DC7700 CMT won't boot, no beeps or flashes (now)

[mdklassen]

Big "corporate" customers need to test the monthly updates, and the semi-annual upgrades, before allowing the deployment of those updates, to ensure that their business-systems keep running.

But can they outright refuse to install updates that they don't want, or can they only defer them for a limited time?

Can an update be uninstalled if it causes problems?

Yes, the corporate company's IT Department  can fully control the updates of "managed" computers.

Of course, included in those management tools is the ability to uninstall any update.

[Rekrul]

I finally got around to swapping the motherboard and for the moment, everything seems to be back to normal. The real test will be to see if I get any random reboots or if the system is stable.

I did notice that when I first powered it on and it went through my memory (I have 4GB installed), it counted to 3584 fairly quickly, but then slowed to a crawl for the last 512MB.

I also had a brief moment of panic when I discovered I had no sound, but I just had to go into the BIOS, disable the Nvidia sound device and re-enable the onboard one. I don't use the Nvidia one because I have a VGA monitor and there's no way that I know of to send the audio on the card to my speakers. As far as I know, it's only on the HDMI connector. So I disable it and use the system sound.

If I DO get random reboots, is that more likely to be the power supply, or the CPU?

[erico]

I see that my less wordy answer was appropriate and accurate.

I will stick with being as concise as I possibly can. That way we do not waste each other's valuable time.

Why not wait until you do have issues before addressing them?

[mdklassen]

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@erico wrote:

Why not wait until you do have issues before addressing them?

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I outsource "preventative maintenance" on my automobile and my teeth, and do P.M. on my computer, to avoid "issues", before they arise.  It is my opinion that doing so is a good thing.

[Rekrul]

An update:

I've been using it for the last couple of days with it on for hours at a time and so far I haven't had any problems, so it looks like it's all fixed. At least until the next thing wears out.

After I removed the old board, I examined it more closely and I couldn't see anything wrong with it. There were no burned traces or components indicating a power surge, all the capacitors looked normal, I didn't see any cracks, etc. It apparently just died.

[SamirD]

A little late to help you, but I don't think you had a bad motherboard at all, although the random rebooting could have been indicitive of something starting to fail.

I ran across a very similar problem with a Dell system and it turns out the processor wasn't seated propertly.  Once I reseated the processor, everything was fine.

Since you do enjoy your system and want to keep it running (and I don't blame you since I have even older systems which I still keep running), I would recommend a few things.

First, use this as an opportunity to upgrade.  Upgrades on systems of this era are quite cheap, and now that you potentially have a spare motherboard, you can afford to do some experimenting.

I would get a spare or upgraded power supply and try booting that on your old motherboard with an upgraded processor like the e6700, x6700, or potentially a Pentium e6700 (I believe this should work but can't find any information online of anyone who's tried it).  You might need some ram for this test as well, so you can carefully take that out of your existing system.

Once you've established you've got a faster setup as a backup, you can transfer the power supply and cpu to your working system at your leisure.

Another area I would look into upgrading once you have a bigger power supply (if an upgrade is indeed possible), is to add a gtx 770 gpu.  This is one of the fastest gpus you could use on windows xp, and would be a huge kick in the pants, even if you don't play games.

And lastly, because xp isn't supported and is still somewhat targeted for malware, etc, I would recommend you look into windows steadystate.  This was an addon for xp that allowed you to lock down your system to unprecented levels.  You can freeze the entire configuration to the point where nothing can change it, and a quick reboot restores it to how you initially set it up.  We actually use this for several xp systems and it works great effectively turning them into toasters that just work. 

Internet access for xp isn't easy as many sites require upgraded security, and firefox 50 seems to be the best that we've found so far in addition to chrome 45.  Portable versions of these are great to use in conjunction with steadystate as you can install them on a different partition without any installation.

I wish you the best in keep your faithful dc7700 running.  As someone else who appreciates keeping things running, I know where you're coming from and wish you the best.  🙂