Optiplex GX270 (Tower) Dies Early

A friend asked me to look at this problem. After power-on the CPU and
power supply fans turn, but most times nothing else happens. Sometimes
it gets as far as the start-up options screen (normal, safe mode,
etc.) but when I make a selection it dies in a few seconds. Once I saw
the XP start-up screen but it soon died. I get I/O errors on known
good boot-able diskettes and he won't boot the XP Recovery CD even
though the CD is before the hard drive in the boot sequence.

If I change the amount of RAM I get to go into the BIOS and look
around. When I exit the BOIS I get the Dell flash screen (the only
time I see it) but it soon dies. I tried a stand-alone video card but
it made no difference. I can see everything on the hard drive on
another PC.

The BIOS is A02, the service tag is 69SSV0J and the power supply is
PS-5251-2DFS, 250 watts.

Any thoughts out there? Thanks, Tom
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Compaq Presario 1230 Laptop Accessing BIOS Setup
    ... look for one that has a Phoenix BIOS made around the same time as this 1230. ... I found one in my Fujitsu laptop. ... Of course I changed the boot sequence to CD drive first. ... Pressing F10 presents a screen that says, ...
    (sci.electronics.repair)
  • Re: Mac - pelnoprawny czlonek mojego PC.
    ... Poniewaz Mac siedzial na swoim dysku, gdy chcialem bootowac inny OS - musialem wchodzic na BIOS i zmieniac boot sequence. ... Podlubalem - i teraz Mac jest pelnoprawnym czlonkiem mojego PC - z chwila gdy wlaczam PC pokazuje sie menu - moge wybrac Linux, WinXP lub Mac'a - no more BIOS and boot sequence! ...
    (soc.culture.polish)
  • Re: Compaq Presario 1230 Laptop Accessing BIOS Setup
    ... look for one that has a Phoenix BIOS made around the same time as this 1230. ... I found one in my Fujitsu laptop. ... Of course I changed the boot sequence to CD drive first. ... Pressing F10 presents a screen that says, "Phoenix BIOS Setup Utility" ...
    (sci.electronics.repair)
  • Re: video card recommendation ? - UPDATE
    ... Applied the packages, removed Live CD, and rebooted. ... Normally there is an entry in the BIOS, ... Unfortunately it is not possible to simply change the Boot Sequence. ... It is listed at the top of the device listing with a "" ...
    (Ubuntu)
  • Re: Intel Macs that boot FreeBSD?
    ... loading (I see message indicating that cdboot is trying to start BOOT/LOADER on the screen). ... My guess is that Apple has only implemented BIOS in amount necessary to bootstrap WinXP, while FreeBSD requires some functionality that doesn't exist. ... I have not time to investigate the exact point when it dies. ...
    (freebsd-current)