troubleshooting a computer and general

tremmor

tremmor

Well-Known Member
I thought maybe someone had posted and NO, or did not find it.
Many here answer questions all the time and still learning all the time.
Looking for something general for computers and isolating hardware
components. Motherboard, mem, video, usb hd's etc. I understand the technology changes all the time. Many will answer and seems to be always related to something a little different.

question is there a general procedure for the basics and where and how.
I have a family member asking out of state. Just not that savy to explain
and don't know enough.
thanks
 
The two basic hurdles in troubleshooting

Computers are complicated and they keep changing. Is that problem caused by a virus or just a part of wear and tear?

Here's an example of a recent change that may be more difficult to troubleshoot. You'll hear about how much better SSDs are vs HDDs. From recent research, you'd be well advised to back up your important data on a HDD because when a SSD does break down (even without moving parts), you can more easily lose data since it's more difficult to recover data from a SSD than a HDD (this is one reason why my new computer system will have both types of drives).

So what I'm saying is that the best way to troubleshoot is to anticipate possible problems.
 
Last edited:
Sometimes there are guarenteed tell-tale signs. For instance a BSOD (Blue Screen of Death) check your memory and drivers, 99% of the time it is down to one or the other

If you are hearing a grinding sound, your hard drive is most probably at fault.

If you have artifacts on screen, video card.

Computer restarting or spontaneously shutting down, most probably overheating CPU.



If you are still stumped, for hardware first perform tests. You have utilities for different uses - memtest to test memory, hard drive vendor software for hard drive (only use the manufacturer software if it is available), or stress testing software.

Stress testing software will push the hardware to the limit, proving if the component is stable. If you are getting BSOD's for instance and stress test the CPU and it happens again, the CPU isn't stable, which often happens when overclocking. You can also stress test the video card to try to recreate artifacts or crashes.

Note though that when components are being stress tested they use more power. This means if the power supply is at fault, the symptoms may lead you to believe that it is the components that is being tested which is causing the problems.

The best way to find out which piece of hardware is causing your problem, use a known good. If you can't narrow it down, swapping components out one at a time into a fully working system can help you to find the cause of the problem. If you have the computer working, put a stick of memory in and it then begins to stop working correctly, you can say fairly certainly that the memory is causing your problem.

If it isn't a hardware fault and instead software:

Work out when the issues began. If it happened to be just after you installed a program, updated a driver or started/stopped a service, that is probably the cause. You can use tools in Windows to get back, such as last known good configuration (only works if you aren't able to log in and haven't logged in since the system was last working), rolling back drivers, system restore or safe mode.

If you aren't able to roll back, you can instead manually remove the software which, if you are having problems booting up correctly, may require you to load into safe mode so no additional software or drivers are loaded
 
ram is usually the first thing i suspect if im getting spuratic restarts...just ran into so many cases of bad ram, which is why i dont recommend running voltages out of spec...that stuff is sensitive, espically to overvolting...

heat is a big problem, first thing id look at after ram, well possibly before, is dust buildup, cure that, then run a stress test, if problem goes away...woo, solution solved...people dont often think about their little box in the corner needing a cleaning, from a users perspective.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top