Computer cannot start up

[Ex14]

First of all before i begin, i'll like to say i'll be in semi rant mode, so i apologise if this turns into more "complaint" thread than a tech help thread. also i'm not too sure where this goes so sorry if i posted in the wrong forum.

First of all i got a com, an Acer M5800, with the following specs.

Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium , 64-bit, Intel Core 2 Quad Processor Q9400 (2.66GHz, 6MB L2 Cache, 1333MHz FSB), 4GB Ram, 1TB S-ATA HDD, DVD SuperMulti Double-Layer Drive, Nvidia GeForce GT230 Graphics Card (1.5GB Dedicated RAM), Wireless LAN, Wireless Keyboard and Mouse, With 23" LCD Monitor.

----WOT ahead----(u may skip this)

So all was nice and well....till. a certain thing called MY BROTHER came in and installed all his crap. multiple converters, !@#$ing crap games. All this after i told him to run anything he wants to install thru me first. No. he doesn't do that.

So anyway the firs signs of trouble started on sunday. when the com refused to startup. by start up i mean really start up. heck the CPU was on but it wouldn't even show me the ACER screen. To make things worse the HDD indicator light wasn't flashing at all. I had to turn off the power and switch it back on. this continued a few times before it worked. I told him immediately.

Fast forward to yesterday. Arrived home yesterday from sch. saw that idiot using the com. Saw he had two installation files for dragonica (yes TWO that idiot, and from the file name he used to have more). I tried to del it but all it resulted in was the com hanging. So i told him off and said u btr del that shyt. well low and behold he managed to. after like 2-3 hours. My turn i decided to BT overnight some stuff. started BT went up to my room watched Fringe, came down. I was perplexed to see the router light not blinking furiously as it always di when bt-ing. switched on the monitor and viola. a BSOD. best part. the com was HANGED on the BSOD. So i had to off the power and reboot. thee startup probs came again. but i finally got it working. turned on my BT and went to my room again. watched criminal minds, came down and same thing. BSOD. thinking it might take some time to sort out the BSOD i left it on and went up to sleep.

SO today morning came down and check on it. !@#!@$! it was still stuck on BSOD. never changed from the night before. turned off power and tried to boot it. start up probs again. when it finally DID boot, i tried booting it into safe mode, but it hanged again. 30 mins later, with my father rushing me to school, i managed to start it, and started Startup repair.


----WOT ends----

To summarize. My com can't start up 100% all the time, and when it does it BSODs after a while. Safe mode hangs, and i have started startup repair. in the event this continues, can anyone provide some advice/assistance for me? thanks. ._.

 

[blueprintstudios]

typical all time popular hardware error even 64bit can't handle : sibling replacement required.

j/k

tell your dad to get your bro another comp and don't share.

 

[Ex14]

typical all time popular hardware error even 64bit can't handle : sibling replacement required.

j/k

tell your dad to get your bro another comp and don't share.

To be honest i have a laptop of my own. i use the desktop cause it's the only com which is not moving, hence using a wired internet connection. another reason is the HDD space. which for me is important since i save most of the TV shows and Music in high quality formats like FLAC and WMA lossless, not to meniton HD content...

I hope my media files can be saved. it ammounts to almost 500 GB.

I wouldn't also put ALL the blame on my bro. ACER is not exactly a fault free brand. =3= and i wouldn't be surprised if tis was caused by a hardware failure. but that seems unlikely cause we got this com only on july.

After this I'm gonna give my bro a non admin acc. so he can't install anything till he gets my ok.

 

[kongwee]

Best it is not to share. Vista from what I know from the work side, do not totally clear guest account after log out.

Also next time put your media files on external HDD. A cheap USB 2.0 HDD can handle HD MPEG 2 video flawlessly.

 

[Gr3yF0x]

fringe is a damn nice series eh!

