Computer Will Not Boot Up

karen45 · 28 Jan 2012

I have an HP Pavilion Slimline s7700e PC, running Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit. When I tried to boot up the computer today, it played a little tune and then started beeping at me. The monitor remained black

. Does anyone have any idea what could be wrong with it? When I did an online search for my symptom, I found one suggestion that it could be the video driver. I looked on the HP site, but couldn't find any video driver that I could download. That may not be the problem anyway.

Thanks in advance for any assistance!

Karen

scrooge · 28 Jan 2012

how many beeps did you get?
if you no how many beeps it can help at finding out whats wrong.
scrooge

pebbly · 28 Jan 2012

Hi Karen45, Have you tried booting into safe mode? Safe Mode

karen45 · 28 Jan 2012

scrooge said:

how many beeps did you get?
if you no how many beeps it can help at finding out whats wrong.
scrooge

It's two beeps.... a short and a long, continuously until I unplug it.

karen45 · 28 Jan 2012

pebbly said:

Hi Karen45, Have you tried booting into safe mode? Safe Mode

I don't know how to do that if I have no monitor. As soon as I plug the computer in, it starts beeping. How would I know what to do without the monitor?

scrooge · 28 Jan 2012

found this at
BIOS Beep Codes - HP Customer Care (United States - English)

2 short beeps and 1 long beep (repeats 5 times)
Unable to initialize video or video card required but not installed

3 short beeps and 1 long beep
CPU configuration error or CPU type is not compatible

scrooge

Arc · 28 Jan 2012

There are some other things that you may do, if it failed to boot up in even save mode, as pebbly suggested.

First, try SFC /SCANNOW : Run in Command Prompt at Boot ; it will fix all the system file violations and try to make it solved.

If the first option failed, you should pay attention to the bootloader. Mark either 100 mb hidden system reserved partition (preferable)or the C drive as active using the method two of the tutorial : Partition - Mark as Active ; and then run Startup Repair , for at least three separate times, with restarts after a single run.

www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/105541-startup-repair-run-3-separate-times.html

Let us know what happened after that.

kegobeer · 28 Jan 2012

One short beep followed by one long beep means you have memory problems, per this article:

BIOS Beep Codes - HP Customer Care (United States - English)

Since you can't get past the post screen (or even to the post screen, most likely), this isn't a Windows problem. I would open up the computer and remove the RAM, then install it again. After doing that, try to boot the computer again.

bigmck · 28 Jan 2012

Did you install anything in the computer or change it in anyway just before the beeps started? Just as Kegobeer said, try taking out the RAM and installing again. Let us know how it goes.

karen45 · 28 Jan 2012

Thanks so much everyone for all the suggestions and help. I don't know why it worked, but we took the cover off and reset the memory modules, as that's what the BIOS beep code said could be the problem. Once they were taken out and put back in the computer worked perfectly. I don't know what would have caused them to be dislodged, but we vacuumed the inside of the computer case as well, so maybe it could have been a bit of dust? Whatever it was, the problem is fixed. The computer is 5 years old... maybe on borrowed time anyway.... but I'm a happy camper to have it up and running again.

Couldn't have done it without you.....! Thanks again.

Karen