On Thu, Mar 20, 2008 at 6:29 PM, Grant <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > A Gentoo desktop of mine won't turn on anymore. I was hoping it was > > > the power supply but I've installed a new one which doesn't fix the > > > problem. Is there a sure way to know if the motherboard needs > > > replacement or if I have two dead power supplies? > > > > Hi there, > > > > I work on PCs for a living, mostly peoples' home computers, and in > > the case of a "dead pc" the cause is nearly as often something else > > as it is a dead PSU. > > > > Causes such as a duff CD-ROM drive or a damaged USB connector are > > surprising but not uncommon, so reset the BIOS (using the method > > described by Volker) and if that doesn't work unplug as much as > > possible from the motherboard - you'll surely need the CPU & RAM for > > it to post, but you may wish to swap out the RAM at some point in > > your diagnostics - and unplug most everything else. That means > > drives, PCI cards, USB devices, stuff connected to the USB & serial > > headers, graphics card if possible. Also don't connect the power > > supply to any of the drives, or anything else that you're not > > currently using. > > > > I've seen cheap power supplies take out the motherboard when they go. > > Sorry if you find that to be the case. > > I removed everything from the motherboard and even tried another CPU > that used to run on that same motherboard. No luck. I can't test the > power supply in my P3 router because the CPU power plug is different. > > I should have said before that every couple times I try to turn it on, > the CPU fan spins about 2% of a full rotation and some of the LEDs > along the back light up for a second. > > Would you guys say it is most likely the motherboard at this point? > > - Grant > -- > gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org mailing list > > I'm going to take a stab in the dark and say this is an Emachines PC. Am I right?
Emachines, when the PSU goes bad, have a habit of taking out the motherboard, too. Hooking the old PSU up to a new motherboard fries the new one. I fried 2 motherboards (not Emachines supplied) back in my early days doing this (PSU wasn't Emachines, either). So, it can happen with other PSU/motherboards. If the motherboard has a status light and it isn't even coming on, then the motherboard is dead. Even bad CPUs I've damaged still allowed the motherboard, fans, etc. to power up (though nothing came up on the screen). -- - Mark Shields
