What Have You Done Today - (Computer Version)

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StGeorge
Something has died badly since I last posted in this thread.

Was browsing the web last night when all power suddenly went, my PC went off and automatically booted itself just a second after it had gone off but without display from my monitor, which leads me to think it's an electrical fault with some form of hardware.

My PC turns on fine but there isn't any display, I think it might be the graphics card what is broke after a power cut last week followed by another just milliseconds after power was restored, going along the lines that a power surge has done something with the GPU, either that or the PCI-E slots on my motherboard are shot, or finally it could be the motherboard itself as it doesn't even give power to my mouse & keyboard on boot-up (LED keyboard & mouse usually blink once they receive power) either way I'm one 🤬 off 🤬 right now.

I've also read that my OS could be operating in hibernation mode hence why the monitor won't display anything on boot but I'm pretty skeptical about that.

Going to use my dads graphics card in my system with my monitor to eliminate either my GPU, monitor or motherboard.

I'm hoping it's just the GPU what has died & not the motherboard as I see DDR2 has been phased out with the current selection of motherboards at my local computer shop, could be a costly rebuild all because of a 🤬 power surge.

I've placed my GPU in the 4 PCI-E slots available to me and I end up with the same result, I've also pressed the reset button on my motherboard to no avail & I've taken pretty much every slot, pin & every other form of electric out & back in just to be sure nothing is loose.

All in all, what haven't I done today computer wise? 🤬 tearing my hair out, or whats left of it :lol:.
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Did you try a different power supply?

Do the fans stay running at full blast, usually a few seconds after computer boots the fans generally slow down?

Any Beeps?
 
Have you tried taking the 24pin motherboard power connector out and bridging the green wire and one of the black(ground) wires? That will boot the PSU without the use of a power button. Of course remove all of the other power leads when you do this. That will tell that the PSU at least powers on. It can be a bad PSU or a PSU that was not designed to protect the computer from a power outage. It is a possibility that the PSU did not have those protections and let the power outage damage the motherboard.
 
Infinital-NG
Did you try a different power supply?

Do the fans stay running at full blast, usually a few seconds after computer boots the fans generally slow down?

Any Beeps?
Click to expand...

I haven't yet but my dad has a spare one so I'll try that tomorrow.

The fans run full blast all the time on my computer unless I alter them via a 3rd party program.

There isn't any beeps.

Thanks for the reply, appreciate the help :)

nick09
Have you tried taking the 24pin motherboard power connector out and bridging the green wire and one of the black(ground) wires? That will boot the PSU without the use of a power button. Of course remove all of the other power leads when you do this. That will tell that the PSU at least powers on. It can be a bad PSU or a PSU that was not designed to protect the computer from a power outage. It is a possibility that the PSU did not have those protections and let the power outage damage the motherboard.
Click to expand...

I've taken the 24 pin motherboard connector out and securely put it back in but I haven't bridged the wires yet, this another thing I shall do tomorrow.

Thanks for the reply, appreciate the help :)

*EDIT* Ruled out the monitor being a problem, that works fine when plugging the socket into my younger brothers laptop.
 
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Finally making a backup of my Seagate Barracuda 2TB drive. Funny thing, out of the 3 drives I bought for my recent upgrades, 2 were more or less dead on arrival. The 180GB OCZ SSD was dead for real, not being recognized properly and so on. The 2TB HDD was working but failing a lot recently.

557141_10150943615984022_709259321_n.jpg


The one on the floor is the 2TB one, hoping that it's staying online until all the data has been copied to another HDD.
 
Installed a 4GB RAM that was on sale recently, for 20 quid including delivery.

Now have a total of 8GB, should be a bit better to use on the desktop.

It was starting to annoy me that I had a laptop with more RAM than the desktop!
 
StGeorge
I haven't yet but my dad has a spare one so I'll try that tomorrow.

The fans run full blast all the time on my computer unless I alter them via a 3rd party program.

There isn't any beeps.

Thanks for the reply, appreciate the help :)



I've taken the 24 pin motherboard connector out and securely put it back in but I haven't bridged the wires yet, this another thing I shall do tomorrow.

Thanks for the reply, appreciate the help :)

*EDIT* Ruled out the monitor being a problem, that works fine when plugging the socket into my younger brothers laptop.
Click to expand...


