Won't turn on

[Serephino]

This morning makes the second day in a row that I come down, press the power button on my computer, and instead of turning blue and booting up it turns orange and starts making a godawful beeping noise.  I have to hold the button in until it stops.  Then I press the button again and it will boot up.

I have scanned with Avira and Malwarebytes several times.  Neither has found anything.  WTF... 

[Izu]

Hm... could have something got unplugged inside it? I've had a similar problem before when the hard drive had gotten slightly loose from its plug (moving the computer, kicking it and so on)...

The beeping part makes me think that it's most probably some hardware failure...

[Serephino]

Yeah, my boyfriend said it could be the power supply going bad, or a lovely virus that's frying something.  He told me to back up my important stuff and he'll poke at it when he gets a chance (aka; never).

[kylie]

     Falls under "something unplugged," but to be sure.  If you're going inside...  Also make sure that all your fans are fully connected.  See if the little fan for a graphics card has dust, or is spinning normally when you brush it (it should show a little bit of elastic springback at the end of moving from a tiny push, and not fly around without any bounce).  If your system is really smart, some parts might refuse to operate when their fans are off.  Some graphics cards simply can't.

    A single piece of hardware in there can shut down the whole works if it's not happy.  Fortunately, it's also cheaper to replace just one part.

[Oreo]

If you decide to go poking around in there to see if something is loose, be sure to take precautions regarding static electricity.

[Serephino]

It's a Dell.  Aren't their parts custom or something?  Though my boyfriend has switched parts around before, and hopefully the local computer shop will have something should that be the case.  The box has been getting pretty hot lately.  Could that be part of it?  The box itself isn't hot, but the air coming out of it is.

[Oniya]

Might check for dust build-up.  That can contribute to heat build-up.  I was appalled by how much dust had accumulated in the old computer that got donated to the little Oni (she doesn't get it until we get to the new place).

[OldSchoolGamer]

I'd say the odds of it being a virus are rather remote.  There's precious little software that's loaded in the first few tenths of a second after the power button is pushed on a PC (which seems to be all the time it takes for the train to leave the tracks in your case).  Not the operating system.  Probably not even the system BIOS. 

I'd bet at least 6 to 1 it's hardware.  As others have pointed out, make sure everything is firmly seated.  Depending on how comfortable you are with doing surgery, you can disconnect the hard drive, and any expansion cards except video, one by one and see when the system stays green (obviously it won't boot with no hard drive, but it should POST and display the initial self-check or BIOS screen.

[Serephino]

Okay.  I'm not allowed to touch it, but I'll see if I can get my boyfriend to check things out tomorrow morning.  He's a computer geek that likes to build his own machines.  Hopefully nothing is going bad.  I just got done moving important files to his computer through the network because they're too big to burn to a cd.

[Serephino]

My video card was a little loose apparently.  *shakes his head*  All that because of a video card neeing tightening up. 

[Izu]

Glad to hear it wasn't something major. :)

[OldSchoolGamer]

My video card was a little loose apparently.  *shakes his head*  All that because of a video card neeing tightening up. 

Yep...video is the only essential expansion card to successful completion of POST (although if other cards are defective they can scupper the POST).  Glad you found the problem.   ;D

[Oreo]

Way better than an expensive fix it job. ;D

[Oniya]

And now you have back-ups of lots of important things, in case of something that's actually serious!  ;D