ACER Aspire Z3 all in one PC - Turns on but blank screen

Hi,

Few days back the PC started playing up so decided to reinstall windows 10. After fresh Win 10 install the system couldn't recognise the HDD Next reboot nothing on screen, I can hear the fans the power button lights up but nothing on screen - absolutely nothing. Already tried the following:
1. Reboot
2. Reseat HDD, RAM, checked other connections
3. Connected HDD to other PC - seems to work - Backed up (Lucky)
4. While installing Windows - had problems with GPT partition / MBR
5. HDMI IN works if I connect it to my laptop - I can see the laptop on the screen
6. HDMI OUT doesn't work
7. Tried resetting BIOS by pressing DEL to enter BIOS, Press F9 enter and then F10 enter to save - Doesn't Work

Appreciate any help

Thanks

Accepted answers

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Leostat

Just to check, you can see the bios ok , bit anything after is just black? Is there a blinking white line 9n the top left?

When you re installed , what was the issue you had? It needs to be gpt

irasheed

Thanks for your quick response.

Unfortunately no I cannot see anything not even the first screen when the PC starts. Cannot press F2 to get into BIOS but I can hear the fans, the power button sits up just nothing on the screen.

Here is the full story:
I have been using windows 11 since the preview release everything just worked, no problems - updates and everything was fine, 4 days back suddenly it started showing an error blue/black screen and kept restarting - it will restart by saying "preparing to recover" and boot loop. I tried everything to fix this including booting from a USB to fix the installation it didn't work - still the same thing. Finally decided to get the HDD out and connect to my other PC (Old intel core 2) with SATA cable and back up the data. following which formatted the drive and tried to install win 10 but it said "windows cannot be installed on this partition - GPT style" so I used minitool partition wizard software to change it to MBR and installed win 10. connected back to ACER and it didn't recognise the HDD - restarted and OOPS nothing on the screen. Im sure the screen is ok but I messed up somewhere with installing win 10 on the HDD.

Appreciate your assistance

Thanks

billsey

Which Z3 model do you have? It should be something like Z3-xxx-xxxx. My guess is they were pushing the release version at you instead of the beta and there was some issue with that. It sounds now like the EFI is corrupted.

irasheed

Z3 - 615 what can I do to fix the EFI issue ? Hope nothing wrong with my hardware !

billsey

The Aspire Z3-615 models have a 4th gen processor, and Windows 11 requires an 8th gen or newer. The release version will not work on your system and that's likely the reason...

irasheed

Ok, but i cant even get windows 10 working. the problem is now im stuck with nothing on the screen not even the POST no way to access BIOS! Does that mean the bios is corrupted ? How do i get it back ?
Thanks

billsey

Try plugging in an external monitor to the HDMI-Out port to see if it's just mucking with the display settings...

irasheed

The display is fine. I can plugin my laptop to the HDMI-IN port and it works, HDMI-OUT doesn't work ! Last night tried doing a BIOS reset by moving the jumper to 2-3 position leave it for 2-3hrs and back to 1-2 position unfortunately didn't work any other ideas???

Easwar

Hi @irasheed,

Check here

https://www.acer.com/ac/en/AU/content/service-contact

billsey

If the external monitor is working, can you get into the BIOS from it?

irasheed

I think I wasnt clear enough. HDMI-OUT doesnt work ! I also have a HDMI-IN i can plug in my laptop and it works. Hope its clear?

billsey

Ah, that means the display itself is working, but the computer is not. The HDMI-In port goes directly to the monitor and the HDMI-Out goes directly from the computer. I don't believe you are getting any beeps when you power up so the motherboard is likely not successful in getting the processor initialized, much less starting POST. The fans run (and likely a HDD if one is installed) but they just need to have the PSU energized to spin up. If you were getting either a single beep (which denotes POST was successful) or a sequence of beeps (giving the failure point during POST) then we could dive more into diagnosis. As is all we can really say is something really bad is broken.

irasheed

No beeps at all. I can feel the processor is warming up I guess its OK and getting the power. called up one of the computer repair stores they asking for $40 for just diagnosis. Im just wondering if its worth getting repaired, at this point i believe they will come back and say the mother board needs replaced which is not worth it.