My Comp is Kabput

[General Sun]

My computer is broken, it refuses to turn on. Immediate symptoms include, when turning on... the power switches on for less than a second, the fan twitches, then everything stops. It's not the powersupply (I know because I bought another one... ). So I'm thinking either the CPU's gone or the Motherboard's gone.

I was just in the middle of using the stupid thing (actually afk, some distance off when the computer spontaneously shut down.) I don't mean BOSD, I mean went black and power turned off. I tried to turn it back on, no go. It's been about a month now.... Is there a way to either isolate the problem or to fix it? Thanks!

[danzig]

My computer is broken, it refuses to turn on. Immediate symptoms include, when turning on... the power switches on for less than a second, the fan twitches, then everything stops. It's not the powersupply (I know because I bought another one... ). So I'm thinking either the CPU's gone or the Motherboard's gone.

I was just in the middle of using the stupid thing (actually afk, some distance off when the computer spontaneously shut down.) I don't mean BOSD, I mean went black and power turned off. I tried to turn it back on, no go. It's been about a month now.... Is there a way to either isolate the problem or to fix it? Thanks!

Sounds like motherboard if you swapped out psu. No lights stay on at all more then briefly when turning it on? CPU would cause mother board error beeps and most likely report no cpu detected.

[Spiff]

I agree, if youre sure its not the PSU then it pretty much has to be the motherboard, anything else wouldnt cause the actual comuter to turn itself off again as far as i know.

Was it a fairly old motherboard or were you overcloking perhaps? In any case im pretty sure a new motherboard is going to be the solution

[Sammur-amat]

did you check contacts on front panel (on/off) ...i know cases when similar stuff happened because of loose wire on the front panel ...

[General Sun]

Thanks for the advice everyone. Considering what nookie said, the best course of action might be to take everything apart and put everything back together again before making any further purchases. I'll see if it helps and report back.

[Pent uP Rage]

Visually inspect the mobo. Very possible it COULD be a capacitor that went bad. IF you see no small burns or any capacitor leakage, it COULD be one of the secondary chips.(north or southbridge chips). GENTLY wiggle any bent or suspect capacitors.
If you're handy with a soldering iron, all MIGHT not be lost.

Of course, it all depends on how far you're willing to go before just saying screw it and buying a new one.

[matereo]

A decent motherboard isnt expensive and the easiest way to fix things... A great tool when things go bad is to have a "damn small linux" live disc and try to run... makes it possible to download drivers for flashing bios and other things eaven if the Hd's gone.