Dell XPS 400

Hey shooters!

I recently had someone ask me how to diagnose the startup problems that can happen when working with computers. It is impossible for any one human to know the steps to take for every model of computer on the market today, so I will show you how to come to a solution with a common dell model desktop.



In this case, the computer would power up, and the system would beep. No video would display on the screen. I first thing I checked was the beep codes. They can usually be found from the computer manufactur's website. In this case here: http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/xps400/sm/adtshoot.htm



I then reboot the system and listen. It turned out to be a Video memory test error. So I proceeded to check the onboard video. There were no other video cards in the system when I opened the case, so i took another expansion video card and added it to the machine. Reboot and the beeping is gone and the system posts fine. In this case the onboard Video has malfunctioned and we must use the added video card to use the computer :(



This is one of the many things that can occur when troubleshooting broken PC's. For more info on diagnostics and flow charts this link can help. http://www.fonerbooks.com/pcrepair.htm

Happy Shooting!

Quickbooks Loan Manager Missing

Hi everyone,
I've decided to day to post about an issue I have seen come up when using quickbooks 2008. I know that the general theme of the blog was suposted to be hardware troubleshooting, but this problem is a really frustrating one that i hope nobody gets into.
Any company using Quickbooks 2008 loan manager should know this; do not rename your company file! If you rename the file it DOES NOT change the .lmr file associated with your loans in the QB data store. This sounds like an easy problem to avoid; but recently I was stumped with this issue.
I arrive at the customer site only to find they were complaining about missing loan data. I looked in their QB data share only to find all of the files intact. As I browsed over the files within; I had overlooked the file names. Their "companyfile.qbw" was now "companyfile1.qbw". The loan manager file was still "companyfile.lmr". That little change was enoough to send me on a wild goose hunt to no avail until I saw the re-name that had been done a couple days later.
All in all; please do not renam the company file with loan manager data held within the data store.
Is this a bug? or the way Intuit intends the loan manager data to be stored? I hope they will chang that in an update soon; right now it is just appears as if it were a bug in the program

Aaron
On-site Tech

Hey all,
Who likes a dead PC? I wanted to post up a basic hardware troubleshooting guide for this issue you may face . These steps can be completed in order for you to determine what part (or parts) is malfunctioning...

http://www.fonerbooks.com/cpu_ram.htm

I know it looks like too much information here. Following the chart for your individual situation will go fairly quick. To see an application of a dead PC troubleshooting situation please, visit this blog where you can see what steps need to be taken in order to solve your individual problem.

http://www.cybertechhelp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=81113

Good luck and happy shooting everyone!

tech_aaron
aaron@on-siteoc.com
http://www.on-siteoc.com/

Hardware? Software?

are you hving video resolution problems Are you having video resolution problems? Is your computer making noises like a beached whale? Does Internet Explorer just not want to open? All of these are either hardware or software issues... ALL computer problems come from either a harware failure; or a software malfunction. It's not your fault; unless a window comes up with a "Flagrant user error" message... and that never really happens in the free world as I have seen it.

So what to do first? Admit that it is a problem not on your end. Computers are stupid. All they do is take commands from you, the human, or a run a set of scripts that programming geeks (slightly less human) make up.
Second? Find a guide or chart to help you find what is really going on in the box. Here is the link to a Microsoft written guide (Yes I know it'll put you to sleep). It is pretty good for the beginning computer user to follow to diagnose what might be wrong with a malfunctioning computer.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/322205

Happy shooting!

Welcome !!!!

I hope everyone brought their clubs, brass knuckles, and shotguns today... for today we are gonna fix us some computer problems. This is the "Front desk" so to speak of a forum where I can offer up tricks for dealing with some common computer issues. Viwers can offer feedback on issues they would like to hear about; so subscribe to the blog and post away!