Inspiron 546 Desktop wont boot

[chewie8008]

I have a Dell Inspiron 546 that wont boot. When the power button is pressed it makes the usual sounds like it is booting, the PSU fans run as well as the case fans. Nothing will come up on the screen. I have tried it on two different monitors, so I know it's not the monitor or the VGA cable. The power button light glows a solid orange, as opposed to the usual solid white. From what i've read it's a hardware failure. I am trying to narrow it down to what I need to replace before I go buying random parts. I have opened it up and pulled out all the memory sticks and cards and placed them firmly back in, no luck. I have also tried a different power supply from another working PC, no luck there either. I also tried a different CMOS battery from a PC that I know was good, no luck. I am leaning towards a failed MOBO, but how do I find out for sure without just buying one and trying it?

Oh and one more thing, I pulled the lever up to allow the CPU fan and heatsink to be removed, once I released the lever and lightly pulled on the fan, the heatsink and fan came right off of the CPU, is that normal? I wasnt sure if that thermal paste was supposed to be solidly connecting the heatsink and CPU or if that matters?

Any help would be greatly appreciated...

[jagabo]

Remove everything that's not needed to get to the BIOS setup. Ie, hard drives, DVD drive, extra memory, PCI cards, etc. Any better?

It's normal for the CPU/cooler to easily come off after releasing the lever.

[chewie8008]

It's just a basic Dell PC, so it doesnt have a lot. I will disconnect the DVD drive and the 56k modem. It has 4 sticks of 1GB ram that came with it...how many should I remove? Doesn't Windows 7 need at least 2GB? And it only has the one HDD that has the OS installed on it, so cant pull that obviously. I just pulled that HDD and put it in my other PC that already holds 3 HDDs. I pulled the 3rd HDD out and put the one from the Dell into it's place, the PC wouldn't boot correctly, I forget how to set the slave/master drives on a SATA drive, how do I do that? I am assuming that is the reason it wouldn't boot correctly because the slave/master settings were messed up? Or maybe the HDD has failed? Or will it even boot since that HDD contains an OS...

Sorry for all the questions, can't figure out which way to go with this.

[jagabo]

You're not trying to boot into Windows at this point. You're diagnosing what's wrong. Remove everything you can: all cables, drives, etc. Even the graphics card. Any one of those items could be causing the problem. Leave only two sticks of memory. Can you get any further along the boot (BIOS beep codes)? No? Switch the memory sticks. Any difference? If the situation improves, put in the graphics card. Once you can get to the BIOS you can start plugging other things back in, one at a time until it locks up again.

There's no slave/master switch with SATA drives. What you probably did was change the boot order when you switched drives in your other computer. Go to the BIOS and rest the boot order.

[chewie8008]

Ok, didn't know you could get to BIOS w/o a HDD. Guess it makes sense now that I think about it. Anyway, I unplugged everything, the DVD drive, HDD, 56k Modem... Same thing, no boot. I switched all 4 sticks of ram in every different order, two at a time, even tried the 3rd and 4th slots(thinking maybe the slots were messed up?) after I had tried every different combination and still no luck. So, whats left? MOBO?

[chewie8008]

Oh also, why wouldn't the HDD from the Dell boot in my other problem free PC? It is a SATA drive, I pulled one of my other three HDDs in the working PC and put the Dell's HDD directly in the place of one of my working HDDs and it wouldn't let my working PC boot...any reason why?

[jagabo]

Oh also, why wouldn't the HDD from the Dell boot in my other problem free PC? It is a SATA drive, I pulled one of my other three HDDs in the working PC and put the Dell's HDD directly in the place of one of my working HDDs and it wouldn't let my working PC boot...any reason why?

Like I said, swapping drives may have caused the BIOS boot order to change. So instead of booting the regular boot drive it may have been trying to boot another drive. Even if you had only one drive and replaced it with another it with another boot drive it might not get all the way through Windows boot because of the different hardware. Or the drive could have a serious fault which prevents the BIOS from finishing its drive initilization.

