[NBLUG/talk] Weirdness: BIOS POST lockups

[Eric T. Landerville]

I don't mean to suggest a simple answer that you have probably already
covered in your trials and tribulations, but have you unplugged all of
your usb devices.  I have a problem with a machine at work that if a
flash drive is plugged in it has the same symptoms that your machine is
having.  As soon as I snatch (usually full of anger) the flash drive out
it continues the boot process.  No reboot needed.
Eric

William Tracy wrote:
> (Sorry this email got so long, but I've been fighting this for a while
> without getting a resolution.)
>
>
> Hello,
>
> I've got a weird issue that has me stumped. :-) My computer randomly
> locks up on boot during the POST.
>
> Normally, when I first power on the machine I see a screen from my
> video card's firmware, then the screen for the Award BIOS. It checks
> my CPU and displays the CPU name, then checks the RAM, and I see the
> numbers rapidly count count off the amount of memory, followed by a
> brief pause before my bootloader launches.
>
> However, recently it has started locking up somewhere between the CPU
> detection and RAM detection. When this happens, I see the CPU name
> displayed, but the line where I normally see the memory count is
> completely blank. At the bottom of the screen I can see the notice to
> press delete to enter set up, but the computer doesn't respond to
> this--its completely locked up.
>
> Now, here's where things get really weird. :-)
>
> I first noticed the problem about a month and a half ago. It steadily
> got worse--sometimes I would have to power-cycle the machine half a
> dozen times to get to the bootloader (turn it on, see it lock up,
> power off, ...two ...three ...four, power it up, it locks up, power it
> off, go organize some books, power it up, it locks up...)--until it
> reached the point where I couldn't boot the machine at all. I pulled
> out the power supply (an Antec) and replaced it with a Dynex one. The
> problem magically went away, and I chalked it up to capacitor plague
> in the power supply.
>
> Then, three weeks ago, I left the machine running continuously for a
> week while seeding some torrents. At the end, I powered the machine
> down for the night (I normally turn off my computer at night or when
> I'm at class), and when I powered it up again the POST locked up as I
> described before.
>
> My first guess was that my new power supply was defective, and just
> hadn't failed until I stress tested it. I used the system normally for
> the next week, and found that the POST locked up more or less
> randomly, again as described before.
>
> However, before I returned the Dynex, I opted to test the old Antec
> one more time. Lo and behold, it booted. Again, over the next week, I
> found that it failed randomly on maybe every other boot. When I had
> stopped using it before, it had not been booting at all.
>
> So, now I'm wondering if the problem is really the power supply at
> all. I can't imagine what else it could be, though, unless maybe it's
> something in the motherboard. (I really don't want to replace the
> motherboard!)
>
> So, at this point I'm trolling for ideas. I've run out of keywords to
> throw at Google, and I've resorted to just leaving the machine on all
> the time because I don't know if I'll be able to power it up again.
> I've started panicking every time I think I smell smoke (happened
> twice so far, but it wasn't actually coming from the
> computer--probably from someone's microwave). :-(
>
> Any thoughts?
>
> (Trying to stay on topic, the machine in question *is* running Debian Etch...)
>
>