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My computer seems to have died :(

R

rmrf

Platinum Member
This morning as I was heading out for work, I realized I didn't hear the hum of my computer coming from the office. When I peeked in the door, I saw that my computer was not on. I pressed the power switch..and nothing. The motherboard is getting power, because when it is plugged in, the lights on both of my NIC's are on, I just can't power the computer on. Here are my specs:

450W PSU
Barton 2500+
EPoX 8RDA3+ NForce2
1 GB Corsair XMS 3200
120 GB Maxtor SATA
Liteon DVD/CDRW
Windows XP Pro

Any ideas on what to do are much appreciated. TIA.
 
Actually, nothing at all happens when I turn it on. zero lights, noises etc. That is why I am so stumped. If it were the proc, RAM, hdd, or other peripheral; I would at least get some beeps out of my motherboard. But alas, I get nothing. I hit the power button and it doesn't do anything. The wierd thing about it is that when the power supply is switched on, and is plugged in, the lights for NIC, etc., are on I just can't get any response out of it at all.
 
I would suspect the PSU since nothing powers on. Your harddrives and fans should spin, even if your motherboard is toast. Pull the ATX connector from the board and insert a paperclip into the connector leading to the green wire and any other black wire connector. This will power on your PSU. If you still get nothing, draw a chalk line around your PSU, cause it's dead. 🙁
 
Originally posted by: beatle
I would suspect the PSU since nothing powers on. Your harddrives and fans should spin, even if your motherboard is toast. Pull the ATX connector from the board and insert a paperclip into the connector leading to the green wire and any other black wire connector. This will power on your PSU. If you still get nothing, draw a chalk line around your PSU, cause it's dead. 🙁
Click to expand...

So even though it still puts power through to the NIC's, it is toast because it cannot supply the load that the mobo needs?

btw, thanks a lot for everyone's responses.
 
The psu is some cheap one that I bought off of fs/t a while back. I guess if I have to bite the bullet and buy a new psu it won't be all bad since I was kind of expecting the other psu to go out sooner than it did.
 
I've had PSUs that went bad do the same thing. They could light up the NICs, but nothing else. Get another one and give it a test.
 
I have seen some strange psu problems like that. I even had one that worked fine for awhile and then one day it would start the computer but no video would come up. I changed it out and sure enough, everything worked fine with a new psu.
 
Thanks a lot to everyone. I will test a little when I get home, but I have kind of accepted the fact that the psu is probably dead. I will probably go for the Antec 450W TrueBlue from newegg.

Again, Thanks to everyone.
 
The amount of power to light an led light is minimal, so that doesn't mean much....
Try unplugging the power supply or even try shorting it out (while unhooked from drives and mobo), and see if it kick starts the mobo....

Overall I think it is failing but be interested to see if it gets an assemblage of life out of it....
 
Try unplugging the power supply or even try shorting it out (while unhooked from drives and mobo), and see if it kick starts the mobo....
Click to expand...

Duvie, this does not make much sense. Please explain...
 
Originally posted by: Jalapeno
Try unplugging the power supply or even try shorting it out (while unhooked from drives and mobo), and see if it kick starts the mobo....
Click to expand...

Duvie, this does not make much sense. Please explain...
Click to expand...


I can't!!! I have just been around here long enough to have seen it actually work a few times....Quite strange and since I have no electrical background I can't really explain why it worked just know that unplugging and let setting for a period of time has worked though has not necessarily fixed the overall issue of dieing or flaky power supply...I have also seen where shorting the power supply plug with a flat head screwdriver has worked as well....

I am just trying to help a brother out.....If we can isolate sometime to give us a clue as to the culprit of this situation....
 
Originally posted by: Jalapeno
Try unplugging the power supply or even try shorting it out (while unhooked from drives and mobo), and see if it kick starts the mobo....
Click to expand...

Duvie, this does not make much sense. Please explain...
Click to expand...

I've had the same issue before also. My power in my house went out while the PC was running but when the power came back on my PC wouldn't power up. I thought it was a goner. Until I unplugged the PSU waited a while then plugged it back up and it has been working ever since after a year now or atleast until I did a chipset upgrade then I had to upgrade it. It's almost like it has to reset itself! Plus I think it was a cheap PSU that came with my case. BTW, it is protected behind a surge protector.
 
Originally posted by: Duvie
The amount of power to light an led light is minimal, so that doesn't mean much....
Try unplugging the power supply or even try shorting it out (while unhooked from drives and mobo), and see if it kick starts the mobo....

Overall I think it is failing but be interested to see if it gets an assemblage of life out of it....
Click to expand...

That's happened to me before, as well. I just unplugged the PSU and plugged it back in and the computer would turn on. It seems to happen after a computer is left on for an extended period of time and is then turned off and using a crappola PSU. I upgraded to a Thermaltake Purepower 480W butterfly (I wanted the sleeving 😀) and I haven't had a problem since.

Also, I've seen this problem before but it wasn't the PSU. It was a thermal sensor I was using from my Thermaltake case that would cause problems with my CPU every time I traveled with the case. Usually resetting the CMOS would help the problem, so I wasn't sure exactly what it was, but last time it wouldn't turn on no matter how many times I reset the CMOS. Using some deductive reasoning, I concluded that since the problem started when I got my new TT case about a year ago, and that the little POS thermal sensor had gave me problems before, I pulled the little ah heck out, hooked everything back up and it ran fine. I doubt that this is what you're experiencing ... but I thought I'd throw it out since the symptoms are the same.
 
Hmmm... It seems everyone who experienced this kind of problem had a piece od shid power supply. It shows if one invests in high quality hardware... Oh well, a broken record...
 
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