Nick09's idea is good, but if you've got another power supply to try you shouldn't need to jumper those wires.

Sounds like motherboard to me, but sometimes it can hit your processor as well.
 
Infinital-NG
Nick09's idea is good, but if you've got another power supply to try you shouldn't need to jumper those wires.

Sounds like motherboard to me, but sometimes it can hit your processor as well.
Click to expand...

Got down to business regarding the problem yesterday.

My graphics card, HDD, power supply unit & RAM are all working fine in another system, tried a different power supply with no joy so the problem either lies with the motherboard and/or the CPU.

In my eyes its the PCI-E slots on my motherboard which have gone totally which is a little weird considering It's an Asus P5Q premium which is a quality peice of hardware or so I thought...

Cheers for all your help & ideas lads :cheers:.
 
StGeorge
Got down to business regarding the problem yesterday.

My graphics card, HDD, power supply unit & RAM are all working fine in another system, tried a different power supply with no joy so the problem either lies with the motherboard and/or the CPU.

In my eyes its the PCI-E slots on my motherboard which have gone totally which is a little weird considering It's an Asus P5Q premium which is a quality peice of hardware or so I thought...

Cheers for all your help & ideas lads :cheers:.
Click to expand...

It's difficult to determine what has been fried by what. I'm just thinking your PSU never protected your motherboard or CPU from too much current or too much voltage(voltage getting out of specification is a possible way to kill a system easily). Without knowing the PSU, I would not know if it has the circuits to protect your system.
 
nick09
It's difficult to determine what has been fried by what. I'm just thinking your PSU never protected your motherboard or CPU from too much current or too much voltage(voltage getting out of specification is a possible way to kill a system easily). Without knowing the PSU, I would not know if it has the circuits to protect your system.
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You can try different cpu/motherboard with your current, but both might be fried.

If you hook up the bad motherboard to a new cpu if the mobo is bad off it could fry the new cpu and vice versa.

I'd bet more on the motherboard as if voltage did get into your system, depending on where it went your cpu might just be fine.

Does your motherboard show any scorching/bulging capacitors?

bad_capacitors.jpg
 
Bought 8GB of RAM for my MacBook.


FINALLLLYYYY!!!!!! :D :D You know, I've been saying I'm gonna upgrade for the last year? Well I got it dirt cheap on the EBay from a guy I've bought a few things off, so I know it's reliable (and a 99.9% positive feedback can't prove wrong).

On a sadder note, however, I broke another headset. This is my 5th headset of this particular model, and the one that lasted the longest. Gonna have to buy a new one tomorrow.

Oh and another thing, Lindsay (my mate that I upgraded his rig with a GTX560 and a new motherboard, etc) has lots of issues with his graphics card all the time. A lot of them we just pass by, and I'm not up for RMAing the card etc, we're just going to live with the bugs until he gets a completely new rig (only thing we'll transfer over is the graphics card and hard drive).

Thing is, his graphics card shut down yesterday. No biggie, goes to restart it. Doesn't post. Gives me a panic call, "OMGOMGOMG IT"S NOT WORKINGGGGG", I tell him to put in an old graphics card he used (A GT210) before the 560. Nope, doesn't post either. Now this baffled me. Maybe the PCI-E slot was gone. Might have shorted out. Could be the motherboard. Onboard graphics works fine, but nothing if he plugged in a dedicated card.

Hangs up from me, and he gives the 560 one more go. Well turns out one of the 4 pin molex connectors fell out (both 6 pins are running off 4 pin molex adapters, yes I know it's bad, i can't do anything about it, he's using a bit of a cruddy power supply that he got out of a friend's old rig. No name brand thing, it's 550W, so it's crap as it gets but it's the best we can do for now). He felt stupid, but it still worries/wonders me why the 210 wouldn't work, it only sucks 75W from the PCI-E, doesn't need a 6pin or such.

Oh well, hes now saving up to move up to 1155. Core i5 here we come!

Will probably update the thread of his when that happens too. This is going to be a 80% overhaul of the rig, these small cheap upgrades were just to keep him going till he got 1155, and so he could have his Battlefields 3s.
 
