RE: [SLE] Need help diagnosing hardware problem

On Monday, October 16, 2006 @ 7:44 PM, Felix Miata wrote:

On 06/10/16 19:19 (GMT-0500) Greg Wallace apparently typed:

On Monday, October 16, 2006 @ 2:04 PM, Felix Miata wrote:

What happens if you disable the screensaver and DPMS?

Could a screensaver problem cause the machine to not be able to re-boot?
I

Certainly seems possible if the video card has a heat-related problem.
Screensavers commonly keep a graphics card loaded more than web surfing,
IM,
or email typically do.

forgot where DMPS is controlled. Could you tell me how to turn it off?

Comment out the xorg.conf option line that has it.

I'll try this later. I've just come across some documentation on the
European Dell web site that informed me about 4 little lights on the back of
my machine. All lights should be green. If any or yellow, then the
particular pattern tells you the problem you are having
(green-yellow-yellow-yellow = Possible BIOS failure,
green-yellow-green-yelloow = Possible video card failure or bad on-board
video, etc.). So, I just need to wait for the next time it freezes and
check those lights. Hopefully, that will point me to the specific error,
assuming it functions as advertised and they aren't all still green!

Check the docs on your BIOS to find out exactly what 2 beeps means

What docs. I got zilch in the way of documentation with this Dell
machine,
and Dell tech support couldn't tell me what two beeps meant (actually,
they
took off on a tangent and didn't even try to answer that question, about
what I've come to expect from their tech support).

Google for BIOS beep codes Dell should answer it, or search the Dell
forums.

Yep, I found this via Google. I had googled before but just didn't specify
the right search criteria.

1. Cleaning -- Well, I cleaned it out as best I could. I tried a vacuum
and a wisk broom. It's hard to a lot of the areas because of all of the
things sticking up in the air and covering other things up. I have to
say,
however, that it really didn't look all that dirty.

If it didn't look very dirty, particularly on the heat sinks, then likely
heat is not the problem, unless the video card has a dead fan cooler. How
old is it?

2. Power supply -- How does one test the power supply?

You can get a go/nogo power supply tester for under $20. With the system
running, check the voltages with any multimeter at the
power-to-motherboard-plug and see if they match what the label on the PS
says they should be.

I'll keep this in mind if the light codes don't give me a diagnosis.

Overall, as I said above, I'm suspecting a bad video card as the culprit.

Methinks same thing. Don't you know anywhere to borrow or steal any old
video card just to test? PCI or AGP (or if you have such a slot, PCI-X,
though not likely you'd find an old one of those to borrow), anything just
to see if problem goes away. The US is full of old puters sitting around
collecting dust with no one to be bothered to get rid of them. Just be sure
with an old AGP card that its voltage requirement matches what the
motherboard can provide. Newer ones use lower voltage.

Searching for video on your model on the Dell forum might turn up a reason
to get Dell more involved.

Greg Wallace


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