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I have a 7-8 year old Dell computer and lately turning it on has become a bit of an ordeal,
I push the on/start button and instead of coming to life all i hear is a brief whoosh of a fan but the light on the on/start button just flashes amber and nothing else happens so i hold the on/start button till the computer turns off then try to restart it again, its usually taking 5-6 tries before it finally comes to life. I'll assume something is wearing out but have no clue what it might be, is this something i can fix or is it a job for a computer tech?
Thanks
I've run across this issue a number of times, possible causes are bad motherboard or power supply.
Open the case and have a look for blown capacitors. They all should be perfectly flat on top, if they are bulging or leaking they are bad. Also look for excessive dust while you're in there.
I saw this symptom on dozens of Dell computers about 8-10 years ago. The brief fan activity followed by a blinking amber light on the power button was a failed power supply every time.
I have a 7-8 year old Dell computer and lately turning it on has become a bit of an ordeal,
I push the on/start button and instead of coming to life all i hear is a brief whoosh of a fan but the light on the on/start button just flashes amber and nothing else happens so i hold the on/start button till the computer turns off then try to restart it again, its usually taking 5-6 tries before it finally comes to life. I'll assume something is wearing out but have no clue what it might be, is this something i can fix or is it a job for a computer tech?
Thanks
The same thing was happening with mine a couple of months ago (more like 10 years old) and then it stopped.
I only turn it on maybe once a week or every couple of weeks though.
Real helpful, huh?
It's the 'fingers crossed' fix-it method
I've run across this issue a number of times, possible causes are bad motherboard or power supply.
Open the case and have a look for blown capacitors. They all should be perfectly flat on top, if they are bulging or leaking they are bad. Also look for excessive dust while you're in there.
When I saw the leaking capacitors in the Dell computers 10 years ago, they almost always powered on with a CMOS message saying the previous shutdown was due to a thermal event. (I guess, in a way, that was correct.)
When I saw the leaking capacitors in the Dell computers 10 years ago, they almost always powered on with a CMOS message saying the previous shutdown was due to a thermal event. (I guess, in a way, that was correct.)
Depends on the failed caps, they can have any number of symptoms. I've had PC's with a number of bad ones that still boot and run fine. I've had others that were up and running for months just fine, but would not POST when a reboot was needed.
Depends on the failed caps, they can have any number of symptoms. I've had PC's with a number of bad ones that still boot and run fine. I've had others that were up and running for months just fine, but would not POST when a reboot was needed.
This is pretty much how we saw them too.
My wife had a box that ran for over a year with several bad caps on it. I just made sure it got it's daily backup, and we ran it until it died.
At work we had a rash of bad caps about 10 years ago (several hundred machines in the field). They would run fine until they got rebooted, then they wouldn't POST.
Depends on the failed caps, they can have any number of symptoms. I've had PC's with a number of bad ones that still boot and run fine. I've had others that were up and running for months just fine, but would not POST when a reboot was needed.
Based on the OP's statement that it was a 7-8 year old Dell reminded me of the experiences I had with the OptiPlex GX-270 model and figured he probably has something similar, like a Dimension 2400. I had one with failed capacitors that failed to POST but sounded like it was revving for takeoff with the fan running full speed.
I had an SX-260 to simply failed to start back up on a restart too.
I saw this symptom on dozens of Dell computers about 8-10 years ago. The brief fan activity followed by a blinking amber light on the power button was a failed power supply every time.
Concur, bad PSU. Any easy DIY. PC could also have failing motherboard caps, it's in the right time period when cr@p Chinese caps were all the rage....
Concur, bad PSU. Any easy DIY. PC could also have failing motherboard caps, it's in the right time period when cr@p Chinese caps were all the rage....
This isn't a time period related issue, I see devices only a couple years old still having the same cap issues.
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