Sudden Computer failure syndrome! please help.

[Kleffman]

ok today i was running my computer as usual, actually playing a game of "worms" and suddenly out of nowhere it shutdown, total power loss and will NOT turn back on. no signal whatsoever, no system beeps, nothing indicating any power to anything.
Background info:
WinXP pro
amd athlon 1.33 ghz
IWill KK266 motherboard
512 mb ram
ATI radeon 32 meg ddr agp graphics card
nothing overclocked or tweaked that i can think of
Lately i've been researching why my system will not run ANY game with openGL support and it turns out there is massive conflicts with my amd system and that video card. so naturally i updated the video drivers to the newest ATI ones. also updated directx. this is the only real change to the system recently, except 2 months ago added a second slave hard drive (working fine all this time). What in the world do i do to even start? i'm assuming maybe the power supply went bad, but does that happen? and if so do i lose my data? i'm good with computers but this is the biggest problem i've ever seen. if anyone can help, thanks!

 

[vey99]

Hi there,

Looks like a faulty power supply, or a loose power cable somewhere (I know ppl who get too excited playing Worms such that the whole table moves). You might want to take a torchlight and check the fan in the power supply unit. I once had someone extract a dead lizard from there.

Hope that helps.

 

[plynn1236]

Sudden failure of the power supply is what usually happens. This isn't like a stressed
video card that starts sporting dots in cute rows. It's on -- oh, it's not. Power supplies
have big filtering capacitors that can hold juice for hours, buy a new one, that's rated higher that the last one; ie 300 watts? buy a 350 watts or better, like a 400 watt model. I suspect the start-up load of the new secondary Hdd was the last straw that wore it out and "done him in ..." plynn1236 Chaos reigns within. Reflect, repent, and reboot.
Order shall return.

 

[TerrySr]

I would check that your "AMD" processor isn't overheating.
I worked on one that was overheating, shutdown, and would not come back on for several minutes, only to shut down again in a hurry. Acted like the power supply had failed.
Just something else to check out.

 

[paparazi]

If you can take it back to a bare bones state, just pull out everything except memory, graphics, CPU with heatsink/fan, reseat the main power plug to motherboard but pull all the IDE cables out incl floppy and pull out front panel header connectors.
Reset cmos clear.
Carefully bridge the power switch header pins with a small flade screw driver just momentarily.
Now if it doesn't post to bios in this basic configuration all you have is five possible culprits: Memory, CPU, Video card, Motherboard and Power supply.
But the most likely, given the desciption, is the power supply.
Even more suspect if it happens to be a cheap generic type 250watt or similar.
Martin Replying helps further our knowledge, without comment leaves us wondering.

 

[Kleffman]

Alright, thanks for the help guys, figuring it was my power supply ( i took it out and yes...generic 250 watt, those bastards!) i got a new 430 watt dual fan excellent supply and my computer works again. luckily my data is still there, and i'm backing it up now. i've heard the horror stories of the supply ruining other stuff as well.