Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler IT guy needs computer help, go figure :)

Ok so I came home from work tonight planning on jumping on the net and talking to you guys. I usually leave my computer in standby mode, since we got broadband internet I like being able to jump on and not have to use dialup.

Anyway, last night I actually turned it off to give it a break So I walk in the door and push the power button, what happens, the greeen led light flashes for a second and nothing. So I flip off/on the surge and try it again, same thing, quick flash of the green led and nothing. Then I tried flipping off/on the main switch on the back to the power supply, same thing.

This pc is one I built myself about 2 years ago, it is a 1.2ghz Athlon and I have had great luck until now.

So what is it, the power supply shot, the switch screwed up?

Any ideas. this really sucks as I was going to burn, oops I mean make an archive copy of a DVD that I own

Randy

Since the green light turned on for a bit then turned off, it'd be a reasonable assumption to say that the PSU was the culprit. You are lucky that it didn't die when the computer was on. Many people lose a lot of hardware from dying PSUs. That is why I never skimp on a PSU.

It's really hard to trouble shoot over the phone much less in a forum... but make sure the orange switch (usually) below the power supply switch is set to 115, if it is, try switching it to 220 or whatever the other setting is and then back to 115. Then try turning the pc on again.

Follow these steps.

Hey John......OT.

Hope you got PM.....didn't seem to get usual confirmation upon "Send" activation

Well there is an Orange switch, it was on 115, so just for kicks I switched it to 230, when I turn the main power switch on I have power, the green light stays on and I can hear the fan spinning, however, the pc never boots up and the hard drive light is not active. When I go back to 115, same thing. I don't remember the brand of motherboard I installed but there are 4-5 led lights near the back that are supposed to be helpful for showing the status, I noticed they are all red during the brief second it starts to power up...

Randy

I've got a few Power Supplies from older pc's, I wonder if I could swap one of them into this machine?

NOT, just spent the last 20 minutes trying to find my old pc boxed up in the basement, pulled out the power supply, and the motherboard connectors are different

I wrote down the PSU in my current system:

I'll have to do some searching on the net to see if I can find a replacement, or call the place locally I bought the parts from to see if they can get me one

It should be an ATX power supply if the mobo is anything relatively recent. Did you make sure that the power connection to the mobo is secure? Try pulling it out and plugging it back in. It also sounds like a grounding issue with the mobo and the case, which would explain the powering on for a second then quiting. Since it is a computer that you built I would strongly consider making sure that the mobo is not touching the metal of the case at all.... generally this is caused by one of the stands that the mobo sits on falling out. Kinda hard to explain... but unscrew the side of the case that the mobo is on and make sure all the brackets are properly seated.

If you have the model number and manufacture for the mobo and/or the power supply I'll try to help you look up a manual for both and let you know what type of power supply you need, if that is in fact what is wrong.

If you want to just go ahead an get a power supply then I would suggest www.newegg.com. I've ordered from then on many occasions and they are the best, hands down.

You can try testing the ATX power supply by removing it and taking the main connector of wires, and instering a paperclip or something to short the green wire to ground (black) If its an ATX its the only green wire there is on that connector. It should turn on the power supply. You really dont need a model number. Just know what size you need and how much wattage you think you'll need they all pretty much do the same thing. 3.3v(orange) ,5v,(red) and 12v (yellow).


also comes in handy if you ever need a power supply for.... whatever. Since they are so versatile. Im currently finisng up a project using a Cdrom for a cdp, powered by a computer PS. More on that next week when its all done though.

Thanks guys, it is a Deer brand DR-A300ATX 300watt power supply which came with this Athlon 1.2 machine. The motherboard is a MSI Microstar if memory serves me correctly. Yes, I can check the grounding issue of the motherboard to the case. When temporarily switching to 230 mode, I do get power, however the hard drive does not kick on, not sure if that has to do with the incorrect voltage.

I have found articles on the net where the Deer PSU's have had stability problems. Mine has lasted 4-5 years so I guess that is not so bad I'll keep ya all posted...Randy

It sounds like you might just want to get another PS, even if it's not the problem. $30-35 for a good ~350watt ATX PS not too bad to fix a problem, and for a little peace of mind over the Deer. I'm not sure how good of an idea it is to run it in 230 mode though. I meant cycle the orange switch once. I think I'm pretty much out of ideas. Let us know how it goes.

I notice Compusa here locally has some good prices on 250watt ATX PSU's.. Would it be ok for me to use a 250 watt versus 300 or higher? Does the additional wattage help when a person has multiple hard drives/burners/etc... or is it related to what the CPU needs?

It pretty much comes down to number of hard drives, processor needs, and video card needs. As I recall, the Athlons over 1 GHz need a 300 watt supply. If you're looking to the future and replacing the board, video card, etc, you may want to look a little higher. I've got a 480 Antec PSU in my rig, but I've also got a GeForce 6800 Ultra, which takes 2 separate power lines...

Make sure you get a high quality one. I'd look at spending closer to $100 than $35. A good PSU will keep your computer happy.

All of the above really... cpu, video card, ram, hdd's, optical drive, external devices, etc. This is a great site to calculate about how much wattage you will need. http://www.jscustompcs.com/power_supply/Power_Supply_Calculator.php?cmd=AMD

thanks Ken I appreciate it, one other investment I want to get is another DVD burner. I bought a Sony 2X burner for like $250 back when burners were first getting popular, now you can get dual layer higher speed burners for less than $100, that bites

Ah, computers... almost as bad as audio.

IMO 100 bucks is a little excessive for a 350-450 watt power supply. I really dont think it is necessary. Antec 400W is only ~$55 or so. But, its not my money, and I would also suggest you get a good power supply.

Just going off of what I saw when I was shopping. Plus I tend to lean high end in computer stuff. I almost bought the $200 550 watt PSU, but I decided that might be overkill.

Compusa has 350 watt psu's for 30-40 smackers.

I agree that keeping your computer happy by buying a nice power supply will keep you happy as well. I guess I just don't like to spend money. And my estimate of 30-35 was kinda low for a good power supply. ***well maybe not***

Just took a half day off from work, stopped by CompUSA, bought a 250 watt PSU, took it home plugged it in and....

well you know the rest of the story or else I would not be typing this message so far so good. They were out of the 350watt supplies. I figured since the one that was in there before was 300, the 250 would work. This machine pretty much has the bare essentials.

Now I can burn my movie.....burn burn burn away 2X burning sucks

Great. Glad to hear that you got it working. 2X burning, how long does that take... 4X is somewhere around 30 minutes to copy and 30 to burn.

Hey,

Glad you got it workin. Be careful if you go to add another harddrive or somethin.

If your interested in a good dvd burner upgrade look for a NEC 3520A. Very reliable and fast, oh and only 40 bucks a newegg.

thanks guys....Normally I just copy, oops archive the movie only using DVD Shrink and no compression. If I recall it takes 30-40 minutes to create to my hard drive, then I use RecordNowDX which came with my Sony burner to put it on a blank DVD. The entire process takes around an hour I suppose...

Randy,

I would seriously look in to a quality 350-400 watt PSU. 250 watts are just not enough even with a barebones pc nowadays. And the $15 or $25 CompUSA specials are the equivalent of a cheap Aiwa HT receiver. Computers like lots of clean power. I like the Antec TruePower series. They have separate transformers for each voltage, instead of one transformer and v-regs. Also, if you look around, you can get a USB 2.0 5.25" external case for your DVD-burner for $20. This way you have a portable DVD+-+R-w#_& whatever for about 1/3 the price of an off-the-shelf external. NEC makes very good DVD writers. I think they are better than Sony's.