Ran OCCT CPU stress test for a few minutes, PC shut down and now appears bricked

[Dankk]

Edit: I tested the PSU and it appears to be working fine. Pretty confident that the motherboard is at fault.

_______________

Tonight I decided to run a short OCCT:CPU test (20 minutes). No big deal; my CPU overclock was stable last time I checked a few months ago. I just felt like running another short test to check for consistency.

The test was going great for 10 minutes, until... shutdown. Something managed to trip and everything turned off. Weird. Maybe the CPU temp went too high and my motherboard initiated a safety shutdown. I'll just turn the PC back on and dial back the OC a bit, right?

(Small note: When the PC "turned off", the Power Button LED was blinking, as if the PC had gone into sleep mode or something. I certainly don't have sleep mode - or hibernate mode - enabled whatsoever).

So I pressed the power button, and... nothing happens. The power LED is still blinking though! I press the button again. Hold it down, tap it a few times. Wait a moment, press it again. Nothing happens. At this point I decide to reach behind the PC and flip off the power supply switch. Maybe when I flip it back on, everything will be back to normal.

Now when I press power, absolutely nothing happens. No fans whirring, no LEDs, no lights, no sounds, nada, zip, zilch. This is now worrying me. The computer appears to be bricked. :'(

Here's what I've tried so far:

• I cleared the CMOS using the pins on the motherboard.
• I reset the battery.
• I unplugged everything, held down the power button to discharge any static, and plugged it back in.
• I toggled the PSU power switch (as mentioned above).
• I visually inspected the motherboard for any blown capacitors or any other components that exploded. (I didn't see anything).

Here's my specs:

AMD FX-8350 processor (running at 4.4Ghz)
MSI 990FXA-GD65 motherboard
G.SKILL 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 1600 memory
120GB Kingston HyperX SSD / 2TB Seagate Barracuda HDD
MSI Twin Frozr 7870 1050/1200
SeaSonic M12II 620 Bronze 620W power supply

As you might imagine, I'm kind of freaking out right now. I'm pretty sure something died. Question is, which components should I test first? My suspicion is that it's either the power supply or the motherboard.

I'm honestly leaning toward the motherboard as the main culprit. I can't say for sure... I just know that Seasonic has always been rock-solid for as long as I've had this PSU, but on the other hand, my past two MSI motherboards (including this one) have been really sketchy and have given me a lot of issues. One of the bigger problems being that my MSI 990FXA-GD65 has had absolutely lousy VCORE fluctuations. Voltage flies all over the place. The motherboard also makes a high-pitched electric squealing noise when CPU is under full load, which is also kind of a telltale sign of it being a crappy motherboard.

I'm rambling now though... does anyone have any thoughts/ideas? I'm thinking I'll probably hook it up to another power supply to see if it turns on, but if that doesn't work, I'm almost certain it's the motherboard. I just want to know if there's any possible quirks or solutions I'm overlooking here. Thanks.

 

[richaron]

Yeah... Once you get to the: "useless-stuff-unplugged-and-everything-reset-but-it-still-wont-POST" stage, I start assuming broken stuff & would look for a test PSU also. Can't help more than that, but curious:

Do you get a blip on the fans with first power button? Any difference using just 4 (or none) of the 8pin power?

 

[bononos]

........
I'm honestly leaning toward the motherboard as the main culprit. I can't say for sure... I just know that Seasonic has always been rock-solid for as long as I've had this PSU, but on the other hand, my past two MSI motherboards (including this one) have been really sketchy and have given me a lot of issues. One of the bigger problems being that my MSI 990FXA-GD65 has had absolutely lousy VCORE fluctuations. Voltage flies all over the place. The motherboard also makes a high-pitched electric squealing noise when CPU is under full load, which is also kind of a telltale sign of it being a crappy motherboard.

I'm rambling now though... does anyone have any thoughts/ideas? I'm thinking I'll probably hook it up to another power supply to see if it turns on, but if that doesn't work, I'm almost certain it's the motherboard. I just want to know if there's any possible quirks or solutions I'm overlooking here. Thanks.

Do the psu paperclip test to check that the psu turns on at least. Some sources say to add load by connecting stuff to the psu like case fans. If it turns on, the mb is probably at fault, especially since it was already squealing and could not deliver stable voltages. AMD cpus might pull more power than the rated specs even at stock so its pretty hard on the mb.

