Troubleshooting a hanged PC

Here are some methods to troubleshoot and getting worked a hanged PC.
Follow these methods at your own risk. I am not responsible for any system crash.

1. Check the power supply

If the LED on your pc cabinet’s front panel can’t display light by pressing the POWERON button, check the SMPS in the PC cabinet’s back.
If the SMPS fan is working fine, then check the power supply, which goes to motherboard.
Whenever you check the SMPS’s inner parts, if some liquid is flowing or leaking from capacitors or if any parts are damaged by power failure, replace the SMPS with new one.
Don’t replace the capacitors or fuses in the SMPS. If you replace them, sometimes they may cause system failure due to the insufficient power supply.

2. Remove Cards/Drives

If the SMPS is OK, then remove all PCI/AGP cards and Hard Disk / Floppy Disk / CD/DVD media cable connections from the motherboard.
Then Power On your PC. If you see display on your monitor screen, then connect each and every drive/PCI/AGP card one by one and check display. If you can’t see display by connecting any one of them remove that card/drive.
Generally, the IDE/power supply/RESET button cables can create problems.
Check them clearly.


3. Physically checking the motherboard

If all the cable connections/card connections are OK, go to this below step.
Sometimes some of the components on the motherboard can look like color less due to overheating. Don’t neglect them. Remove the RAM/PCI cards from those slots, clean both slots and RAM/CARDS and fix them in those slots again as they are fixed previously. Sometimes the display card on the motherboard PCI/AGP slot can cause a problem. Remove that card once, clean it with a dry cloth and fix it in the slot. If you found something bad with those RAM/Cards, replace them with the new ones.

4. Check the CPU & BIOS Jumper Settings

If all are OK as I said above, follow this step.
Replace the processor with another one if it is available with you, or somewhere else, as the processor clock speed is compatible with your processor clock speed. If it is OK, then check the BIOS jumper settings. Sometimes system can hang if the BIOS jumper settings are wrong.

5. Check the Keyboard Fuse

If you connect or remove your keyboard when your system power is on, it may cause damage to your pc or hang, by keyboard fuse burning out. It is too difficult to identify keyboard fuse in the keyboard inner part. See for F1, F2 names on the keyboard controller board, there exists keyboard fuse. Check the keyboard inner part board with multimeter when it is connected to pc. If there is no reading in the multimeter replace the keyboard with new one.

6. Check CPU fan

If all are OK, follow this step.
Whenever you are working on your pc, suddenly if system halts, first of all check the CPU fan. Sometimes overheating can also cause system hang. Remove one of the cabinet cover and keep it up to 30-60 minutes. Then restart the system. If your system works, the system hang is caused by overheating. Fix one extra SMPS fan in the cabinet backside.

7. Check L1, L2 Cache

If your system hangs within seconds when you boot PC, it’s all about you have to check L1, L2 cache. How can it possible? Here is the way….
Whenever you boot from floppy drive, these type of problems will come.
Go to BIOS setup prompt when your system boots. It is easy to enter BIOS.
You have to press F1or F2 or DEL or ESC keys to enter BIOS at system startup.
Then you will see a setup prompt. Find L1, L2 cache options from those options given in your BIOS setup prompt. Disable those L1, L2 cache and restart your PC. If your PC works correctly, keep those L1, L2 caches disabled.

The Last and final step to getting worked your PC…

If nothing helps as I have mentioned above, remove the motherboard from cabinet and take it away to a well known hardware technician. Sometimes the onboard VGA display can cause problems. The display chip controller can also cause problems. Check it with a good hardware specialist.
The information above, I have given is collected from various sources. I am not tried those above tips. If you found this article helpful and got the information you needed please forward it to your friends and share it in online communities and forums and give me feedback.

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