I don't know what I did to my laptop. But since a couple of days certain keys come out double when I press them.

'' "" ~~

Anyone know this problem, and a cure?
 
I'd remove the key tops and inspect the buttons. They could be getting stuck and need a little adjustment. Otherwise you may have to replace the keyboard itself since it would not be a software issue.
 
Well, they aren't stuck, and it seems that I am not the only one with the problem..

Only thing is, the solutions I found so far don't work for me.


Edit.

:lol:

The solution couldn't have been any easier. Removed the keyboard from device manager, and voila ' " ~

They are fixed.

And no one mentioned it in any solution offered. :lol:
 
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Does anyone know why Opera sometimes moves the text to the address bar when you are typing in a text box for a forum?

Also, I had some worrying signs, that whenever I page down on Opera recently, it goes straight to the address bar and flashes super fast. I have to use the Escape button for it to stop. Initially I assume my keyboard was dying. But its working rather well. So it seems that I have to re-install Opera. Would I be correct in my assumption?

I like Opera, mainly because to me, it is quick at loading and it seems to be rather user-friendly to me.

Currently using Google web browser. I got Firefox here, but it did get infected some time ago (since been clean) but decided to avoid it anyhow, as it was a bit too common to use for attackers.
 
I don't use Opera much, it's my 'backup backup'. :P

I use FF as main, Chrome for flash, java, and shockwave things (I disabled them on FF due to the Flashback trojan, just as a precaution till I get Karapasky), and Opera I've left as stock as it comes (got AdBlock and other plugins on Chrome and FF) incase something goes arse up with the other two. However, I had to use Opera to troll a friend in an AJAX chat one day, and I noticed it was putting it into the address bar. It became a real pain.

I think it might just be a bug they'll fix in the next patch, whenever that may come about.

EDIT: Oh my gosh, this shipment from the states is taking forever. Does it really take 5 days to get something from L.A to Queensland, AU? Unless the plane it was on is swimin' with the fishies, in which case we would have heard about it. I've had a few things shipped from the states and as soon as they leave the US boarder, I never hear from them until they rock up at my doorstep, which has never taken this long.

Perhaps Australia post is farting around with it for some reason, they're slow in my town and one of the main branches is down for reno's. Now I'm just rambling... time to hit up the Premo thread!
 
Installed MotionCreator 2 for my Razer Hydra and been fiddling around with that, mainly. Bit annoyed though because for reasons unknown Assassin's Creed II doesn't want to pick up the Hydra despite it being a documented compatible game. Lots of fun playing Modern Warfare 3 with it though, very precise and accurate 👍
 
Upgraded my PC to an i7 2600 and fitted an Asus Sabertooth Z77 in aswell.

It runs so much better now.
 
I just ordered an Arctic Cooling Accelero Twin Turbo II to replace the noisy and hot Asus Glaciator.

EDIT: It blocks about 3-3¼ slots with my GTS 250 so I gotta get rid of my PCI wireless card for more breathing space (and better temps too) and then either just simply get an USB Wifi card or fix my ethernet port (but I doubt it will ever work).

EDIT2: Just made a backup of my system on an external HDD, so I'm not screwed when something goes horribly wrong.

EDIT3: Idle temps on Twin Turbo II are at around 33 degrees celsius (42c with the side panel on) running on the 12V adapter (vs. 45-50c on the Glaciator, which had some concrete-like TIM, went up to 50-55c and 80c+ on load with the side panel on!), even though the wireless card is still there (1cm clearance!). It's also much quieter (a pleasant, smooth whooshing instead of just a plain, harsh wind noise), so I'm very happy with the results. :) I also installed some heatsinks on the voltage regulators, replacing that bulky golden Asus heatsink which would've blocked the ATT2. A SATA cable for my DVD-drive was also blocking the massive cooler so I had to get rid of it, I'm not sure if an angled one would even fit there. Overall this was quite easy to install. :)
 
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Installed the new Asus monitor(Mmmm great colors) and worked on fixing the old HP monitor. So far the flickering issue has been fixed by removing and inserting the power board back into the monitor but I'm not holding my breath. I'll just keep the CRT in the garage for a week or two and see how the HP works.
 
