I have a Dell OptiPlex GX620 mini tower with a Celeron processor, 2GB RAM and 320GB SATA hard drive. The problem is when I press the start button, everything starts up (green lights, fans and all) then shuts back down within 30 seconds. I have changed the RAM, hard drive, CMOS battery and nothing has helped. What could the problem be?
Try this: remove the DMOS battery and unplug the on/off switch plug. It's the one in the corner near the power supply. To be sure follow the cable from the front on/off switch board on back to this plug. Then plug the A/C cord in, if the system boots up fine, then replace the front panel power on/off swith board. Naturally you will not be able to power off the computer using the power switch (since we unplugged it), so you will have to just pull the plug. Hope this helps. Joe
There are 2 probable causes for this. What is the power rating on your power supply? Less than 400W is going to have a hard time running newer boards and a SATA drive.
Also, how many cooling fans do you have? hopefully you have at least 1 case fan and 1 cpu cooler fan. If you don't have adequate cooling then your system will shut itself down when the cpu gets too hot. I've seen this a lot when someone builds a system with no case fan, and it usually gets about 30-50% into loading windows before the system powers itself down.
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Well, it is the mini tower and I have changed the original SATA hard drive out with another one. As far as fans go, the original fans are working. It isn't getting hot because it doesn't have any time as being on to get hot. Right from the first time I press the start button, it does it's starting up, 30 seconds or so, then shuts off, then by itself, starts again and will do this cycle until I hold the start button to turn it off. The power supply is the original and it states..."Max output power 275W". A couple of days ago it did run long enough for me to put XP on it, since then it will do what I described above. Thanks!
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