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PAUL161

PAUL161

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I know it's old, about 9 years, but it has always worked perfect and was working perfect when I shut it off the other day. Went to power it up a couple days ago and it did nothing, Dead! It has power going in the back, but a little green light on the back that is always lit when the computer is plugged in won't light up. I can find no reset button on the power pack and have no way to check to see if it's working. Not much information, but any clues to what's going on? It has two SATA hard drives in it with a ton of information on them and no way to retrieve it. Help! PJ
 
Could be your power supply has gone bad.

you may be better off just removing your old hard drives & installing one or both in a new computer.
(that's what I did). Especially, considering the age of your machine.
BTW: you can also get a special chassis box that will convert your internal hard drive into external drives with usb plug in.

Most any computer repair shop can probably assist. (Again what I did)

added benefit: I had the shop copy all my data to a 500 gig. new solid state hard drives. Talk about fast.
 
Hi Paul,
What do you mean by "power pack"? On the computers I've worked with, the green light is on the network card.
 
Greg, You may be right, all I know is when the computer was plugged in the light was on. I thought that light was only to indicate the power was on, didn't know it was for the network card. I think it's time for a new computer and get an external HD case to retrieve my data on the old drives as Guy suggests. I liked this old HP computer that has all the bells and whistles, but as the power pack might be shot, it's time to replace it with something newer. My son has a new laptop with a solid state drive and it is almost instantaneous in it's operation. Used for his business, I wouldn't pay $2500 for a custom computer like his. I don't know the make, but it looks to be only 1/2 inch thick closed up. PJ
 
Greg, You may be right, all I know is when the computer was plugged in the light was on.
Click to expand...

my old HP (7 or 8 yrs) had a green indicator light on the power supply module, right below the power cable. It was static when things were good.
However, when my machine gave up the ghost it was blinking. I lost or tossed the manual long ago, so I don't know what the relevance of the blink was.

i replaced the HP with a new custom built (put together from the same shop) with a new 500g Solid state HD & installed (internally ) my old 650g Reg. Hard drive as back up. Total cost was about $425.00.( no monitor) Only thing I miss is the SD card reader on my old one.

i try not to do big box stores, and have found the "right " small shops can better accommodate my needs.

One other thing: now you are going to have to decide on Win 10 , 7, or 8?

good luck with that Paul.
 
Paul! Replace the power supply.
 
Hey that's the same iMac I have! I couldn't live without it. But, he wants to keep his old stuff. Might be the motherboard needs repairing. If you are going to go PC at one of the big stores (I won't tell), the big Kahuna insurance is worth it. When my daughter was a teenager, she was very hard on her laptops. She went through SEVEN (!!??!?!!) laptops in two years (don't ask.) All replaced for FREE each time after a $100 per year investment in that insurance. After that I made her earn the money for her Macbook Pro. Amazingly, she hasn't destroyed the one she had to help pay for!
 
Well, I decided to replace the power supply as Doc suggested, only thing is, it's in a new Dell tower desktop! :encouragement: :grin:. All the bells and whistles and a 1 Terabyte HD. I pulled the HDs out of the old one and now need to get a external case to get the info off them, then wipe them clean. Their SATA drives. I have a case for the old 3.5 IDE drives and also 2.5 inch drives, but the plug is wrong for the SATA. ?? Is there a converter plug or do I have to buy a SATA case for the 3.5 drives? PJ
 
So which Linux version are you putting on the new Dell?

alfred_e_neuman.jpg
 
Thanks Paul. Let us know how the installation goes, and if some device drivers are lacking.

I'm thinking there may be more and more folks ready to move to Linux.

Tom M.
 
Paul said:
Is there a converter plug or do I have to buy a SATA case for the 3.5 drives? PJ
Click to expand...

I know of no "converter" to go from IDE to SATA. Planned obsolescence is to blame.
 
If your old drives are 9 years old and you're going to wipe them anyway, I'd skip getting ext. cases for them. Open the new computer up and install them as internals.

I used to have an external case that had both IDE and SATA interfaces. Didn't last very long though.
 
Greg, This new Dell, which isn't here yet, more than likely is set up for 2.5 inch drives, as the case is narrower than previous models, the old drives are 3.5 inch. Not wanting to open up a new computer unnecessarily, for 20 bucks I can get a USB case for the old drives, cost more than that to have the info pulled off of them in a shop. Only thing I'm not sure of with the new one is, it comes with a 19 inch screen, my HP has a 22 inch screen, but I believe I can use it with the Dell.
 
Paul - are the old drives only holding data? Or do they have programs installed on them?
 
NutmegCT said:
Paul - are the old drives only holding data? Or do they have programs installed on them?
Click to expand...

Both Tom. One drive has W-7 on it and the other has Ubuntu. Both drives have equal data on them as I bounced back and forth learning Linux languages and still get confused at times.:rolleyes2: But, that's nothing new! :highly_amused: PJ
 
PAUL161 said:
Both Tom. One drive has W-7 on it and the other has Ubuntu. Both drives have equal data on them as I bounced back and forth learning Linux languages and still get confused at times.:rolleyes2: But, that's nothing new! :highly_amused: PJ
Click to expand...

Should be no problem using the old data, as long as your new Linux setup recognizes the drives/folders, and associates the data with the appropriate application software.

You "still get confused at times"? Hey, you're lucky. Nowadays, I often say "I still get lucid at times". Oh well ...
 
Paul jinxed me! The power supply in my Linux kernel firewall conked out some time Wednesday, knockin' us off th' innerwebs! The hardware I've used for the firewall appliances is a Shuttle "cube" and the one we've had here for a decade finally decided to surrender. Problem is, the power supply is a compact unit, had to order replacements. And the spare unit sat for as long as the original was running, unpowered... IT wouldn't boot up either. *sigh*

Made one out of three of the units I had sitting about, we'll see how long THAT lasts.
 
Doc, Sorry I put the hex on you! I know you'll get it up and running! I just installed Ubuntu 15.10, which I'm on now to try it out and it appears to be quite a nice system. Laid out different than Mint, so I'll give it some time and see how it goes. PJ
 
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