After 2 years, I finally opened up my laptop and cleaned the dust out.

For a while now it ran hot very fast, and when my sister played The Sims 3 on it, it would overheat eventually and shut down.

Then there was also the issue how my laptop has been performing bad in general compared to last year. I've ran CCleaner, Virus scans, Defrags, my laptop just seems clean in general. Yet in games it is performing worse then it did before. (Longer loading times, slightly worse framerates)

I don't know whether heat = performance since I am no PC knowitall, but I decided to clean my laptop out anyway since I'm not buying my desktop for another half year or so.

So I unscrewed it and removed the small lid that was halfway covering the fan. When I removed this lid I saw how badly the dust had packed itself where the fan is supposed to blow the dust out of the laptop. The dust had completely blocked the exit, only a tiny bit remained open. No wonder my laptop ran hot so fast!

I didn't have compressed air though, but my sister draws and paints a lot so I borrowed a very small, but quite stiff brush. The brush appeared to be very effective, and I managed to completely clear the fan exit and the fan from dust.

Succes! 👍
 
Not sure if this counts as a computer.. pretty darn close to a net book though, i flashed a new ROM and Kernal to my Asus Transformer

ROM- Android Revolution HD ICS

Kernal- test 21 max cpu speed... 1702 MHz for each of my dual cores... AWESOME! Haha
 
I just cleaned the CPU heatsink from dust because I felt a bit uncomfortable with 53°c (TjMax 70°c) on heavy h.264 encoding, ~36-40°c idle. Now I'm having 28-33°c temps idle, just tested encoding a full HD video and it never went over 45°c. Not bad for a stock HSF I guess.

By the way, is it safe to use 'Zalman ZM-F1BL' as a CPU fan? It has a 3-pin connector but I'm unsure if it could change the rotation speed by itself when temps go up. The stock fan's bearing is starting to create noise, so I should replace it soon, to a more powerful one if Zalman is no good for the job (thinking about a 80mm→120mm adapter!).

I also found a 90° SATA cable for my DVD drive, it fit there wonderfully and now it's back in action!! :):)
 
If the fan has a 4-pin fan(not molex) connection then it will be controlled by PWM(lame man terms means that the PC will rise the fan speed if the CPU gets hotter). A 3-pin fan will always run at 12V and at it's max speed. Don't even try to get some adapter to attach a 120mm fan. It's much better to replace the cooler with a 120mm cooler(if the rear fan over the I/O plate is a 120mm fan then there is room for a 120mm tower type cooler like the Coolermaster 212). If you can, it's much easier to use a aftermarket cooler that mounts to the standard mount that the stock HSF uses as you won't have to remove the motherboard to change the HSF.
 
Yeah, but I'm sure the CPU fan's speed is being controlled by the motherboard, despite having a 3-pin connector or it has a built-in heatsensor. Both of my computer fans are 80mm and there are additional 92mm holes at the case (rear) fan mount, so I guess I won't have enough room for a 120mm fan. I'm happy enough with my stock heatsink and I only want to replace the noisy fan, it's quite probably the only part which needs replacing at the moment. I also have a couple of fan controllers if I'm going to need any. :)
 
:(

My laptop just died on me. Most likely my graphics card. I have pulled it apart, will get some new paste tomorrow, and hope that it was just a case of overheating. Spare parts aren't cheap, I just found out..
 
Dennisch
:(

My laptop just died on me. Most likely my graphics card. I have pulled it apart, will get some new paste tomorrow, and hope that it was just a case of overheating. Spare parts aren't cheap, I just found out..
Click to expand...

Yeah, a replacement motherboard(If the GPU is on the motherboard of course) for any laptop would not be defined cheap.
 
nick09
Yeah, a replacement motherboard(If the GPU is on the motherboard of course) for any laptop would not be defined cheap.
Click to expand...

No, it's a separate one, lucky me, it a NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GT 256MB MXM card. I found a second hand GS model for 35 Euro, so if repasting it doesn't work I'll get that one. On the plus side I had to remove the cooling block for my cpu too, and that paste was pretty hard.. So that one will get aome new paste too.
 
The paste is in place, My cores run at 43 and 40 degrees C. But my GPU goes to 60 C.

Is this normal for a laptop?
 

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