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Perhaps 3 years ago I built a nice gaming rig from new parts. About 2.5 years ago, it started to have trouble booting up and continues to have troubles to this day.

Typically, the first time it is powered on each day, all the fans run but the screen stays black (and no beeps). I used to just hit reset over and over and it would eventually start. When it starts the first time, a BIOS screen comes up. I just hit a key to continue, and Windows XP will start with the clock reset to the factory settings. I will fix the clock, and then everything is fine and the machine works great. I can even soft/hard reboot it over and over and it will be fine.

Often, instead of hitting reset over and over, I will hit it once, and then open and close my CD/DVD drive. The computer will start on the first reset 95% of the time if I do this. I tried this voodoo one day when I noticed the DVD drive spinning during a boot sequence. I tried removing the DVD drive but it didn't fix the problem.

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CMOS battery maybe? Why else would your clock randomly clear itself? – Breakthrough Aug 19 '11 at 17:29
Even if the battery is shot it should still boot every time with the wrong time. – Col Aug 19 '11 at 17:36
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7 Answers

up vote 2 down vote

Replace the CMOS battery, its probably dead

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That's exactly what it sounds like, but it's really strange. I haven't had a CMOS battery die on me since 1997--in my experience they usually outlast the motherboard they're mounted on. – amphetamachine Aug 19 '11 at 23:48
They are batteries... they do wear out. – Keltari Aug 20 '11 at 0:19
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up vote 1 down vote

I would try taking out the CMOS battery, cleaning the battery and contacts with alcohol and then putting it back. If it's disposable, not rechargeable, battery swapping to new one might also be useful.

Problems in cold POST can also be related to power circuitry being slightly bad. Slightly but not totally broken capacitors sometimes take some time to collect enough charge to work properly.

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up vote 1 down vote

Expanding on wetware hacking's point, it's likely that something, somewhere is not making a good connection. Could be the CPU, could be an expansion card, could be a cable.

Buy some cable cleaner. Remove every cable, clean the contacts where possible, and reattach them. Don't forget where each one goes!

Also remove and reseat all expansion cards. Wearing gloves, you could even remove your CPU and reinsert it. (Since you built your system I assume that you know what you're doing here.)

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up vote 0 down vote

Problems that early in the boot process are usually BIOS related, have you updated your BIOS? Even if there isn't a newer version I'd still try the update in case the one you have has corrupted.

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up vote 0 down vote

I got the exact symptoms once, it was due the the CPU being unglued from its base.

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If no beep means CPU might unplugged. Remove it, use thermal paste and place it again. Plus check the HDD cables. Try to unplug HDD cables next time if there is no start/beep.

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It could be the power supply. A flaky one can cause all kinds of weird behaviour, particularly at startup.

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