i guess im going computer shopping on sunday....

 

[jm1234567890]

can you boot from a floppy?

if you have an NT boot disk, you should be able to run a "chkdsk" on your hard drive to make sure it is error free.

then you can reformat and try installing windows again.

if not, your computer sounds very dead...

 

[INXS]

It would be better it's in safe mode when running "chkdsk

 

[Emily.]

can you boot from a floppy?

if you have an NT boot disk, you should be able to run a "chkdsk" on your hard drive to make sure it is error free.

then you can reformat and try installing windows again.

if not, your computer sounds very dead...

no my computer is a compaq and its set to boot from the CDROM drive
it only came with system recovery CDs, no floppys

 

[INXS]

http://www.bootdisk.com/

That might be able to help you out.

 

[Emily.]

i have the xp service pack 2 cd

will try the bios update thingy if i can get my computer to stay on for long enough...or actually turn on for that matter

i think the term to describe my computer is the deadly "CACTUS"

 

[!! CaR`JiE !!]

can you boot from a floppy?

yes u can :uhhuh:

 

[RUB!X]

It could be corrupt RAM ...
Same happened to me about 6 months ago ...
I thought it was the Hard Drive, so i reformatted it, that didnt change anything, so i bought a new hard drive ... that also didnt fix the problem ... Anyway my uncle suggested taking out the RAM ... and problem was solved
Try taking out your RAM and see what happens, if you only have 1 RAM module you need to borrow one just to see if it fixes the problem, make sure the RAM is the same spec ...
Hope u fix the problem

 

[jm1234567890]

It could be corrupt RAM ...
Same happened to me about 6 months ago ...
I thought it was the Hard Drive, so i reformatted it, that didnt change anything, so i bought a new hard drive ... that also didnt fix the problem ... Anyway my uncle suggested taking out the RAM ... and problem was solved
Try taking out your RAM and see what happens, if you only have 1 RAM module you need to borrow one just to see if it fixes the problem, make sure the RAM is the same spec ...
Hope u fix the problem

yes! that's right.

I was pulling out my hair to solve random blue screens too a few months ago, then I found it was faulty ram.

and it does the crash during install with bad ram too.

 

[loquasagacious]

I think theres a utility memtest availble online in iso form. Burn to cd and stick it in should boot and check the memory for errors.

 

[Emily.]

well ram replacement for compaq laptops is pretty hard to find

anyways, i fixed it

the computer came with a set of 5 system recovery disks which is a compaq formatter and it returns the computer to compaq factory settings

its all runing smoothly now

thanks for all your help, i reckon the problem might be with my windows xp disk...even tho its a compaq one, there must be something wrong with it

but its all cool now!!
thanks

 

[Emily.]

well ram replacement for compaq laptops is pretty hard to find

anyways, i fixed it

the computer came with a set of 5 system recovery disks which is a compaq formatter and it returns the computer to compaq factory settings

its all runing smoothly now

thanks for all your help, i reckon the problem might be with my windows xp disk...even tho its a compaq one, there must be something wrong with it

but its all cool now!!
thanks

unfortunately not fixed anymore



it was...



but then did the same thing as before...and now it wont turn on

i think it really is cactus...

 

[jm1234567890]

yeah, bad ram.

you should test the ram.

ram is cheap to replace

 

[Emily.]

compaq ram isnt cheap

and i would have no idea how to test laptop ram

 

[jm1234567890]

compaq ram isnt cheap

and i would have no idea how to test laptop ram

you don't have to get compaq ram.

all laptops use so-dimms (think that's what they are called)

testing ram might be problem if you can't find another laptop. A computer store should be able to diagnose it pretty cheaply.

 

[Emily.]

mm compaqs only work with compaq stuff.....im pretty sure the computers fucked, so i dont wanna waste money getting it fixed...i eman its 3 years old...time for an upgrade i reckon

 

[Emily.]

YAY i took my lappy to a computer dude and its all fixed!! only $264....its alright i suppose

 

[loquasagacious]

Will you trust us next time when we say its easily repairable?

 

[withoutaface]

mm compaqs only work with compaq stuff

That's just what Compaq would have you believe.

 

[Emily.]

Will you trust us next time when we say its easily repairable?

well it wasnt actually easily repairable.....
my dads old compaq that was slightly better than mine that we got at the same time is fucked, he blew the powerpack bit on the motherboard on it
we had to take both laptops in together to get useable bits out of both of them....so my new lappy has the big screen, faster processor...teh ram out of both and my hard drive

so like a brand new computer cos my computer was used to death and dads was hardly even used!