OS Plays Hide-And-Seek
Hi Fred, A computer I'm working on for a friend goes to a black screen immediately when powered on, that simply says "Operating system not found." When this has happened before, either rebooting a couple times, or checking for loose cables, corrected it. This time, nada. What are the various reasons or possibilities with this problem? Thanks, Ed Langham
Sometimes, especially as a system ages, the hard drive may not spin up fast enough, and the BIOS ends up looking for the operating system before the drive is ready to deliver it. Once the drive is up to speed, everything works normally. This sounds like what your friend is experiencing.
Some BIOSes let you insert a delay into the startup sequence specifically to overcome this kind of problem, but it's really a band-aid fix. If a drive is no longer able to spin up in time to avoid a boot delay, it's a pretty clear sign that the drive is wearing out: the bearings may be going, the lubrication may have thickened, or whatnot.
Usually, when a drive starts behaving this way, it's a clear signal that it's time for a new drive. Once a drive has trouble starting, it's only a matter of time before it may not spin up at all.
Alas, this may already have happened to your friend--- the drive may not be able to start; or may be unable to reach operating speed; or may have some other major problem.
You can check in the BIOS to see if the PC "sees" the drive and knows it's there; but to me, the symptoms sound like a dead or dying drive, not a BIOS problem.
Fortunately, drives are amazingly inexpensive these days, so it's not the pain-in-the-wallet it once was. <g>
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