Power-up problems

[attrofy]

I have a PC I am looking at that won't power up. This isa friend of mine's PC. He said he unplugged everything because of a pending thunderstorm (old house with poor wiring). When the storm was passed, he re-connected everything, and it wouldn't power up. No posts, no lights, no beeps, the powersupply wouldn't even come on. This PC is a replacement for a MB that failed in his old PC, so he took the PowerSupply from that case, and still had the same problems.
He brought it into work today, and the same is still going on. I have tried a new power cord, switched the power button with the reset button (on the MB), checked the AC connections on the PS plug, I still can't get the PS to turn on (an yes, I have checked the switch on the PS itself). I guess my question is if anyone knows of something on the MB that would overide the PS ability to power up? Also, is there anyway to jump (or short) one of the PS plug leads (that connects to the MB power supply plug) to make the PS think it has gotten a "power-on" switch "push" from the power button on the front pannel??? Any thoughts or advice. I don't have a spare PS that IO can test on this at the moment, and am afraid to test a good one in case something on the MB is damaging his. ANy thoughts??

BTW this is an ECS K7AMA board with a 300 Watt King Star power supply.

Russell

 

[ceh4702]

Power supplies can be awful touchy sometimes. They can go out at any time. Also if you have a card that isnt seated right like a Video card or the motherboard is grounding out on the mounts it can short out and you will get nothing. I shorted out a power supply a while back while putting in a new modem. The Power Plug may not be in all the way or something. Also check to see if the connector for the Soft Power On switch is plugged into the motherboard properly. Usually there is a lead that connects to the power switch it may be plugged into the motherboard wrong or loose. Hopefully you tried a different power cord also. If you do not like my post feel free to point out your opinion or my errors.

 

[Dan1976]

I'd say to try his PS on a known good motherboard. No need to unmount anything, just string the connectors across, nice and ugly. I have seen PS' go into a 'protect mode'. It's the best i can describe it. We would do a lot of the same checks you did and nothing. However, sometimes we could hold the reset switch in, not the power switch, for about 10 seconds or so, and the PS would come out of it's protective mode.

Good luck.

 

[attrofy]

CEH4702 - tried all of the above - no go....

Dan1976 - that sounds like something I will have to try. I think we left it at the fact he was going to try to find a cheapy PS at Circuit City. But this may be good advice to find out if that is what happend. It may bring it back and make it a useable backup PS.

Thanks for your help.

Russell

 

[sleew]

If you are shure that everything is pluged OK and power cord is ok than try next:find power jumper on mb and use pincers to shortcut them.Does it goes up?You are mentioning storm.If you have integrated modem it happens that storm hits modem and burn north bridge chip.Try to band node at every 1 meter of phone cable(induction stuff)and it should protect your friends modem from further storm attacks.
That's all i can remember now... Sleew
Compaq & Microsoft TS
sleew@infosky.net

 

[FatesWebb]

uh, I suggest to test it you unplug EVERYTHING but the powersupply, and take out all the expansion cards such as the video and sound memory processor ect. and see if it powers up. if it doesnt then your motherboard is most likely toast. if it does it was one of the things you unplugged.

 

[Cindy1]

You were asking if there was a way to check the powersupply in the system, yes there is. On an atx power supply you have it connected from the wall then the other end that would normaly go into the motherboard hold it in your hand and take a plastic coated paperclip strip the ends and put one in the green and one in the black. Make sure that nothing else is connected to it just the wall. What you are looking for is the fan in the power supply to spin. When that happens it's good. Check to make sure the toggle switch on the back is set to 115 not 230. One more thing, a modem is notorious for holding down a system so strip it of all but power, motherboard, cpu. Turn it on and see if it beeps.
Good luck,
Cindy