My foolishness + electricity = damaged computer?

[suspectbanana]

Okay, so I just got a non-faulty KG7 today off an RMA with Newegg and I finish building my new computer. I boot up, set up Win 98 and I'm good to go. Get myself on the internet and started to download some updates. Then I notice that my computer case (the black hydraulic one from Directron.com featured in Hot deals a while back) is running a bit warm to the touch. So, I take off the side access door and find a nice warm pocket right between my cpu and my vid card. So, I figure that a rear case fan will take care of it and (this is where my vast foolishness comes into play) I go to put the case door back on WITHOUT shutting off the power. Stupid, yes. Unforgivable, definately. As the metal door came into contact with the metal case, a spark shoots out and my system just dies. Okay, after I stopped wetting myself and the deep, dark empty pit of despair left my stomach, I reset my power strip and rebooted. My system comes back online and it seems okay. Now, what I'm wondering is, what kind of damage did I do to my computer? everything seems to be running okay, fans are all on, windows isn't reporting any problems with any of the components (but I've yet to test it all out). Basically, I'm wondering what, if anything, I did to my poor, poor, newborn system.
Also, on another note, is it possible to plug in the Power Switch cable from the case in the wrong way and still have it boot? My HDD led and Power LED weren't working so I flipped their connections to the motherboard and bam, they work. The power switch cable is connected in the opposite way from these two and seems to boot the computer fine. Should I reconnect the connector so it's the same as the others? Thank you and have pity on my computer...

 

[Generalen]

The Power Switch cable and reset button don't have any polarity, so you can connect them at any direction you want.
That spark you mentioned, it must have been static and it shouldn't be doing that, it must been a coincidence. Yuo should be able to take the side off and put it back on without anything happends.

 

[Pederv]

I've had a system shut down when I tried to put the side panel back on the case, no ill effects as of yet (I did it 6 months ago).

 

[bacillus]

sounds like your case isn't grounded properly!

 

[Mitzi]

<< sounds like your case isn't grounded properly! >>



Yup, sounds like something shorted out. I've never had a problem taking case on/off when the machine is switched on.

 

[odog]

<< sounds like your case isn't grounded properly! >>

it's either that or the electrical outlet isn't wired correctly.... their are a few different ways an electrical outlet can be wired incorrectly and still work.(hot nuetral reverse, nuetral ground reverse, open ground etc etc etc) specifically it sounds like you might have a hot neutral reverse, from what i can gather.


and don't worry about the case LEDs thats all to common.

 

[Jiggz]

When you saw the spark and system shut down it could be that a short happened between the case the another line on the PSU which tripped it off the line. Good Thing circuit breakers or overload device works. LED's are polarity sensitive like the HDD LED and Power LED. On the otherhand, switches are not. I think you're good to go this time!

 

[ganesha]

I had the same thing happen last year, it was just static electricity. Had no problems after I restarted. I have the old cast iron radiators in my apartment which drys up the air and creates so much static electricity that sparks come off the nylon rollers on my keyboard tray when they move🙂

 

[suspectbanana]

Whew. Thanks for the replies. It looks as if though the electricity wasn't too serious. This is the first time I bought a power supply seperate from the case and attached it myself. All I did, if I remember correctly, was to take it and attach it to the case with some screws. Did I miss a step here? Is there some grounding procedure I didn't do?
And it seems like I did mess up my computer somehow. Soon after the static elec. incident, I installed some software and shut down to fix some thing in my case. I rebooted but got something I've never seen before:

Windows Protection Error. You need to restart your computer.

I got this just before I went into windows. I can boot into safe mode but there doesn't seem to be anything wrong. I checked the bootlog.txt and found that the only things that weren't loading were some fonts. WTF?
So I wiped the HDD and reinstalled windows. This time, after the Windows setup tries to find the PnP devices, I get this:

General Protection Fault blah blah blah VxD HID(a long string of numbers here) and so on.

What is this error? Windows won't even install past this point. I tried flushing the bios and starting again, but no dice. The last thing I did before I got the windows protection error and the VxD error was this:

I assembled the system, installed the drivers for all the components, download the updates from MSoft, downloaded the IE 5.5 service pack and upgrade, installed office 2000, half life and Grim fandango, then I threw in the AMD miniport AGP driver off the KG7 disc and then ran the VIA 4 in 1 w/o installing the AGP driver but everything else. I'm going to disassemble the whole she bang and throw the components into an Antec SX1040. Screw that other case I had. Hopefully, the erros will go away. But any information about what could be causing these problems would be great. Thanks to all.

Oh, on a side note, my bios is reporting these temperature readings:

CPU 57 degrees C/134 degrees F
System 36 degrees C/96 degress F

Are these readings to high? I don't know what the room temp is but it is warm enough to sit around with the windows open and no sweater or jacket. I had to attach and disattach the heat sink from the cpu because I changed motherboards and I'm worried that the thermal paste connection is that great. I have a front case fan, a HDD fan under my WDD 800BB, a hsf on the Athlon (1.4), the fan on the KG7, the fan on the Gainward Geforce 2 PRO and the fan on the PSU. So, is this good? I'm not overclocking but heat is a very important issue for me. Thanks again for everyone who replies. I'm going nuts over this thing.

 

[Pederv]

If you have 2 or more sticks of memory, try one at a time, see if the problems go away - you might have bad memory. I've noticed that even though all boards don't measure the temp the same, the average CPU temp is about 10-30 C hotter than the system - depending on what HSF you use.

 

[LintMan]

There's nothing special to do to attach the power supply besides screw it in. Since it couldn't hurt, you might want to check to make sure that your outlet is grounded correctly:

1) You're using a real 3-prong outlet, right? Not one of those 3-to-2 prong dealies?

2) At Home Depot or about any hardware store you can buy a $5 gadget with a few LED's that you plug into an outlet and it will light up if the outlet is wired incorrectly (or isn't properly grounded).

3) Get a good surge protector. It won't fix grounding problems and wouldn't save you from a static zap like the one you saw, but it's still worth getting a decent one.