Identifying faults: Faults can happen for a number of reasons, such as power surges, poor maintenance, accidental damage, malware or intentional damage. IT technicians and help staff must log the issue on a fault log sheet identifying the Machine, owner or users, fault, date, symptoms, problem history and back up documentation.
When investigating faults you should: check the simplest explanation first , record the steps taken, state tools used to identify the fault, record actions taken to resolve the fault, note specification of any new software or hardware, record time taken and costs for repairing the fault.
Troubleshooting Tools
Event viewer: When an error occurs on a computer, the event viewer is updated with information about it, including what the problem is, When the problem occured, the seriousness of the problem, what caused the problem, the event ID number and who was logged in at the time.
Self test programs:
POST (Power on Self-Test): This is a function of the BIOS where it will check the memory, power supply, hardware, CPU, BIOS and heat/cooling. There are two types of information provided:
Beep codes where one beep means all is well from a motherboard perspective, as the CPU is functioning. More than one beep means an error has been detected. Each BIOS has its own set of beep codes which can be downloaded from the manufacturers website to identify the particular error.
POST codes are visual, two-character read out of the stage that the POST is at.
Ping tests will test the connection between the requesting host and the destination host. It uses ICMP to send an echo request message to the destination host and listen for a response called the echo reply message. a response shows that the host can be reached.
Ipconfig/ ifconfig identifies the specific IP configuration of the hosts affected by the problem. It is especially useful where dynamic addressing is used and the IP address of each host can change.
Nslookup aids the diagnosis of issues with dynamic name systems (DNS) addresses. This utility looks up the IP addresses associated with a particular domain name. If the utility cannot determine this information, there is a DNS issue. This utility can also query DNS servers to find out if there are issues with the default DNS servers
Diagnostic Software is available from third parties. Some are free and others require payment. They can include memory testers.
