"kony" <spam@spam.com> wrote
"steve d. podleski"> <steve.d.podleski@boeing.com> wrote:
>
>>While I was working on my pc, the system shut down as if the power failed.
>
> You were working on it while it was turned on ??!!
>
> Could you describe what you "think" might have happened?
> I suspect you might have shorted something, tripping the PSU
> to shut off. That might mean you needed to unplug it from
> the AC for a few minutes then retry it. If you didn't
> unplug it from AC, it might not start.

I think that I was typing when it shut off.

I unplugged the power cord and tried starting it without success.


>>I tried to turn the system back on but nothing happened. The only sign of
>>power was a green light on the motherboard. I replaced the power supply
>>with
>>a used Dell power supply that I got at a surplus store; this used power
>>supply had an extra bundle of blue and while cable with a small connector
>>that, I guess, needs to be connected to the motherboard but I could not
>>find
>>a compabatible socket;
>
> What did that extra connector look like? I'd guess it's for
> the PSU fan RPM sensor- and you don't need it, shouldn't
> hook it up.

I need to look at it again.

> More important, does this Dell PSU's wiring colors and pin
> positions match up to your other PSU? it might be a
> proprietary, incompatible pinout.

The Dell power supply had different colored wiring.

>>the old power supply had only one connector to the
>>motherboard.This replacement power supply had no effect including not
>>lighting the green light on the motherboard.
>>
>> Also, when the computer was functional, I would get occasional warnings
>>from the BIOS that the fan had 0 rpms but the after a few seconds, the fan
>>rpm was back to full value; I did not see this warning before the compuer
>>shut down.
>
> It could mean the fan was bad, or it could just mean the fan
> was running at a low RPM, low enough that the motherboard
> bios couldn't detect it's RPM properly- that's a common bios
> bug that is "Sometimes" corrected on later bios.
>
> I'd plug the old PSU back into the system, try to start the
> system and note whether it's fan is spinning (look at it,
> not by the bios health monitor screen). If the fan isn't
> spinning then turn the system off and decide whether to
> attempt replacing the fan (if the PSU hadn't baked for too
> long) or replacing whole PSU.

I plugged the old PSU into the motherboard and did not connect anything
else. The fan did not run.
Will buy a new PSU.

>>This system is over 5 years old with a 1.1GHz Athlon, ASUS motherboard and
>>300W power supply and 768MB Crucials (sp?) RAM.


> Depends on exactly what happened when you were working on
> it. if you think you damanged some particular part, pull
> that part out. you might also unplug AC and clear CMOS,
> then retry it.

How do you clear the CMOS?