CPU Any ideas?

so, its 11 pm, I'm gaming as normal, when for no apparent reason, there's a crackling from my case and my system powers off. Now, the mb lights come on and the post display, but it refuses to start up. System is only a year old. I called scan but they want to know which component specifically is dodgy. Seeing that I can't actually power on the system nor have the spares handy to run individual tests, I'm a bit screwed. Any suggestions to what I can do? Specs are in my Sig .

 

Start simple, remove anything unnecessary. Try booting with just one stick of memory, no graphics card, no hard drive, no optical.

Then if it works, try a different stick of memory. Then if all memory allows it to boot, add graphics card and try it again. Keep going until you find the thing that won't let it boot.

If it doesn't boot at all no matter what, I would say either PSU or motherboard. Unlikely to be your CPU as they very rarely fail.

 

thanks for the reply. That's the thing, its as if there is no power full stop, whilst the rog logo is lit up, as are the post display and the array of power and reset etc switches, it does nothing if I press either the case, or onboard power switches

 

It does nothing even when there's nothing except your CPU and one stick of memory plugged in?

 

Give the psu a sniff

Id strip it down, try it with just one stick of mem etc but your going to play guessing games without being able to swap parts.

 

Do that. In fact, can you smell anything unusual from inside the case?

It may seem stupid, but you didn't manage to loosen the power cable going into the power supply with your foot?

 

If this turns out to be the issue I will bake everybody on bit-tech a cheesecake each

On topic - Any word on whether anything works with just the basic bits?

 

Tried all suggestions. It's basically a very big paper weight

 

Oh and no funny smells, nor any physical signs of damage

 

I would hazard a guess at the PSU, most fizzy crackling explosions are PSU based. But, one thing to check, are all the screws in the right place, none have come loose. I had a motherboard screw come loose of its own accord when I was playing BC2. The resultant noise, and smell made me fear I'd accidentally entered the game world lol

Edit: Could still be PSU. You really need another to see if it's that or your board.

 

I doubt its the psu cos it still seems to be supplying power to the board. I think I have a spare somewhere so ill dig it out when I get home from work

 

Could be PSU, just because your board has power doesn't mean it has enough to turn on, or anything left to power the other bits. Best check, either way you're going to have to enter the realms of the RMA

 

Is it possible for a dodge psu to damage the rest of the components?

 

Very possible unfortunately.

 

So potentially I may have to Rma the whole rig? Yay D:

 

It's unlikely, most of the time it'll probably just be the PSU. Maybe the board as well if you're unlucky. Hopefully it's just one or the other

 

I hope its the psu, last thing I want to do is a windows reinstall, my data isn't backed up

 

On a side note, is there any way to recover data from a previous windows install if I do a new install on a different hdd ?

 

Yeah, if the hdd isn't damaged then it's just copy and paste. If it is damaged, data recovery might be necessary. Not difficult to recover data unless the hdd won't even recognise so you can't access it.

 

It's definitely the motherboard, I tested with my spare psu and got the same result. after going over it with a fine toothed comb I found some brownish blackish rust like residue on the right edge of the fujitsu capacitor under the memory modules so I guess that's the issue. I've got an rma number off scan and sending it out tomorrow. Thanks for the help noizedaemon, +rep