New computer issue

Hardware and technical stuff
1

I just started up my new computer this evening. It was working in the store the other day when I physically bought it - I have been waiting for the monitor to arrive.

So it started ok and I was in the security settings enabling Windows Defender. I then tried to sign in with my MSoft password and while it worked the first time it didn’t the next time it was needed. Then the computer flashed up an error message which was too quick to read and rebooted.

I now seem to be stuck on the UEFI setup menu. If I exit from there I just go to a black screen with an ASRock logo and four options - F2 to enter setup etc etc.

Any suggestions? It is a Windows 10 trial version if that is significant. Thanks

2

Could be a hard drive failure. Can you see the HDD in the bios?

3

In UEFI is your hard drive and the proper amount of memory listed? What are the other boot options besides entering setup?

You may need to create a Windows 10 installation USB if you have access to another PC and reinstall or repair Windows. If it’s brand new, and no hardware seems missing in UEFI, you may as well just reinstall, but I’m curious… How do you buy a new PC with only a trial version of Windows 10?

4

As mentioned above, check the boot menu.

Esc, Delete, F1, F2, F10, F11, or F12. … One of them keys should get you to the boot menu, during the post.

5

Ok this is kind of embarrassing but I just restarted for the zillionth time to answer your questions and…it’s working.

Not only that but NVidia control panel now appears; up till now it wasn’t there and the monitor wouldn’t run at the right resolution. Now it is.

@mono re Windows…I don’t know but I’m in Indonesia. They said I could buy a key elsewhere and activate it.

Anyway thanks to all including @lordkosc for assisting…

6

Update your nvidia drivers when you get the chance. :)

Did the PC come with onboard video? I’ve heard people do builds where they only use the onboard video to get windows installed, then forget to test the video card before sending the PC on its way to a customer.

7

Cable or slot could have loosened during transport home, so if it happens again - reseat the HD to your mobo, or replug the cables if it’s not m2. Do the same for the memory.

8

Yes ok thanks.

9

Yes I wondered about this. Thanks again.

10

Very much this, especially on a new PC. Things get shaken around and need a reseat, pulling them out and back in to ensure a good connection.

PCs have actually gotten better with this over time with snapin connections, etc. But any time you have errors on something new, it’s worth a check.

11

The problems have continued on and off; they have overall been getting less frequent but still not really acceptable.

I think I will take it back to the store; I don’t have any expertise in this and the warranty situation seems complicated here if I dick around with it.

I see in the event viewer the crashes have a kernel-power 41 (63) error; unfortunately no dump file is being created. Googling that error it could be a lot of things, often power-related it seems. Not sure that helps.

12

could be ram, mobo, cpu or case shorting. make the store deal with it.

13

Great call. If there is an actual hardware issue, they need to deal with that for sure. Wishing good thoughts your way, UtilityDog.

14

Thanks. Lol typing this on my phone as screen has literally just frozen while playing Imp2…first issue in 20 hours.

15

Sounds electrical short related based on that freezing. Or CPU or ram or mobo.

16

Yes you may be right. This was a different error as I could actually use other keys like ctrl-alt-delete and start programmes but the screen wouldn’t alt-tab to those programmes; but I could see they had started. Anyway was able to restart using windows-r and it booted ok but yeah…

17

Yeah the complete freezing without software error log dumps I’ve experienced in my long career have been due to electrical related issues with grounding etc

18

there now. Seems like the cooling unit was not seated properly…they have reinstalled and the temperature has come down although I didn’t know that was a problem. Doing some other checks and applied more thermal paste. It’s a little tricky as they don’t speak English and my Bahasa isn’t anywhere near good enough for this sort of discussion.

19

I would have liked to have seen the temps generated. I would be concerned if the cpu was running too hot for an extended period of time. That lowers the lifetime of the cpu via electron drift and other heat expansion issues.

20

Well as it has only been operational since Saturday night hopefully no serious damage. They did say on bootup the temperature was over 60 degrees C which they thought was too high. It also turned out one of the case fans was not plugged in because of a shortage of USB ports; the lighting for the cooling unit was using the last one.

While I didn’t feel the heat was excessive I must say it feels a lot cooler now…barely even warm with office-type use.