Hey there.I am new to this place.This is the first time I ever post on a tech-related forum so please do not lose heart at probable lack of basic knowledge and experience.A bit of a background.I posess a PC of 12 years that I have not used for 2 years and started utilising it again since the middle of July.Around a month and a half ago I started having trouble starting my PC.I would press the powerup button and then it will boot up for a second or 2 and then it would shut down for 1 or 2 seconds and then boot up and then shut down and so on for a random number of times.For 2 weeks it did this while after a while it would start eventually and then there would be no problem with playing or listening to music or browsing the internet.Then one day it would not start no matter how much I waited.
First I tried to clean the dust of the fan of the processor that had a lot of dust but I could not unscrew it completely so I had to put it back again (I see no scratch on the motherboard or the CPU but I thought this might have some importance).I tried another way to clean the dust with a compressor thus cleaning most of the dust away.It did start eventually this time,though it was still having trouble booting up.I had a spare power supply from another PC that was the exact same model and the same voltage of 230 V. I never replaced parts of the PC but I think I did a good job at it.This time after replacing the PSU it did start far earlier than before and I could see that it was doing a system restore.After the system restore I shut it down and then booted up again and it did work with no shut down or delay.I was really happy that I ''fixed'' it .
Fast foward to the next day the problem of booting up and shutting down reappeared and this time it was doing a restart before starting for good.Now was also the first time I had a restart while being on the internet or gaming(it happened only for a few times).Since then I have done a few more system restores that have had no tangible succes and the problems appear at random (somtimes it needs 4 or 5 cycles of starting and closing down till it works,other times it needs 9 or 10,others it restarts 2 times sometimes only once).Since I replaced the PSU i also ocassionally hear screeches and whistles from the PC but I am not sure if it is the software or me replacing it badly or hardware failure as I can not see any scratches or obvious elements of rust or dust or broken pieces.
My neighbour who was good at computers moved to Germany and there are no professional pc repair services in my town and as I have no car it would be pretty hard to get it to the closest city and get it back.Hence I tried to look for fixes on the internet.Right now I am using my laptop so I don't push my PC way too much.I have not made any hardware changes myself but my neighbour replaces throught the years a few power supplies and a video card way back in 2016 when he installed my Windows.
I use Windows 7 on the PC and I believe it is pirated although I am not sure and it is just a guess based on the fact that I did not have updates enabled.It says it is genuine but I am a bit scared of upgrading to Windows 10 as I have never upgraded the Windows or backupped my data(around a few 100s of GB of pictures and games) and am scared of losing the photos or games and saves I already play.It would be a big pain to reinstall them all and an even bigger hearthache to lose the data I collected over the years.
I have checked the temperatures with Open hardware monitor and they dont ever reach even under heavy gaming more than 50 or 60 degrees.My system log have reported as critical 3 Kernel code 41 in these weeks.
I am looking for advide on what I can do to figure out the problem.I mention I have tried an Intel CPU diagnoser that came clean.I believe it could be a BIOS problem or software related.I am not sure what to check in case it is hardware related.Any advice is welcome.Thank you for reading my long rant.Stay safe and healthy.
First I tried to clean the dust of the fan of the processor that had a lot of dust but I could not unscrew it completely so I had to put it back again (I see no scratch on the motherboard or the CPU but I thought this might have some importance).I tried another way to clean the dust with a compressor thus cleaning most of the dust away.It did start eventually this time,though it was still having trouble booting up.I had a spare power supply from another PC that was the exact same model and the same voltage of 230 V. I never replaced parts of the PC but I think I did a good job at it.This time after replacing the PSU it did start far earlier than before and I could see that it was doing a system restore.After the system restore I shut it down and then booted up again and it did work with no shut down or delay.I was really happy that I ''fixed'' it .
Fast foward to the next day the problem of booting up and shutting down reappeared and this time it was doing a restart before starting for good.Now was also the first time I had a restart while being on the internet or gaming(it happened only for a few times).Since then I have done a few more system restores that have had no tangible succes and the problems appear at random (somtimes it needs 4 or 5 cycles of starting and closing down till it works,other times it needs 9 or 10,others it restarts 2 times sometimes only once).Since I replaced the PSU i also ocassionally hear screeches and whistles from the PC but I am not sure if it is the software or me replacing it badly or hardware failure as I can not see any scratches or obvious elements of rust or dust or broken pieces.
My neighbour who was good at computers moved to Germany and there are no professional pc repair services in my town and as I have no car it would be pretty hard to get it to the closest city and get it back.Hence I tried to look for fixes on the internet.Right now I am using my laptop so I don't push my PC way too much.I have not made any hardware changes myself but my neighbour replaces throught the years a few power supplies and a video card way back in 2016 when he installed my Windows.
I use Windows 7 on the PC and I believe it is pirated although I am not sure and it is just a guess based on the fact that I did not have updates enabled.It says it is genuine but I am a bit scared of upgrading to Windows 10 as I have never upgraded the Windows or backupped my data(around a few 100s of GB of pictures and games) and am scared of losing the photos or games and saves I already play.It would be a big pain to reinstall them all and an even bigger hearthache to lose the data I collected over the years.
I have checked the temperatures with Open hardware monitor and they dont ever reach even under heavy gaming more than 50 or 60 degrees.My system log have reported as critical 3 Kernel code 41 in these weeks.
I am looking for advide on what I can do to figure out the problem.I mention I have tried an Intel CPU diagnoser that came clean.I believe it could be a BIOS problem or software related.I am not sure what to check in case it is hardware related.Any advice is welcome.Thank you for reading my long rant.Stay safe and healthy.