Weird beeps at start up

[SeanC]

Hey all,

I'm having a problem with my desktop PC that I've NEVER encountered in my 12 years of working on PCs.

First off specs:
Athlon 700
512MB
15GB Maxtor IDE
LG CD writer
Windows XP Pro SP1

The problem:

Press power and instead of the POST beep I get a low pitched beep and a high pitched beep this repeats until I shut the PC off.

It started just earlier. I've tried about 12 dozens over the last few hours and get the same thing every time.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Sean

[MitaDC]

I got the exact same thing.....
I don't know what it was
This is what I did...
I didn't have any thermal compound on my cpu so I took off hsf and put on Arctic Silver 3 which dropped temps 20F...Go Arctic Silver....also i got a Volcano 11+ heatsink and got a new stick of ram...well I had my mom buy all that stuff cuz I wanted it lol but I didn't really need it cuz after I put on the thermal compound it went away....come to think of it it wasn't arctic silver it was some cheap crap cuz I hadn't ordered the arctic silver yet.......but anyways it didn't happen again....Hasn't ever happened again....By the way what BIOS r u running??

[MitaDC]

Check the temps of your CPU and check room temp..I think that is what caused mine was how hot my CPU was running.....140F Idle 60C

[Bovon]

I was gonna suggest the problem is heat related..but I have never had that happen, so I really don't know for sure. Does your motherboard BIOS have temp monitoring?..if it does, go into the BIOS and check what the cpu temps are. If this system is an older one..maybe a year or more..check the cpu fan and heatsink fins for dust collection..that will sure cause a cpu temp to rise. If dust is not a problem, and you can determine its heat related..take the heatsink off, clean the sink and cpu as well as you can, put just a small amount of thermal compound on the core top only..and do not slop it on like butter either..just enough to make core to sink contact...replace the sink and see if this helped.

[SeanC]

I can't get into the BIOS. It won't POST. Instead of POST beeps I get the low pitched tone then the high pitched tone repeated until I shut the computer off. I'm going to try putting on new thermal compound that's all I can do right now. I'm not going to be able to do that until Tuesday or Wednesday evenings. I'll let you all know then.

It's not really a problem for me though. It's a problem for my wife. I have a laptop I use at home, which I have to take to work with me so I'm fine. She needs the computer for job searching during the day.

Sean

Try unplugging the PSU from the mobo for about 10 secs, then plug it back in and see if it starts.

[SeanC]

I'll give that a try too. Thanks.

Sean

[SeanC]

Good news, the computer is working again. I didn't have time to look at it yet but my wife went and unplugged all the cables from the back and plugged them back in and it worked.

Thanks for all the help.
Sean