Friend's PC is playing up help..

[fox20thc]

Why everyone thinks I know what goes wrong and how to fix it boggles me so here I go with two questions on their behalf.

 

1. PC won't boot up, it wont boot in DOS either. She doesnt have a recovery disc to reinstall. Has been quoted £30 ph for somebody to 'look at it'.

 

2. Other friend has a problem whereby whenever they switch on the pc the picture goes really patchy And sticky. Also, it goes blank for a few seconds when you change pages. This happens whether surfing the net or using apps offline. Is this a graphics card prob?

 

Ta in advance oh wise ones.

[GraZ]

1. Probley knackered the boot file so it cannot load up the operating systems details, you'll need a copy of xp, run it on boot, when asked wether to install or repair go into repair. Then once on the command prompt window use "FixBoot" or "BootFix" one of the two is valid. That'll drop a new bootfile onto the harddrive and should get onto windows unless theirs something else thats been done like a hard drive wipe.

 

Being charged £30/ph is rediculous, I'd charge £20 to sort it, no fix no fee eh.

 

2. Upgrade the graphics cards drivers, if their the latest try and see what temperatures the cards running at, most cards made this year and last will have this ability with new graphics drivers, could be a case of faulty wire at the back or the cards on its way out (check its fan too to see if its not clogged up)

[fox20thc]

1. Probley knackered the boot file so it cannot load up the operating systems details, you'll need a copy of xp, run it on boot, when asked wether to install or repair go into repair. Then once on the command prompt window use "FixBoot" or "BootFix" one of the two is valid. That'll drop a new bootfile onto the harddrive and should get onto windows unless theirs something else thats been done like a hard drive wipe.

 

Being charged £30/ph is rediculous, I'd charge £20 to sort it, no fix no fee eh.

send me your number on PM and I'll pass it on

 

2. Upgrade the graphics cards drivers, if their the latest try and see what temperatures the cards running at, most cards made this year and last will have this ability with new graphics drivers, could be a case of faulty wire at the back or the cards on its way out (check its fan too to see if its not clogged up)

 

I will pass this sage advice on, I think the PC is pretty old though.

[fred_notdead]

1. When you say it won't boot, what actually happens? What can you see on screen, what are the mesages, is it white text on a black screen or on a blue screen? Does the PC bleep at all? Can you hear the hard-drive spinning, does it get too warm, what version of windows is being run?

 

Full diagnosis please.

 

2. When did this begin? What have you installed lately? How much memory do you have? What else is running on the PC? Have you tried any basic maintenace?