My fellow tech nerds, I need your help! LET OUR POWERS COMBINE!

Greetings fellow tech nerds,

I write to you today as a very sad nerd. My self-built beauty of a beast machine has died on me without rhyme or reason. Now, I know my fair share about computers, I've been troubleshooting for years. Though my current problem baffles me abit. If I hit the power button, nothing happens. If I flip the power supply off and then on, the green light comes up on the motherboard. Power is getting to it. Yet, if I hit the power button on the front of the case, everything only turns on for a quarter of a second. All the fans start spinning, all the LED lights turn on and then it just shuts down. Hitting the button again does nothing, unless I flip the power supply off and on again.

I suspect that the problem is the power supply which came with my Aspire X-Dreamer II. Though, there have also been times where my computer has suddenly turned off, which could be a heating problem or it could just be further proof the the power supply is faulty. The front of the case usually reads the temperature inside at around 101 Fahrenheit which is about 38 celsius.

For those curious, I've had the computer since mid-summer.

The specs of my machine are:
Athlon XP 2800
Aspire X-Dreamer II case with built-in 350 watt power supply
ATi Radeon 9800 pro
2 Corsair Value Select 128mb sticks of DDR

So the basic question is:
Is it the power supply or is it something else?

Any help would be appreciated. Sadly, the computer lab is closing in fifteen minutes, so I may not be able to respond until tomorrow

 

I just had this problem when i put my MOBO on my new case.
You have to make sure that the mobo is not touching the case.
You have to have a little space between.
Having some spacing screwes would fix this.
When the MOBO's back is touching the case metal, the power will go right through to the case.
This is called a short.
Make sure there is space between the MOBO and the CASE.

 

make sure that theres no short circuit on the components; see if theres power going to the mobo , there will be an indicator LED on the mobo itself. Make sure if you have the auxil power connector connect it to the mobo itself. Never seen anyone install a mobo w/o spacing screws; pretty dumb idea imo.

 

Could be.

But I also gather that PSU's can behave that way if there is a short to ground on any power rail. They will shut themselves off to avoid damage to themselves and connected parts.

That's pretty toasty for the air temps within the case. It's a little high even for a mobo temp. Are you sure that you're moving enough air through the case to provide adequate cooling for the CPU and PSU?

AMD's recco is that temperature rise within the case shouldn't be more than 7C above room temperature. Either you've got a much bigger rise, or you're working in a very warm room. Normal room temps run around 20-22C, implying that your case air temp should be under 29C.

And I'm sure that you will have noticed that your PSU is trying to cool itself with that 38C air. That means you have a very warm PSU.

 

I'm surprised that your case didn't come with an adequate supply of 1/4" brass and/or nylon standoffs to provide that separation. Any new cases I've seen come with that stuff in the little bag of hardware.

I'm also surprised that your mobo manual didn't tell you of the need to use standoffs to mount the board in the case. The ASUS manual is quite clear in that regard.

 

Yeah, I've installed a mobo without standoffs. Blew up the PSU. Heh.. good thing it was a crappy PSU.

Err, anyway.

I doubt that there is a short from the circuit board to the case, because that would happen as soon as it was built, not "for no apparent reason" after presumably operating for some time.

Do you have a voltmeter? If so, can you measure the 5V and 12V rails from a spare molex connector? If they are withing 15% or so of their calculated values then the PSU is *probably* okay. Of course this has nothing to do with the ATX / P4 connector, but molex connectors provide 2 of the same rails as the ATX, without making it over complicated to measure.

Now, have you gone through standard hardware troubleshooting procedure? I.e. take ALL periphrials out, including video card and ram, and see if it beeps and complains at you like normal. Add ram, see what happens, add video, see what happens... and so on. And of course, starting off with a clear CMOS.

If you manage to get it booting with video, does it stay booted just sitting at bios setup?

If not, then you may want to take a look at your HS/F application. Make sure the ridge on the heatsink is in the right place! (lined up with the ridge on the socket) Stupid, I know, but I did it myself. Also, make sure the CPU fan speed wire is connected to the mobo!! If this isnt plugged in then the mobo might turn itself off to protect the CPU.

If you can't boot at all, even after clearing CMOS, try hijacking someones PSU to try. After checking all you mountings (i.e. no shorts on any of the components), of course. Of you'll owe someone a power supply

It could be the PSU got fried by a surge or somthing, but until you've troubleshot it (lol, thats a new word ) you can't be sure

 

I had the exact same thing happening when my "last" Antec True 430 PSU was on it's way out. Everything would be running fine, then the puter would just shut down. When I tried to bootup it would do exactly as you described. Power would come on, fans would spin for only a second or two, then again shut down. The LED on the MB was lit up, though it was explained to me that the PSU was attempting to protect itself by shutting down. I guess it didn't realize that it was already fried. lol

 

Goldfish is on the right track. It's not a short.

 

Standoffs! That's what they are called!

 

As it turns out, it was the power supply. Thank you all for your help. As for my heating problem, there's not much I can do about it. My apartment is extremely hot. I may end up looking into liquid cooling.