 

[Cheez]

Best way - dual boot your machine. One boot partition on a hard drive for yourself, another boot partition on an entire different hard-drive for your bro. Make sure no sharing between the HDs. Then he can do whatever he wants on his partition without affecting yours.

However, if your machine is not booting up right from the start (ie you can't even access your bios), it's more likely a hardware problem rather than software.

If you can, do a clean install with 2 partitions as described above. Then see if problem still exist. If it's still there, contact Acer. By the way, I've totally given up on Acer. I've 2 notebooks in the past (one a desktop replacement) which I've spent too much time trying to fix (including sending to their factory multiple times without getting the problem fixed). Not worth the time and money.

 

[Ex14]

Also next time put your media files on external HDD. A cheap USB 2.0 HDD can handle HD MPEG 2 video flawlessly.

lol not enough. the media alrdy occupies almost 85-90% of my D drive which is 500 GB. gonna extend that drive when i reach home later.

fringe is a damn nice series eh!

Agreed. =D

Best way - dual boot your machine. One boot partition on a hard drive for yourself, another boot partition on an entire different hard-drive for your bro. Make sure no sharing between the HDs. Then he can do whatever he wants on his partition without affecting yours.

However, if your machine is not booting up right from the start (ie you can't even access your bios), it's more likely a hardware problem rather than software.

If you can, do a clean install with 2 partitions as described above. Then see if problem still exist. If it's still there, contact Acer. By the way, I've totally given up on Acer. I've 2 notebooks in the past (one a desktop replacement) which I've spent too much time trying to fix (including sending to their factory multiple times without getting the problem fixed). Not worth the time and money.

LOL adual boot would solve my problems but at the same time give me a new set of probs. My parents aren't really average with the com calling me for every little thing. so yea.

LOL the reason we got ACER was the price. which in all reality if u pay for those specs under a 2K premade is pretty cheap. I was kinda prepared to see it fail. but alas this is not the time. Apparently startup repair worked, and i managed to regain the nice experience of a maintained system. immediately ran a update of MSE and ran a quick check, which not surpridsingly came up with a slew of trojans and malware.

So thanks for all the help guys, i'll close my fingers that this period will last as long as possible. thanks once again.

 

[Cheez]

Dual boot is not difficult to set up, and once set up, is really easy to startup. A novice can do it. You get a startup screen on bootup of which you need to choose which OS you want to boot. You can use a free utility called EasyBCD, of which you can change the name options (e.g. Boot 1: Naughty Brother, Boot 2: Everybody Else). The person just select which to boot from, and it's done. No more problems.

 

[logicdroid]

Next time you manage to get the PC up and running, create an Administrator account with a password,

Create accounts for everyone else who are going to use the same PC including a guest account.

Make sure the accounts are standard accounts and are not "Administrators"..

Every time someone wants to install more programs, they'll need the ..... administrator's password.

If this is not secure enough for you, then better to go Dual Boot.

Boot disk 01 - family HD.
Boot disk 02 - Your own.

Best.

 

[CrazyCactusJack]

By the way, I've totally given up on Acer. I've 2 notebooks in the past (one a desktop replacement) which I've spent too much time trying to fix (including sending to their factory multiple times without getting the problem fixed). Not worth the time and money.

Same experience here..

 

[kongwee]

I rather build my own comp (for Window system).

 

[Cheez]

Kongwee is right. Actually, I thought Kongwee is going to say, "Just get a Mac!" :mrgreen:

 

[Ex14]

Next time you manage to get the PC up and running, create an Administrator account with a password,

Create accounts for everyone else who are going to use the same PC including a guest account.

Make sure the accounts are standard accounts and are not "Administrators"..

Every time someone wants to install more programs, they'll need the ..... administrator's password.

Yup plan to do so.

Kongwee is right. Actually, I thought Kongwee is going to say, "Just get a Mac!"

I rather build my own comp (for Window system).

If i could i would, unfortunately i dun have the funds. this current desktop is pid by my prents. i plan to build one once i get the cash lol.