Ok, didn't know you could get to BIOS w/o a HDD. Guess it makes sense now that I think about it. Anyway, I unplugged everything, the DVD drive, HDD, 56k Modem... Same thing, no boot. I switched all 4 sticks of ram in every different order, two at a time, even tried the 3rd and 4th slots(thinking maybe the slots were messed up?) after I had tried every different combination and still no luck. So, whats left? MOBO?

Since you've already tried a different power supply it's sounding like the motherboard or CPU -- most likely the motherboard. Look for bulging or burst capacitors, especially around the CPU. That's been a very common failure point for motherboard for the last several years.

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=195

[TBoneit]

I believe that your Dell has a array of diagnostic lights, if so then you can look up their meaning at www.dell.com. You have a hardware problem.

Beware that searching in Google may yield results leading to iYogi, a pay support site, steer clear as you have a hardware problem. Plus I've heard they are expensive and I wouldn't trust anybody that wants to log into your computer to do repairs.

[chewie8008]

Like I said, swapping drives may have caused the BIOS boot order to change. So instead of booting the regular boot drive it may have been trying to boot another drive. Even if you had only one drive and replaced it with another it with another boot drive it might not get all the way through Windows boot because of the different hardware. Or the drive could have a serious fault which prevents the BIOS from finishing its drive initilization.

I just tried it again, checked the boot order, I placed the HDD in question at the bottom of the boot order, it won't boot. So now I can't decide between the HDD or the MOBO...

Thanks for all the help!

[jagabo]

I just tried it again, checked the boot order, I placed the HDD in question at the bottom of the boot order, it won't boot. So now I can't decide between the HDD or the MOBO...

If you remove the possibly bad drive does it boot?

One other thing to consider: if a device causes a power to ground short the power supply often shuts down and won't restart again until it's been unplugged from the wall for a while (and the offending device remove, obviously).

[chewie8008]

Yeah, I guess it would be the MOBO then, cause it wouldn't boot without the HDD either. I have tried to boot with the only the basics(MOBO, CPU, fans, PSU) and it wouldn't boot. So i'll try a new MOBO. The OEM MOBO is $99 on Ebay, can you recommend one that might be cheaper/better that would work with the CPU and other components of this Dell Inspiron 546(something from a different company or whatever)?

Thanks so much, you have been a ton of help!!!

[jagabo]

Yeah, I guess it would be the MOBO then, cause it wouldn't boot without the HDD either. I have tried to boot with the only the basics(MOBO, CPU, fans, PSU) and it wouldn't boot.

Did you have any memory? You can't get to the BIOS without some memory installed.

So i'll try a new MOBO. The OEM MOBO is $99 on Ebay, can you recommend one that might be cheaper/better that would work with the CPU and other components of this Dell Inspiron 546(something from a different company or whatever)?

Thanks so much, you have been a ton of help!!!

I don't know what's suitable. Dell used to use a lot of custom stuff so you may have problems with other motherboards.

[usually_quiet]

Have you ever built your own PC or replaced a motherboard? The reason why I ask is you need to carefully examine the motherboard before replacing it with something other than the part Dell used for your model. Since at least 2001 the PSU connections have used the standard ATX pin-out, but Dell motherboards may have a non-standard form factor and non-standard connections for the front panel and power button. The other problem could be activating your OS. Windows OS OEM licensing is tied to an individual motherboard. If the motherboard is replaced, even with the same part, Microsoft may refuse to activate the OS.

[DarrellS]

Yeah, I guess it would be the MOBO then, cause it wouldn't boot without the HDD either. I have tried to boot with the only the basics(MOBO, CPU, fans, PSU) and it wouldn't boot. So i'll try a new MOBO. The OEM MOBO is $99 on Ebay, can you recommend one that might be cheaper/better that would work with the CPU and other components of this Dell Inspiron 546(something from a different company or whatever)?

