My PC is Dead

[JGrimaud]

Having some issues and I do not know what.

When I try to power on my PC it doesn't post or beep. All of the fans come on. I hear the hard drive start to spin and the Graphics card fan turns on to full power, but that is it. So I am thinking it is one of three things: Motherboard, CPU or RAM. Had a hard time installing a Zalman fan on the CPU and worried some thermal grease (Arctic Silver) may have gotten into the processor casing while tempering. Checked the chip and it looks fine, there was a nice seal all around the top of the chip casing. The Power indicator on the motherboard is lit up, so I'm not sure if it would do that with a short. And I have no knowledge as to why my ram would go bad after one week exactly.

Anyway, this was my system setup:

Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 2.40 GHz 1066MHz FSB 4MB L2 Cache
Asus P5n32-e SLI
Foxconn GeForce 8800GTS
Corsair HX 520W Power
Zalman CNPS9500 LED
Netgear WG311v3
Jetram 2GB DDR2 800

I have tried clearing the CMOS and still nothing. No beeps or any other thing to indicate that something other than the motherboard is fubar. I would like some advice on this before I try to buy another motherboard and start all over. Like I said, everything worked fine for a week. I shut it down overnight. Had a horrible day at work the next day and when I came home to relax to my nice PC... nothing.

Cheers!

 

[Puffnstuff]

How did you clear the cmos? Did you unplug the ps then pull the batt out?

 

[stevty2889]

Try booting with no ram at all, and it should give you beeps. If it doesn't try booting with the ram in, but no video card. Again, it should beep at you. If still no beeps, try with both the ram and the video card out.

If still nothing, repeat, but outside of the case, just to verify nothing is touching the back of the motherboard where it shouldn't be.

Also with your Zalman, I would assume it's using a backplate..did you make sure there was plastic/foam between the backplate and the back of the motherboard?
It wouldn't be the first time I've heard of one of those backplates shorting out the motherboard.

 

[leekirlew]

I had this exact same problem on my sig rig, and yep, it was the mobo!

 

[marulee]

What is the chipset name brand on the memory? How about flipping the speaker jumper?

 

[JGrimaud]

The chipset name brand on the memory is transcend. And I am not sure what switching the speaker jumper would do. Like I said I had it up and running for a week. I cleared the CMOS with the jumper set to clear CMOS, I didn't pull a battery out. Tried taking everything out of the case and still nothing. Tried all of the above and it is still dead. Looks like I will have to get a new mobo in the next couple of weeks. And since I am not overclocking yet I might as well leave that Zalman off my rig.

 

[DasSmoof]

Maybe a stupid question, but you never know when it's something so simple: Did you put the CMOS jumper back into the proper position? i.e. not on "Clear CMOS"?

 

[JGrimaud]

to no avail

 

[RebateMonger]

I don't believe you can rule out the power supply, either. All the things you said are still running are on the 12V line. I recently had a Dell that lit up the LED on the motherboard, but the power supply was the problem. Motherboards do fail, but the ratio I've seen is something like 20 PSUs failed to 2 motherboards failed. And one of those motherboards failed because a failing PSU destroyed it.

 

[Noema]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger
I don't believe you can rule out the power supply, either. All the things you said are still running are on the 12V line. I recently had a Dell that lit up the LED on the motherboard, but the power supply was the problem. Motherboards do fail, but the ratio I've seen is something like 20 PSUs failed to 2 motherboards failed. And one of those motherboards failed because a failing PSU destroyed it.

Agreed. After my PSU died, LEDs would still light on and the fans would spin.

 

[JGrimaud]

How often have you heard of power supplies going bad a week after installation where there is no overclocking or strong power load on the PSU? I'm asking a legit question and not trying to be a smart ass. It's got more power than I have things to run on it. One hard drive one optical drive, one graphics card and one motherboard/CPU. It's rated 520W, which isn't a lot but I did some research and I don't plan on overclocking for now, so it is all I need. At least its under warranty. Mobo isn't (out of box special), so thats another reason I'm leaning towards the mobo. I will just have to take this thing into some technicians place on monday, because I would really rather not have to spend too much money on the wrong thing. Anyone know how much it costs just to diagnose a PC?

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: JGrimaud
How often have you heard of power supplies going bad a week after installation where there is no overclocking or strong power load on the PSU?

Early failure of a power supply is certainly possible and wouldn't necessarily require an overload. The same can be said of a motherboard, especially an "open box" one. If you have another PS around, just hook it up and you'll know for sure. It's not necessarily easy to separate a failed PS from a failed motherboard without replacing one or the other.

 

[JGrimaud]

I understand the downfalls of being an enthusiast/hobbyist so I would like to say thank you all for the suggestions. At this point I am broke and don't have a spare PSU around, but I would like to thank you all for caring about my technical problems enough to help me troubleshoot my unfortunate circumstances. I'll stick around these forums for a bit and will let you all know when I get my rig up and running again.

~Peace

 

[RebateMonger]

Good luck. Many folks nowadays have more than one PC around and can swap parts temporarily.

But, yeah, building your own PC is sometimes painful.

 

[Modelworks]

If you have a voltmeter , and you really should have one when building a pc, you can rule out the power supply.

Unplug all the connections to the power supply including the motherboard connector.
Connect a fan to one of the power supply connections ( not always required, but some power supplies like to have atleast a small load present).

Get a short wire, 6 inches is plenty.
Connect the green wire on the motherboard connector from the power supply to one of the black wires on either side of it, this is the same pins the motherboard uses to turn the supply on/off.

The instant you connect the green and black pins the power supply should come on and you can use your voltmeter to check the outputs.
Red 5V
yellow 12V
orange 3.3V
purple +5v standby - should have 5v on it without the wire between green/black connected
white -5v -- this may not be present, its not needed in the newest spec.
blue -12v

Those are the main ones.
If your also using the processor power plug off the supply it should have +12v

All voltages should be within 5% of the target voltage.
Example: 12v can be anywhere from 11.4 to 12.6 and pass the atx spec.

 

[RebateMonger]

Yup. If you can scrounge up a voltmeter, than you can get a really good idea if your power supply is looking functional. If it is, then the problem is very likely the motherboard.