If you’re going to be building computers, adding devices to your computer, altering BIOS settings, or just installing and deleting programs on your computer, then you’ll want to learn the basics of troubleshooting. You might notice that I didn’t say computer troubleshooting. That is because troubleshooting is an independent skill. I learned to troubleshoot as an electronic technician. And most of those same techniques work fine for troubleshooting computers.
Troubleshooting is really a kind of detective work. If you notice, the TV detectives spend a lot of time asking questions and thinking over the facts. And that is where a good troubleshooter starts, asking questions, not with tearing apart their computer, swapping components, or running diagnostics programs.
My intent here isn’t to give you heavy technical troubleshooting instructions, but to provide you with common sense techniques that will likely save you a lot of time and trouble if you follow them.
Take note: I am assuming a basic to intermediate knowledge on the part of the computer user for this article. In other words, that you either build computers or add components to it, like hard drives or CD drives. I also assume you have a basic understanding of the boot process. Finally, I assume you know basic electrical safety rules.
A Typical Scenario
Let’s say one evening you turn on your computer and it starts, seems to boot fine, but stops dead at the point it should start loading Windows. What now? You panic of course. Like most of us you haven’t saved copies of your most important documents for months. And since Windows isn’t loading from the hard drive, you “logically” assume there is a serious problem with the hard drive. It must be physically broken or the data is scrambled.
Since you’re in panic mode you tear the hard drive out of your other working computer and try to boot the first computer. The same thing happens, it stops at the point of loading Windows. What a relief, at least the problem isn’t with the hard drive, your data is safe - there is probably a fault with the motherboard in the first computer.
To make sure, you test the hard drive from your first computer (the one that wouldn’t load Windows) in your second computer, it works fine. That confirms it, there is a problem with the motherboard on the first computer. Probably the hard drive controller, you think, being the expert.
Running Windows? Your PC Is a Target.
The Hacker's Nightmare gives you everything you need to know to protect your machine, in plain-English. Too important to make it complicated! Find Out More.
PCMech was founded by 
jeff said:
7/31/2007 10:36 pm
While playing Delta Force Extreme i randomly freeze.
i can spin, shoot whatever weapon i am holding, but cant move out of place, cant chat, or use Team Speak. it occurs every few minutes and last from one to four long minutes.
I have deleted Team Speak Overlay, i have deleted and reloaded the game and the Team Speak program.
it doesnt seem to occur with anything else. i have changed settings several times within the game and ,,,oh hell, it just happened while typing this so now i am really confused. maybe its Firefox itself but DFX does not run through firefox, i dont think.
[Reply]
Pierre-Paul said:
8/2/2007 10:50 pm
I’ve been using liveCDs to help in diagnosing problems. I like to use PuppyLinux. This way, I bybass the OS installed on the hard drive. If everything works fine on the liveCD, I mount the hard drive and play around with the files. If everything works fine, I deduce the problem is a software problem.
LiveCDs are useful to diagnose computer components not being used (main OS and hard drive) while still having access to all the computer commodities (internet).
I like your article. I will try cleaning my wires and connectors.
[Reply]
Sam said:
8/13/2007 9:40 am
these are the two message that come on when I turn my coputer on, what’s the problem…
A problem has been detected and windows has shut down to prevent damage to your computer.
IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL
Restart computer, press F8 to select advance startup option, and then select safe mode.
Technical information:
*** STOP: 0X0000000A (0XFFFFFFFE8,0X00000002,0X00000001,0X80D9044)
Next message after restart:
STOP: C0000218 {Registry File Failure}
The resistry cannot load the hive {file}
\SystemRoot\System32\config\SOFTWARE
Or its lor or alternate
It is corrupt, absent, or not writeable
Beginning dump of physical memory
Physical memory dump complete.
Contact your system administration or technical support group for further assistance.
[Reply]
demster said:
8/28/2007 10:58 pm
i need HELP on my pc. i always have problem on booting. my pc restarts almost always when windows starts loading. then after restarting a menu fill pop prompting me on running on safe mode. ive been spending alot for pc repairs and i realy would want to do it in my own.
and also sometimes my pc wont boot it just makes a randomly rapid beeping sound, friends tip me off un trying to unplug my memory and cleaning it with an eraser and re installing it again. is that ok, wont the carbon contact have problems in the long run??? pls help tanx
[Reply]
james reply on August 10, 2008 9:02 am:
yes its ok to clean your memory it wont hurt your computerthats is usualy what happen if your memory is dirty it beeps, and also if you have a video card and your screen dont see nothing or its peech you have to do the same thing. clean it w/t alchol
[Reply]
edz said:
9/7/2007 2:52 am
Hi i have my computer problem. Which keeps on restarting everytime we play any computer games. please help me with this problem
God bless
[Reply]
Richard Painter reply on June 5, 2008 11:27 am:
My computer restarts after about 10 minutes and continues to do this every 10 minutes or so.
[Reply]
Tim said:
9/8/2007 11:24 pm
Hi,
I have a problem with my son’s PC locking up. I picked it up from my wife’s house this weekend and I have been messing with the PC today myself. It seams to lock up intermittently. Sometimes it will run for an hour playing video games until it locks up, some times it will lock up during or just after Win XP loads. Most times it remains locked up for 15 minutes or longer until I reboot the PC. One time however, I ran a movie DVD on the PC and it locked up for about 10 minutes and then began to run again. Ran for about 2-3 minutes and then locked up again until I finally had to reboot again. I have built three PCs and have fixed a few of my own problems before, so I would consider myself to have moderate intelligence about computer. This PC I build for my son about 20 months ago. It has an Athelon XP processor and two sticks 512 MB DDR RAM. I’m thinking that it I may be having one of the sticks of RAM go bad, or the processor is possible the problem. What would your thought be?