Thanks so much, you have been a ton of help!!!

When you say it wouldn't boot without the hard drive, what are you expecting it to do? You can't just push the power button and expect it to boot into BIOS (or wherever you expect it to boot to).

As soon as you turn your computer on, and see the Dell logo, start tapping the F2 key. If it boots to BIOS, stick the OS drive back in and boot to BIOS and then make sure that BIOS sees the drive and it is selected as the boot device.

I've had MBs that would not boot to BIOS without replacing the Battery and one machine was not that old.

If you say that you put the drive in another PC and that PC would not boot with the drive in that PC then it is probably the drive that is bad, not the motherboard. My brother's PC would not boot and he unplugged one of his drives and the PC booted. I took the same drive and put it in my PC and it would not boot so a fried drive can cause a PC not to boot. Not just the boot drive but any fried drive. I have a SATA dock on my PC and I plugged the bad drive in the dock and it shut down my PC. Took the drive out of the dock and the PC booted right up.

You can buy an 80 to 160 GB boot drive for under $50.

[chewie8008]

Usually_Quiet, I custom built a PC back in 2006 that I haven't had any problems with. The PSU connections on the dell board are not uncommon, they are the same as the ones for my other PC...so no problems there. I am unsure about Microsoft activating the OS.

DarrellS, when I say it wont boot, I mean, it won't do anything, at all. The power light on the front of the tower glows orange and the fans run, that is it, nothing displays on the monitor at all, period. So there is no way to F2 into BIOS. When I put the HDD in question in a working PC, it will boot to the windows loading screen and then just keep restarting over and over. However, whenever I remove the HDD in question from the Dell PC, I get the same errors, which leads me to believe it's not the HDD.... If that makes any sense.

Jagabo, yes I had at least two sticks of memory in at all times, just forgot to include that. I will probably just try an OEM MOBO then. Thanks a lot guys, a ton of help, really!

[kody_stclair]

ok my DELL Inspiron 546 desktop gives me 4 beep on post when i install ram in the 1 and 3 ram slot but if i put ram the same ram in the 2 and 4 slots it boots into windows ive tried looking in bios,put new ram in and it still does the same thing. plz help

[jagabo]

ok my DELL Inspiron 546 desktop gives me 4 beep on post when i install ram in the 1 and 3 ram slot but if i put ram the same ram in the 2 and 4 slots it boots into windows ive tried looking in bios,put new ram in and it still does the same thing. plz help

Why is that a problem? Just use slots 2 and 4.

Some motherboards require that slots 2 and 4 be used when only two sticks are installed. Otherwise you have no termination on on the memory bus.

[kody_stclair]

i have 2 2gb sticks and i want to run a total of 6gb could it be my cpu i bought the mother board bare and installed a amd and ram from a emachine pc i got for free

[jagabo]

Have you tried four sticks yet? Just because the computer won't run properly with two sticks in slots 1 and 3 doesn't mean it won't work with four sticks.

[Bjs]

Dells and Hps suffer from similar faults which can only be resolved by using a surrogate system which is an exact match.

Orange light only means bad power ... change the power lead, move it to another wall socket and be mindful of power boards which appear to function ... removing power board from the chain may resolve the orange light symptom ... in this case get a replacement and bin the removed unit.

The hd fault is common with mostly hp's ... that is the prevention of a working system or surrogate from booting when it's installed as a slave / master ... this fault is caused by a defect in the hd's control circuit which controls power ... the drive is dying so get the data off it fast.

The older system is more tolerant of the power condition where newer psu's are not. if there's a fault they simply wont boot.

[kody_stclair]

Yes I have tried 4 stick ive mooved the around and it still has 4 beeps. I went to http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/insp535mt/en/setgde/F970NOD.pdf and page 29. it state that the it is RAM Read/Write failure. Ive tried all the ram on the othe slots that work and they work. But when i put all ram in there it beeps ive tried 1 gb stick in them and i still does it.