Page 1 of Urgent PC help, I know, should be other forum!

But for this one I need replies ASAP.
My mate has his own garage and does all my work. He`s also an MOT station.
He`s just off the phone to say his MOT PC has gone offline, all he gets is a blinking orange light.

It`s one of those half height Dell optiplex things. I`ve googled the orange/amber light on power up and have a range of crap from failed PSU through to complete failure. Also had bent pins on a USB port seems common (htf do you bend the pins on a USB port??) but seems unlikely as this machine is used for MOTs only.

Heading over there now but he`s about 40 minutes away so any and all advice/options from anyone who`s dealt with one of these machines before would be appreciated, including the stuff Dell etc. won`t tell you.

Also appears that the parts are proprietary Dell so if anyone knows workarounds on that too I`d appreciate it. He needs this machine running today so it looks like the PC I built him recently is going to have to do a dual job for a bit... and the Dell may end up in the skip if it comes to it!

Thanks guys and again, soz it`s not on the correct forum but need all the help I can get on this one!

Jimbo : oÞ

"Making Teenagers depressed is like shooting fish inna barrel"

Check the motherboard for leaky or bulging capacitors.
There is a way of doing a reset with the older GX`s involving swapping the mouse an keyboard plugs around and then switching it on but I can`t remember if you have to do anything else.
Also read about some surge protectors causing issues so check if there is one of those and also some powered USB devices causing grief. And you are right about lots of issues with bent USB pins! Never seen one myself though.

I would suspect power supply myself.

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Could someone please
Remove these cutleries
From my knees...

sorted now, byt not sure why.....
Removed everything from rear panel, tried to kick up.
Reconnected bit by bit, still wouldn`t boot.

High pressure airline to remove all dust, still nithing.
Couple of hard resets later and it`s working. BIOS reported prev. shutdown due to thermal event so going to re-do the thermal paste on the cpu but for now its running.

cheers for the reply!

Jimbo : oÞ

"Making Teenagers depressed is like shooting fish inna barrel"

Glad it`s sorted! Hate those unexplainable faults.

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Could someone please
Remove these cutleries
From my knees...

I`d check for bulging caps on the motherboard - I`ve had a couple of Optiplex 260 and 270 fail this way >:( (they run for a bit then just power off - symptoms all like like it is overheating). If it is that, the shutdown period will get sooner and sooner (and the only fix is either replace teh caps, or replace the motherboard)...

HK

Quote:
I`d check for bulging caps on the motherboard -
Pretty sure I mentioned this in my post... :B


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Could someone please
Remove these cutleries
From my knees...

Just as an aside, a friend of mine is a PT MOT tester & the HDD failed on the PC at the heart of the machine on the day of the Serenity`s first test.

Fortunately as a IT guy he had created a Ghost backup of the drive but wasn`t certain if it included the latest updates from August\September & we were pondering about cutting & pasting the later program folder from the old (fortunately still readable) to the backup.

Fortunately the backup included the last update, I just brought in a couple of HDD`s to make fresh backups. Result one free MOT for me. :D

May be an idea to Ghost the drive, especially when as mission critical as a MOT tester. ;).




I consider myself an optimist, albeit an optimist with cynical tendencies and a dark side that Lucifer himself would find a little creepy. (Perhaps you've noticed.) You don't normally associate cynicism with an upbeat pov. But I have exactly that combination and will defend it.

Heartily glad that I don`t have to learn how to spell Chiwetel Ejiofor.

Noted all comments.
Considering replacing casing for air flow and possibly the MoBo.

Backup of drive deffo an idea now.

Jimbo : oÞ

"Making Teenagers depressed is like shooting fish inna barrel"