Spilled soda on my desktop and now I can't get any video to display?

So over the last weekend I knocked a glass of sprite onto my desk and some leaked off the side where my desktop was sitting (with it's side panel open). The computer immediately froze up/shut down and I unplugged everything and shut off the power switch immediately. I didn't notice any damage to the parts on first glance so stupidly tried to power it on to no avail. I then got an old graphics card that had blown before (2+ years ago). To my surprise I got video display once it reached my desktop screen and the windows sound since I had my audio plugged in to try and hear anything.

Now I realize this was pretty stupid of me as there could have been massive liquid damage and fried the mobo/psu/gfx card/cpu or whatever but I was desperate and noticed no immediate damage anywhere. Not sure what to look for since the soda was sprite but I figured the liquid had probably hit the graphics card considering the location of the tower, but it's impossible to tell and it definitely wasn't much since most of it fell on the desk. From then I kept everything unplugged and removed all parts (ram, hard drive, graphics card, external devices, etc.) I left this off for about 48 hours and bought a new graphics card, thinking (no video probably meant my card was fried). I completely took apart the computer down to the cpu and inspected the motherboard very carefully, looking for busted cap thingies, any kind of acidic looking material or discolorations or abnormalities anywhere.

The only thing I could find that remotely looked out of the ordinary (apart from a lot of dust was a very very tiny outline of a shape resembling a poorly drawn circle in a light greyish color on a chip on the motherboard (the largest of several on there). I think I had actually noticed it there before many months ago when I had replaced my thermal paste and dusted out the computer.

Anyway, I dusted and did put some articlean also on that spec on the chip with a q-tip and dried it off with a clean cotton tea. I reapplied the thermal paste and put everything back together. Waited about 2 hours and tried again to power it on with the new graphics card. The computer powers on (the fans run, mobo/psu lights come on). I haven't set up the pin with makes the beeping sounds when you turn it on, so i might try that when I get home (just thought of that now). So while it is 'powered on' it will make a whirring sound every 15-20 seconds or so like it's trying to power on. It's very faint but a noticeable sound as if something is trying to start up.

I am concerned that maybe my mobo is in fact dead but I'd like to rule out everything else first since the mobo will end up costing me more than double any other part. I plan to go buy a new PSU today and return that new graphics card. The reason I suspect it might also be the PSU is because with the graphics card I was using, you had to plug in an extra 4 'pronged?' power cord from the PSU into it's side to help it run.

Whenever I did this with the extra power plugged in, the computer lights would flick on and the fans would spin 1 rotation and then immediately shut off. This suggests to me that maybe there is some power but for the most part it's blown/fried/whatever. The liquid very easily would have reached the PSU from the open sided desktop with the big PSU being on the left with an very open spiral top to it. The liquid would have had to splash and in a weird angle to reach anything else except the graphics card. Someone had mentioned in another thread about a similar situation that just because the computer lights and fan come on, does not mean the PSU is necessarily working and that it could still power up fans and lights while not producing enough power to get anything else going. I'm hoping this is the case so I'm only out around $60-80 in stead of $150+ and having to order online (since no one carries local mobos).


Anyway, if anyone can give me insight on what they think I would appreciate it.

Lastly, I heard there's some hardware I can buy(on the cheap) that actually is supposed to detect which part of your computer has failed. What is this hardware and is it easily available or is it something I would have to get online or at a specialty store?

 

Hi, CaptainIndustry. Welcome to Major Geeks.

The whine you heard could be the PSU fan OR the optical drive (it will spin up briefly on bootup to detect if any media is inserted). Sheesh, what a situation. rolleyes

Someone like Spad or The Mekanic may be able to point you in the right direction about test equipment. Best of luck.

 

I also welcome you!
Generally there is no hardware to test a computer system, they vary too much.
But there is a ton of software.
Could you please describe your system? CPU, MB, video card and any other specifics.
If your system runs you can run
http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/belarc_advisor.html
Take it all apart and then:
1) Start with a good inspection (glasses and flashlight time). Clean with distilled water and q tips or alcohol if necessary. Especially check the slots looking for bent or corroded fingers.
2) Build a minimal machine, one RAM stick, no HDD (boot from USB or CD), onboard video if available and run Prime 95 overnight
3) Add one component at a time (one RAM stick or the video card or the HDD) and run again. This takes time, but will be the best path back to stablilty.
4) When you are fully built, hopefully with no problems, choose a video card test. I use Furmark, but it does do a severe stress test on the card and therefore the PSU as well.
Please continue to post here as you progress.