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Thread: Acer Veriton 3200 keeps rebooting.

  1. #1
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    Acer Veriton 3200 keeps rebooting.

    Hello all.
    Not sure if I'm in the correct forum or not, but Acer pc's are not to popular.

    Anyway, I was giving a Acer Veriton 3200 ( win98se, 64 ram, PIII 900mgz) to fix.

    As soon as it get to windows and ask for a password, I then hit cancel and it will go to the desktop for like maybe a minute, then reboot.

    Funny thing is, I can get it to load up in safemode where I then install antivirus and spyware stuff which it finds a lot of spyware and some virus's and get's rid of most of it, but it still will not load in to windows.
    I tried different ram, different hard drives to do a clean install, different power supplys and the same thing, as soon as I get into windows desktop on 98, it will reboot.

    I even tried to install windows xp, but I don't even get through half of the install and it keeps rebooting..

    I'm really stumped on this. Maybe a bios virus? Who knows, but I've tried every thing I know what to do.

    Any info on this would be greatly appreciated..

    Thanks.

    Mitch

  2. #2
    Extreme Member! BipolarBill's Avatar
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    A weak power supply can cause this. So can bad RAM.

    Test your RAM:

    www.memtest86.com

    Formatting (erasing the hard drive) is an needed most likely. Installing Windows over a broken or infected version will result in a broken or infected upgrade most times.
    MS MCP, MCSE

  3. #3
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    Thaks for the reply BipolarBill. It's appreciated.

    As I mentioned, I tried different sticks of ram in all 3 different slots. Memtest 86 keeps passing these
    I tried two different power supplys that work fine in other computers. I tried two different hard drives that work fine in other pc's as well.

    The only thing left to check is CPU/Mother board and maybe corupted bios?


    Thanks.

  4. #4
    Stark Raving MOD Midknyte's Avatar
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    look for leaking or bulging capacitors on the motherboard. that's pretty common.

  5. #5
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    Im looking the the capacitors now, though I don't see any bulging, I do see some resido on top of a few. Looks like what you would see on a car battery terminals when when dirty.

    Could this be a problem? The pc won't reboot in safe mode.

    Would resetting the cpu/heatsink and fan help?

  6. #6
    Stark Raving MOD Midknyte's Avatar
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    bad caps can definitely be the problem:
    http://www.badcaps.com/

  7. #7
    Banned dell8200's Avatar
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    also if it is a intel, and if it gets over 180 F it will reboot, i sure hope if does not get that high, if it does it will reboot godd luck

  8. #8
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    Im going to take a macro picture of the what looks like to be bad capacitors. I'll try to post it on my web site if I remember how, and I'll put a link to it here.

  9. #9
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    Ok Midknyte, I posted that picture of the capacitors.
    Go here.

    http://userweb.suscom.net/~mman046/index.htm


    Looks almost exactly like the bad caps on that site you sent me.

  10. #10
    Banned dell8200's Avatar
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    yep bad caps, also cleaning the computer helps to, it makeing the fans last long, also if too much dust builds up on the motherboard, it forms a condutor, and then when you remove it, the motherboard won't work, it is recomanded you clean computers out about 4-6 monthe

  11. #11
    Extreme Member! BipolarBill's Avatar
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    The bad capacitors are caused by defective electrolyte. This causes the electrolyte to dry up and gas forms - popping the cap.

    Take the motherboard to a TV repair shop or purchase a soldering iron at Walmart for $10, get some solder "braid" at a hobby shop and find replacement caps. I'm lucky to have a good electronics hobby shop nearby. One of the employees told me how to draw out the old solder with the braid and I replaced 5 bad caps easily. Badcaps.net has all of this info you need.
    MS MCP, MCSE

  12. #12
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    I don't solder. I could I guess.

    This was a friends computer I was trying to fix.
    It's only a PIII.
    I could go to my local computer show and probably pick up a PIII for under $100.
    I'd rather get something newer for my self. I'll ask my fried what he wants to do with the computer.


    Thanks for all the help guys, its appreciated.
    I learned something new about bad capacitors...



    Mitch

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