Is this a dying power supply problem or something else?

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Salahudeen

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I can't tell if the Power Supply is faulty or its another problem, the PSU is brand new, but everytime I switch the PC on after leaving it off for ages, nothing shows on the screen the keyboard lights don't even come on, and the led indicators on the front of the case don't even light up, however all the fans are spinning and the DVD drives open up,

If I press the power button and turn the machine on and off a few times, eventually I get POST, do you think the PSU is dying slowly or is it something else?
 
it really does sound like the capacitors in the psu are requiring a few restarts to charge up enough to power it up, but it's impossible to tell without testing
removing that 300mb gfx card should help diagnose it quickly
 
Abz2000 said:
it really does sound like the capacitors in the psu are requiring a few restarts to charge up enough to power it up, but it's impossible to tell without testing
removing that 300mb gfx card should help diagnose it quickly
Click to expand...

If I connect the Monitor to the VGA port on the MB will that be enough? I mean will it produce a POST because I don't have on board graphics I think. just a VGA port on the back below printer port.
 
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thats the onboard basic one, it should do the job fine, but you have to remove the agp one for it to be activated

so if we isolate the psu, the hdd, the od, and the gfx, the only items remaining seem to be the memory, cpu and motherboard.
maybe it is time for a new one, personally i would just get the mobo, cpu and ram.

check these out for low cost high spec:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MSI-G41M-P28-Intel-Socket-775-2-x-ddr3-Micro-Atx-Pc-Computer-Motherboard-LAN-USB-/120771312794?pt=UK_Motherboards_CPUs&hash=item1c1e87fc9a#ht_5277wt_1396

this can be overclocked even more:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Intel-Cor...boards_CPUs&hash=item336e6b2f83#ht_500wt_1413
 
Does the power cable of your monitor connect to the power supply of your computer or does it connect directly to another external power socket?
 
Did you unlock a core? Reset your bios settings to default and then try to boot. A brand new psu is unlikely to be the problem imo.
 
Dagless said:
Did you unlock a core? Reset your bios settings to default and then try to boot. A brand new psu is unlikely to be the problem imo.
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Nah I never, I've tried loading bios to defaults, the thing is, the problem is getting progressively worse each day, the number of times I have to switch it on and off to boot up is increasing every day which means something is dying slowly I think.

Bro it is possible the new PSU is faulty since it was a cheapo unbranded one :p hehe argh I'm just going to return it and see what they say. Annoying thing about buying stuff over internet, delivery charges!
 
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It could also be a problem with the ic controlling the flow of power to your motherboard. btw it might just be cheaper to buy a new psu locally.
 
Well it's not the PSU, I tried the PSU from my new PC and same problem, I give up, just gonna throw it in the bin.
 
Salahudeen said:
Nah I never, I've tried loading bios to defaults, the thing is, the problem is getting progressively worse each day, the number of times I have to switch it on and off to boot up is increasing every day which means something is dying slowly I think.
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Set bios settings to minimum specs.
Did you remove all your additional hardware? So you only have motherboard, processor, hd and RAM? (actually remove all but one stick of RAM too).
If you still have the problem; run a memtest and cpu test (when you can boot).

Random question, but you have plugged in 2 power connectors on the motherboard?
 
Dagless said:
Set bios settings to minimum specs.
Did you remove all your additional hardware? So you only have motherboard, processor, hd and RAM? (actually remove all but one stick of RAM too).
If you still have the problem; run a memtest and cpu test (when you can boot).

Random question, but you have plugged in 2 power connectors on the motherboard?
Click to expand...

Yeah I tried all the above, it's really weird, the fans spin but the LED lights don't come on, doesn't get to POST, nothing shows on the screen. What do you mean by two power connectors??
 
Dagless said:
If you bought the X3 they usually need 2 power connectors into the motherboard (the normal atx connector and a 4 pin atx).
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oh nah, it's very old pc, it's AMD athlon 2600+ xp, 2.13 ghz single core, bought it in 2003, I think the motherboard is just dying or something, cos I've had it for soo long.
It only has DDR ram too and the ram is really slow mhz, and old 64 mb ram, graphics card. its for the scrap I think.
 
bro, i've been bugging you to try hire's boot cd, that also has memtest in it.
i've got a feeling you'll be able to isolate the issue with just one disk.
i'm like you, once i've spent a few hours on something, i don't like giving up too easily no matter how cheap it is.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiren's_BootCD
 
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Abz2000 said:
bro, i've been bugging you to try hire's boot cd, that also has memtest in it.
i've got a feeling you'll be able to isolate the issue with just one disk.
i'm like you, once i've spent a few hours on something, i don't like giving up too easily no matter how cheap it is.
Click to expand...

I can't use the boot disk cos I can't even get to POST, on the off chance I do get to POST after switching it on and off about 15 times, what shall I do with the CD? like what tests?? :p jazakAllah khair
 
bro, you've isolated it down to the mobo, ram and hdd,
with the boot cd, you can remove the hdd and plug in the optical disk drive.
run live mini xp to see if it runs ok without the hdd.
run a live test on the memory with memtest.
the thing with memory is that it can work even when faulty, so you can't just tell by seeing it start - unless you try replacement modules
once you've isolated it to the mobo, you can check it to see if there are any bloated capacitors, if so, replace them, 30p each, all you need is a soldering iron, flux, and solder.
to go further you'd need a mulitmeter.
 
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