 

[Dankk]

Thanks for the tips, guys.

I did the "paperclip test" with my PSU. The PSU is definitely working. I hooked up a couple 120mm molex fans to draw a load, and they spun up quite nicely.

I think it's time for a new motherboard. Can anyone recommend a good AM3+ board that can handle an FX-8350 with a modest overclock? I don't need a Sabertooth or anything fancy. I started a thread in the motherboard forum but if anyone here has any suggestions I'd appreciate it.

 

[owensdj]

The PSU still might not be supplying correct power, such as on the +5V that the motherboard needs to power on. Get a power supply tester unit. It really comes in handy in situations like this.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16899705003

 

[Torn Mind]

You might have toasted a VRM component responsible for delivering power to the CPU.

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=MSI+990FXA-GD65+mosfets
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1748224
http://www.overclock.net/a/about-vrms-mosfets-motherboard-safety-with-high-tdp-processors

 

[Dankk]

The PSU still might not be supplying correct power, such as on the +5V that the motherboard needs to power on. Get a power supply tester unit. It really comes in handy in situations like this.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16899705003

Looks like it could be handy, although I'm not sure I want to buy something I'll rarely actually use.

You might have toasted a VRM component responsible for delivering power to the CPU.

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=MSI+990FXA-GD65+mosfets
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1748224
http://www.overclock.net/a/about-vrms-mosfets-motherboard-safety-with-high-tdp-processors

Thanks for the links. That last one in particular is very helpful. In fact, I just followed the "What to do if you suspect your VRMs have failed":

Try testing the motherboard with the 24-pin plugged in but without the 4-pin/8-pin CPU power plug. This is the ultimate dealbreaker; if the motherboard only boots when CPU power plug is unplugged (though it obviously won't POST), you sir have a VRM failure on your hands.

Yup. Sure enough, my PC boots up when I leave the CPU unplugged. :\ On the bright side, at least I've managed to narrow down the problem really well.

I really hope it didn't break any other components. It would stink to get a brand new motherboard only to find out my CPU no longer works.

 

[mfenn]

Thanks for the links. That last one in particular is very helpful. In fact, I just followed the "What to do if you suspect your VRMs have failed":

Yup. Sure enough, my PC boots up when I leave the CPU unplugged. :\ On the bright side, at least I've managed to narrow down the problem really well.

I really hope it didn't break any other components. It would stink to get a brand new motherboard only to find out my CPU no longer works.

Clever! I'd not heard this one before but I will definitely keep it in mind for the future.

As for a new motherboard, how about the Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3? It's got a similar featureset as your MSI and is priced well.

 

[bononos]

I think overclocking BD/PD cpus are abit of a crapshoot due to the sometimes excessive power demands even at stock (speculation has it AMD is relaxing qc standards to stay afloat). Since your mb was in the good list and still got burnt, I think any decent quality mb is still going to be in trouble with a 'hot' cpu.

It might be interesting to see how much power your pc is using if you have a ups or a power meter like kill-a-watt.

 

[areohdee]

Playing a Steam Game, will shut down my PC, under Heavy Load Metro LL, and Light Loads, Outlast. ANY other games Heavy or Light for my PSU/GPU/CPU are fine, Crysis 3, Child of Light, Dead Space 3, etc... Play for hours... ON STEAM, they only play for about 10-30 Minutes before it Shuts Down ?!? I have had this before, and REPLACED EVERYTHING (Mobo, Ram, PSU, GPU, HDD, and SSD) as it was time anyways.

NOW, today, I put OCCT on the PSU and it shut off ?!? Is that it, is it that simple ?!

Specs: 16gb (2-8gb) G skill ripjaw Ram, AMD FX 6300, 128SSD, 2TB HDD, 650 Watt Kingwin PSU, MSI 970A-G46, Power Color R9-280

Any help/thing you guys can think of would be awesome ;-)

Welcome to the forums areohdee! Posting in a thread from several years ago is generally frowned upon as are "me too" type of posts in help threads. Having two similar, yet different help requests in the same thread gets confusing. So I invite you to post a new thread with your question, and we'll try to help you out.

mfenn
General Hardware Moderator