Help! Need HP Pavilion BIOS beep codes

Texun

Platinum Member
Oct 21, 2001
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A guy at work has a problem with his HP notebook and is unable to get to the net for help.

Anyone know of or have the beep codes for an HP Pavilion? I don't have the exact model but it's fairly new - just 4 months out of warranty. It worked perfectly one night and the following day it started to give one short beep during the POST and would then restart. It never completes the POST or stays on long enough to enter the BIOS. He pulled and reset the RAM but that did not help at all.

Unlike most PC's it never did give the single beep indicating a clean POST. Now a single beep seems to indicate that something is screwed up but I didn't find anything useful with Google or HP's site.

Thanks
 

corkyg

Elite Member | Peripherals
Super Moderator
Mar 4, 2000
27,370
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The short beep is normal - indicates the boot process is starting. Put a bootable CD in the drive and see if it can boot to that.

Sounds like it is failing POST. That can also be a sign that the CPU may need to be reseated. It can also indicate a bad memory SODIMM. If he has a pair, try them 1 at a time.
 

Texun

Platinum Member
Oct 21, 2001
2,058
1
81
A beep is normal on most boards but not this one. My Dell doesn't beep either. Since it won't run long enough to complete the POST there is no way it will boot from a CD. Everything has been pulled and reset but I can't say specifically that the RAM was swapped or installed one at a time. That will be next.

The single beep indicates something is FUBAR but I haven't found a code list.

Anyone?