[Reply]
Darryl reply on June 30, 2008 8:49 pm:
I have just changed the board and processor in a Atlon 64..They tend to heat up..similar problem bought new board and proc ..from tiger direct for around $100.00..This Board also comes with Driver Software.I had to upgrade ram to DDR2..$50.00 …..But PC is like new again…O it,s 2 years old..Total repair $150.00
[Reply]
John Enea said:
10/28/2007 10:39 am
I have question, rather than a reply. My computer intermittently restarts and does not give me an error message. I have re-installed Windows XP, changed my power supply and changed my ram. It is restarting a lot less, but the problem is still there. At times, it won’t restart for days, but the problem is still there. I am running out of options,,,,,,,,,,,please can anyone help.
[Reply]
Rob said:
12/18/2007 2:27 pm
When i boot my pc, it automatically logs into my desktop ignoring the screen you would get with 2 users….my pc has 2 users and one is password protected, but it ignores this and logs straight into my desktop….however, if i log off to change users, then i will see both users and the password will work if i try to log into one of the accounts….how do i fix this?…thanks so much
[Reply]
Ramdas dalvi said:
12/21/2007 6:14 am
When i start my pc,after starting it will boot normal,but when desktop comes I get an application error “that,0*fffffff memory location could not written,
Because of it my pc takes nearly 30sec to open any drive,so I formated my pc and installed again but problem does not solved, so help me and send me reply.
thank you
[Reply]
jacob said:
12/28/2007 7:43 pm
i have just built my computer…it is the first computer i built….when i tried to boot from my dvd drive to install windows it wouldnt boot up…the screen would just stay black…i setup the bios so it would boot from dvd andit shows the dvd drive in the bios…so i took my hard drive out of the computer and boot it in a working computer to install windows then put the hard drive back in my computer to try and boot from the hard drive and it wont boot from the hard drive aswell. is there something wrong with my motherboard or any connections???
[Reply]
Joyce Shelly said:
3/4/2008 3:09 pm
Computer screen is BLACK BLANK nothing will show. I’ve rebooted many times and it will go nowhere after being turned on. Whats up with this? Please help
[Reply]
Tim reply on March 19, 2008 9:57 pm:
i’ve been experiencing this problem for quite some time now. it seems like your cmos battery is dead and it needs replacement or worse there’s something wrong with your motherboard
[Reply]
Darryl reply on June 30, 2008 9:07 pm:
are u sure your Monitor still works? Did u recheck Video cable for secureness?.
[Reply]
fraulein said:
3/21/2008 11:03 pm
NTLDR is missing..how can we fix that problem?
[Reply]
Darryl reply on May 4, 2008 10:52 pm:
When i get NTLDR I reinstall Windows OS…works every time…
[Reply]
Darryl reply on June 30, 2008 9:01 pm:
Also if u reinstall Windows and receive that message again…U might want to try that HD in another PC…It could need replacing….
[Reply]
Gary Bates said:
5/16/2008 11:14 am
im very new to pc use and have recently bought a delloptiplex gx 270 with windows xp. i had a problem with porn coming through on internet i have sorted this . in the process i think i have deleted something to do with the media player as it now makes no sounds. and the trouble shooter i used is no help. I think it comes down to the fact i need a disc to reload deleted media item. i have no discs as it was pre done. could you please tell me what i need to fix this Gary bates ( plonker ) i know thanks
[Reply]
Bill D said:
6/5/2008 9:00 am
I have a problem and I was hoping for some insight. While I was sending a large e-mail my Dell pc froze. I tried to power down by holding in the power button. The system wouldn’t shut down so I unplugged it. I haven’t been able to turn it on since then. Any ideas what is wrong with it?
[Reply]
david solomon said:
6/5/2008 11:41 am
My computer keeps respawning whenever I see the welcome screen at startup….Please tell me how to overcome this problem….I cannot risk on re-installing as I have some crucial data in my C drive !
[Reply]
Linda said:
6/24/2008 11:55 pm
My friend called me tonight and said that sometime during the day possibly during an electric outage her computer came back on and her whole desktop is enormous and she can’t get it back to normal size. I tried the right click on the desktop with her and going to properties, but she can not reach the apply part of the window. How do you fix this problem/ Thanks so much for your help.
[Reply]
Annette Breitkopf said:
6/27/2008 2:57 am
If the motherboard is the problem then what should i do then so that the motherboard will do fine? should i buy new one or what?
[Reply]
david solomon said:
6/27/2008 8:20 am
someone please help me with my problem !
[Reply]
Bino reply on June 29, 2008 3:02 am:
there will be so many reasons.do one thing login at safe mode and try to copy ur important data.If the computer is fail to boot in safe mode remove ur hard disk connect in another computer as a secondary drive and copy ur data.After you copy ur data try to reinstall windows
[Reply]
daniel said:
8/11/2008 8:05 pm
When I turn on my computer it lites up, and makes a consistant beeping noise, and the fan is running real loud, It doesnt boot up just a black screen, and beeping from the tower
[Reply]