boot - Why would my notebook only turn on after several attempts?
2014-07
arielnmz
It was working perfectly fine until I changed it's Celeron processor for a Core 2 Duo today. Now it only turns on 1 out of 5 or 6 attempts. Sometimes at the 1st or 2nd attempt. It's pretty random by the way. This is what happens:
- I press the power button and I hear the fan and the LEDs light up. But it won't turn on. There's no beeps, no bios, not even screen backlight.
- I turn it off (by pressing the power button for ~5 seconds) and turn it on again, but still nothing.
- I repeat steps 1 and 2 until it finally turns on correctly.
- Once turned on it works perfectly fine: there's no lag, no overheating, no failures, nothing.
This also happens when I reboot it: it turns off normally but it won't turn on again and I have to repat steps 1 through 3 until I reach 4. Once it's on, it works perfectly fine.
Temp is about 48° Celsius when idle and maxing at about 71° (the sensors command says that critical temp. is +100°), so I don't think temperature is the issue. I've even tried letting it cool down completely but it doesn't make a difference.
Additional information:
The new CPU's FSB clock rate (800 MHz) isn't the same as that of my old processor (533 MHz), but as far as I know if that were the issue it shouldn't be able to turn on at all, no matter how many attempts I tried.
The lshw command indicates that I have a PM965/GM965/GL960 chipset, each one supporting an 800 MHz FSB, an 800 MHz FSB, and a 533 MHz FSB, respectively, according to what the Intel ARK pages say. So I don't know for sure which is the one that my motherboard has, since this processor has an 800 MHz FSB and it works fine once it has turned on. This is the output of lshw:
/0/100 bridge Mobile PM965/GM965/GL960 Memory Controller Hub
/0/100/2 display Mobile GM965/GL960 Integrated Graphics Controller (primary)
/0/100/2.1 display Mobile GM965/GL960 Integrated Graphics Controller (secondary)
My notebook doesn't have any battery, so it's always running on the AC, in case you wonder.
Update:
It seems that the problem has somehow settled down: now only 1 out of 10 attempts fail. I still can't find any logical explanation for this.
geotavros
I've overclocked my PC by increasing the system bus frequency from 200 to 333(266 has the same issue). Everything works fine except for booting.
When I press the power button, the PC starts up but reboots after only a second. After that it boots and works fine. Note that this only happens when I take the power cable out from the wall outlet. If I shutdown and then press the power button without unplugging the cable, the PC will boot fine from the first attempt.
I think that this may be a motherboard or power supply problem. Any suggestions?
Specifications:
- Intel Pentium E5200 dual-core
- Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3L iP45 Socket 775 motherboard
- Kingston 4GB DDR2 RAM
- MSI R4850 HD GPU
- Zalman 600W power supply
Note that I'm making all of these changes in the BIOS. On the second attempt the BIOS is not resetting any of the settings - I know this because when it does reset the settings to the defaults it gives me a red message box saying that the settings were reset.
Troggy
Are you making these changes in the BIOS? It sounds like it is resetting settings when it reboots the second time around. Does everything work ok normally at stock speeds? You may have one part that does not like any sort of increase. As always, with overclocking, stability can quickly be an issue.
Bobby Hashemi
I have a p45-ds3, and it does this sometimes as well... I don't really know what to tell you other than it may have to do with your OC(but it is not dangerous as far as I know).
I never check to see if it only happened when it loses machine power, but that may be the case. It sounds like a grounding issue or an unstable overclock, but since we have the same mobo, that does the same thing, I tend to think it's just some weird issue with the board.