Smart Computing Article - CPUs

February 2000 • Vol.4 Issue 1 Add To My Personal Library Troubleshooting a malfunctioning Central Processing Unit (CPU), otherwise known as a microprocessor (or processor), isn't exactly brain surgery, but it definitely is one of the more confusing aspects of computer repair. CPUs, including Intel 486 chips, Intel Pentium chips, or clone chips from companies such as AMD and Cyrix, are the brains of IBM-compatible personal computers. They handle the bulk of the actual computing that goes on in your computer. When they go bad, forget about using your PC until the problem is repaired. There is no quick fix for a bad processor. Microprocessors probably are the most reliable part of your computer; something else is likely to go wrong with your PC before the microprocessor. But that's not to say CPUs never go bad. Few CPU failures are drastic or easy to detect. (Smoke rising from your computer is a sure sign of some kind of meltdown.) More likely, your monitor will simply go blank or fail to boot if the CPU malfunctions. Of course, those are the same symptoms for other mundane problems, including loose cables or bad On those rare occasions when the CPU does go bad, you're going to have to eliminate nearly every other component in your PC before concluding that it's the CPU that is bad. But your computer can give you some clues when a microprocessor is malfunctioning. Whenever you turn on your computer, it executes a , which is essentially an inventory of all the PC's working components. If it detects that something is amiss, it generates