HELP! COMPUTER WON'T SWITCH ON

[Angela234]

Can anyone help

When i press the on button its ment to go blue then start up instead it turns red i hear the computer try to start up then stops and the light goes out
This suddenly started today any ideas
i'm on sons laptop (i'm babysitting) so need help tonight as i can't get on here

[sarah707]

Open the side and give it a very gentle vacuum all the way round inside... dust on the circuits causes all sorts of trouble.

Pay attention to the fan area and behind all the bits and bobs.

Make sure it's gentle though, not a dyson at full blast!! :laughing:

If it's not that, I think you need to take it to the repair shop or get someone round... sorry!

:eek: Hope you backed up recently xx

[Bazza]

What appears on the screen when you start it? Does it have any messages?

Im going to guess it does not go as far as the "Starting Windows" message.

Oh, make sure there are no CDs in the drive and disconnect anything that you dont need to use it, basically anything but your mouse and keyboard.

[FussyElmo]

Sounds like mine when the power pack went again.
Hope its nothing too serious:)

[Twinkle]

I panicked when I switched mine on yesterday morning - black display and no files could be found. I still had an internet connection and could surf, but that was all. Fortunately after a couple of attempts I managed to get it working and frantically backed everything up to date - took a few hours.

I know I should back up on a regular basis but I always forget!! :rolleyes:

[Angela234]

I'll try the hoover it's only 18 months old so hope its nothing too serious

I haven't backed up as can't get it to except the cds i'm not very good on computers

I'm on my daughters lap top now

Thanks for your replys

[Bazza]

I'll try the hoover it's only 18 months old so hope its nothing too serious

I haven't backed up as can't get it to except the cds i'm not very good on computers

I'm on my daughters lap top now

Thanks for your replys

Hope its not too late, but its not a good idea to stick a hoover in there as it can potentialy crate a static charge which may not be very much in terms of voltage, but to your main processer can be fatal.

It is likely to be a software fault, as in windows is not being detected for some reason and not booting up. What you shoulod try to do is start in safe mode if it allow you to. Most PCs will do this if you hitb the F8 key repeatedly on start up. Then you will have access to the main systems but most of your stuff like disk drives etc wont work. It will allow you to see if the PC is getting this far which shows it is a software problem. It might also allow you to move files off your drive to somewhere safe like a memory stick and then you can do a reformat which is a drastic step, but might be an option if all else fails.

One option you can try is to create a "boot disk" on a memory stick or CD (you would obviously do this from your laptop!). This will try to get your system to run Windows again and hopefully provide any missing files on starting. You can do a google search on how to create a boot disk but you need to make sure its for your version of windoes, e.g, XP or Vista.

Withouth seeing the fault its hard to give more advice im afraid. Sorry if this is incredibly techie, but thats the nature of the beast im afraid. Its like trying to explain what quarks are, there is a limit to how simple it can be made.:D