Boot up problems with older Acer desktop [Solved]

[Falcon]

Tony45,

This is food for thought.

[ghunter]

well spotted by operadude

According to my eyesight the cards appear to be dusty......and dust leads to excessive heat and often makes a system slower.
Especially the lowest card in the photo

speaking of dust....you can buy a cable that is narrow that replaces the wide ribbon cable going to floppy.
https://i5.walmartimages.com/asr/22d838 ... 3b70e.jpeg

[operadude]

Don't worry, I won't sue you. My widow might, but I won't. (LOL)

I think that I'll pick up a new PSU and install it. I don't think that it can hurt anything. If it solves the problem, then I'll move on to fixing the bad caps.

Sounds like a plan

BTW: Regarding your statement above, "My widow...":

Seems like a logical conundrum, but explains why nobody believes me when I say, 'I see dead people.'

Oh, and super-thanks to @ghunter for the wicked-cool cable

Falcon, please let us know what happens, and good luck!

[Falcon]

Before I go crazy here with this, I'll just ask the question, cuz' I like to understand things. Why would a failing power supply cause the computer to hang at the Acer BIOS screen when the computer is first powered up, but after shutting it off and then powering up again, the bootup sequence works fine, even if I shut down and restart time and time again. It only seems to happen once on a cold start.

I probably should have included this information in the original post, but I had already explained it in the first thread in the Software forum and I neglected to reiterate it again here.

[j2mcgreg]

Because it may need a boot / reboot sequence to produce the voltages array required by the motherboard and peripherals. It's only going to get worse. It's like a car where the starter motor is going bad --- the first few times you might have to turn the key or press the start button twice to get the engine to fire, then it become three times, then four, then it becomes random, and finally it won't start at all. The problem is that as it deteriorates, it may also produce power spikes that can fry your motherboard.

[operadude]

Before I go crazy here with this, I'll just ask the question, cuz' I like to understand things. Why would a failing power supply cause the computer to hang at the Acer BIOS screen when the computer is first powered up, but after shutting it off and then powering up again, the bootup sequence works fine, even if I shut down and restart time and time again. It only seems to happen once on a cold start.

I probably should have included this information in the original post, but I had already explained it in the first thread in the Software forum and I neglected to reiterate it again here.

No problemo, boss

No skin off my teeth to hear more questions!

It really is above my pay-grade to answer your question, since I do not have a degree in electrical engineering!

Having said that, IMHO, these "power" issues sometimes do reflect something not up to snuff in the PSU. It might be that one of the PSU components is starting to go; maybe some of the circuitry, including the traces on the PSU board, solder joints, etc. are not perfect, and need extra "juice" to work properly. I really am spit-balling here, but I have seen wonky PSUs, that are not dead, just "mostly dead" (for extra-credit, name that movie!).

Like I said before, it may not be the PSU at all, and for that matter, not the "bad" caps, either!

I worked on a friend's computer that was periodically, and unexpectedly, re-booting. He thought it was the PSU, because there was obviously a "power" issue (powering-off). This actually proved to be a VERY TRICKY fault, that took me many hours to diagnose properly. The problem turned-out to be a wonky power-switch cable: the thin wires that connect the power switch to the power-header on the MOBO

I returned the fixed computer with my report, starting from "presenting problem", and concluding with "recommendations". The whole report was 5 pages long! Oh, I also advised him to buy a replacement PSU, which was not a standard ATX form factor, but a proprietary small-form-factor from Dell, but which could be purchased on Amazon. I recommended a new PSU as a backup to his aging (10 years?) PSU, which I had dismantled and thoroughly cleaned anyway, just for the fun of it.

Long story short: it may not be the PSU; or, you may have multiple faults/issues.

If it were I, I would probably buy a new PSU, just in case; I'm also a bit of a hardware junky.

Anyway, please let us know how it goes!

[operadude]

@j2mcgreg

@Falcon His answer sounds highly plausible to me

[Falcon]

Well, I guess I'll have to do it. Replacing the PSU is not an easy task because some of the wiring to the drives runs UNDER the MB, I have to practically disassemble the entire computer. I guess if I'm going to replace the caps, I could do that at the same time. I hope that the caps have capacity values and voltages printed on them. I can't really tell until I get the MB out so that I can see them from different angles.

[operadude]

Well, I guess I'll have to do it. Replacing the PSU is not an easy task because some of the wiring to the drives runs UNDER the MB, I have to practically disassemble the entire computer. I guess if I'm going to replace the caps, I could do that at the same time. I hope that the caps have capacity values and voltages printed on them. I can't really tell until I get the MB out so that I can see them from different angles.

While you're at it, clean off as much dust as possible (compressed air, or heavy breathing-- yeah, I'm in love with my hardware ).

CRITICALLY, only do ONE change at a time, and test.

I would start with replacing the PSU, test to see if you pass the P.O.S.T. (Power-On-Self-Test-- basically, see if it boots-up). If yes, then fix the rest later.



BTW: If you have never replaced capacitors before, I would definitely watch some YouTube tutorials. Not only are the correct voltages and capacity values important, but also the ORIENTATION, i.e., where the positive and negative legs go. Lots of short videos on YT

Oh, yeah, and easy-does-it with the soldering iron! I have learned the hard way by burning tracks, damaging other nearby components, etc. You will definitely want to practice on a spare board. A lot of the YT videos make it look easy, but it's not soooo easy. Also, make sure you have good solder, solder wick (to clear-up remaining solder, re-do the joint, etc.). You should get all of these tips from a decent YT video on the subject.

Let us know how it goes

[Falcon]

Okay, I finally got around to getting the computer fixed. Since there were three capacitors that appeared to be leaking, as evidenced by the bulging tops and brown stains, I disassembled the computer and took out the three bad caps. All of them were 1800 ufd at 6.3 volts and they were the only three caps of this type on the board. After hearing that Japanese capacitors are the best, I looked around in eBay and found some that at least had Japanese names. I replaced the three caps and then was thinking of replacing the power supply also, but the way that Acer ran some of the wiring, I would have had to almost completely disassemble the case to get it all out, so I decided to just put everything back together and see if everything still worked as it had before I went any further. Upon turning on the computer, it went directly to the MX Linux boot menu, without hanging as it had before. Over the next couple of days, I tried the cold start again a number of times and it still works as it should. So it looks like the capacitors were the source of the problem and it was an easy fix. I didn't need the power supply after all, but I still have it in case the one in this computer or my other desktop die at some point.

Thanks to everyone who offered suggestions and insights into this that allowed me to get the computer working again.