Anyway yesterday decided to reinstall. but it was not without troubles...it hunged halfway though set up and hung right again just before windows could start for the first time. I'm gonna give ACER a call later. Can they save the ddata on a disk partition for u?

 

[Cheez]

Sounds like hardware problem indeed... Yes, they should be able to retrieve the data on your HD for you.

 

[Ex14]

Sounds like hardware problem indeed... Yes, they should be able to retrieve the data on your HD for you.

shyt. for a desktop less than a year old....mygosh.... o well shall call acer later. thanks for the help rendered by all the peep =D

 

[Cheez]

My Acer desktop replacement was sent to the service center in Jurong thrice just after my 1 year warranty was up. Prior to that, my Acer notebook had to get the HD replaced just after the 1 year warranty was up. Hence I never trusted Acer ever again.

For desktop, always better to build your own. For notebooks, you have no choice. But I never go for Acer.

 

[kongwee]

shyt. for a desktop less than a year old....mygosh.... o well shall call acer later. thanks for the help rendered by all the peep =D

Also backup your harddisk next time.

 

[Ex14]

My Acer desktop replacement was sent to the service center in Jurong thrice just after my 1 year warranty was up. Prior to that, my Acer notebook had to get the HD replaced just after the 1 year warranty was up. Hence I never trusted Acer ever again.

For desktop, always better to build your own. For notebooks, you have no choice. But I never go for Acer.

my gosh *prays*

Also backup your harddisk next time.

I did. to the best of my ability/capacity. the files i really want to be saved, only half of it can be saved for my ext hdd do not have the capacity to contain the data i want held in this desktop.

 

[blueprintstudios]

My personal decade-long-guineapig-experience-recommendation to all who's reading this:

Ram : Cosair / Kingston

Mainboard : Asus/Gigabyte. NEVER MSI. I fixed up 5 identical office pcs with MSI mobos all broke down at the same time.

HDD : I used to vote Maxtor ,then jumped to western d, then used to boycott seagate, but lately ironically maxtor and western d drop standard and seagate so far "OK". one hdd almost starting to fail cos i abused it. Hitachi not good either. samsung probably underrated but i don't want to play guinea pig anymore.

Chicken Vs Egg : i don't want to play ATI vs Nvidia + AMD vs Intel games with any of you. including win xp vs win vista vs win 7 vs mac vs linux.

laptop : never acer or benQ. personally i'm an Asus guy overall cos i think asus makes high quality stuff. if not lenovo/IBM's good too, but a little ugly.. Dell originally sucked, then starting to pickup reputation then going to the gutters again cos of some shipment order problem.

 

[blueprintstudios]

to help trouble shoot :
"hunged halfway though set up" <--
1) if cd installation prompts you missing or corrupted files either your cd is screwed or your cdrom is screwed , or rare cases, the I/O Data cable of your cdrom is screwed.
2) ram
3) if the configuration slows down and hard disk light keeps reading, and your hdd is making weird noises or have fever (high temp) , your hdd is failing.

data backup : i think they expect you to backup yourself. cos in common cases they can't be bothered to sift through your files and ask you what to back up and what not. especially if your "recovery" options is via a recovery partition stored on the hdd.

regarding creating multi accounts. I've given up on that because fixing computers for past clients especially sharing siblings caused great inconvenience when the system fails again (both sharing 1 windows OS, usually the younger bro gamer downloads a virus that screws up) and you have to take ownership bla bla one by one and seek out all files. etc etc etc. before you can reformat and reinstall again.
PC stands for personal computer, if it's being shared, is it really personal? in another thread I stated u could fix up a new pretty decently powerful pc for around $550. and that's not a huge amount as compared to those days when Pentium 3s used to cost easily $1300 (not to mention today's currency is smaller)

do a write up proposal to your parents, either your brother stops downloading rubbish and have discipline in sharing use of the PC or they get you a new desktop.