Last month I left my PC on and I walked away for a moment. I come back and although my PC is still on, there is nothing on the monitor and it is not picking up an HDMI signal. At first I thought it was the monitor (which is only 3 months old ASUS VE228), but it detected my laptop's signal just fine. My two-year-old son was around it and my girlfriend was near him, but wasn't paying much attention to him and he likes touching my PC when the lights are on. Before I jump to conclusions and blame the little guy, I search online for some information and someone suggested that my PSU most likely crapped out.

My PC would still turn on, light up and run all fans, but I purchased a cheap power supply tester and tested my PSU. The tester was made in China and the English instructions were confusing, so when I heard the piece of crap give a continuous ring--which the instructions called a "DuDu ring"--I thought my PSU did in fact crap out. I end up purchasing a new PSU (EVGA 500B).

My PSU comes in the mail, I hook it up and my PC does not even turn on. My CPU fan turns just slightly and that's it; no lights come on and no beeping. I tested my new PSU and it works just fine. I think my motherboard was slowly dying and now it is completely fried, but I need a second opinion.

I had a similar problem and ended up replacing my mobo to find out it was the CPU that needed replacing. Motherboard problems can be a bitch to figure out. Just bring your PC in to someone who knows what they're doing.

I really hope it's not the CPU in my case, especially since I bought a new motherboard on impulse (for $49.99 after all rebates on newegg).

I remember connecting a few cables wrong the last time I hooked up a new PSU and that led to the exact same problem you're having where the CPU fan just spins a little. I'm sure you've done it already but just try again at at starting over and hooking it up from scratch. Try using your ram in different configs (ie with/without/1 stick at a time etc) and see if that helps. When I was making my dad's computer a few months ago the $15 stick of RAM I bought for him never ended up working and led to the pc that booted up but outputted no signal to the monitor. Because the RAM was new brand new I thought it must have been the old monitor I hooked up and I pretty much spent the rest of the day pulling my hair out...

Good luck!

@caska: Yeah, I tried those steps already, but it never hurts to try again. It just sucks because I built it a year ago and I'm already having issues.

thread title to me was "I think my BOBO is dead"

Do you have some older parts or a friends that you can do some troubleshooting with? could be so many things stopping it from posting.

Bad ram will stop a boot. Unplug everything and try boot with your monitor plugged into the Mobo no gfx cards etc to eliminate all the posibilites

report back on your findings.

Good luck duder

@ikilledthedj: I tried booting without gfx cards etc a few weeks ago. What's weird is that the fans, and lights would work after the problem occurred last month, now all I get is my CPU fan moving a few centimeters. I don't have any friends here and none of my girlfriend's friends know anything about PC's.

Check which lights on the MOBO light up and if it makes any beeping sounds, look for the manual and see if it equals some error. It's a real pain if you're not sure what might be broken.

specs?

also try removing parts, like haddrive, ram etc, and see if it acts the same way when you turn it on.

@devildoll:

I already did that last month.

Here are my specs

Nothing lights up or beeps at all. The only thing that happens is my CPU fan moves ever so slightly, that's it.

@broomhitches: from the sound of it im pretty sure its your mother board not distributing the power out. can you hear harddrives spin up?(put your hand on top and check for vibrations) this should happen regardless of the MB working or not

@ikilledthedj: To reiterate, everything would turn on last month, but I wasn't getting picture sent to my monitor, now almost 4 weeks later, nothing comes on at all. Maybe the MoBo is fried completely now, or at least I hope that's the issue.

@broomhitches: it could be like you said, that it semi broke, and now totally broke.

Could also be that you missed hooking up something when you bought your new psu.

In case you haven't tried this yet.

• re-seat all ram
• detach and reattach cpu 4/8pin power cable(s)
• detach and reattach mobo 24pin power cable
• detach and reattach graphics card
• detach and reattach both graphics card pci-e 6pin power cables
• make sure motherboard isnt shorting out on unused mobo risers.

Okay, I just got done doing this, and I'm getting the same results. I also used my spare external HDD case to test out my PC's HDD, and I'm happy to say that it works. I checked for loose screws or anything that could cause a short and found nothing.

@caska: @nictel: @ikilledthedj: @devildoll: @hunkulese: Here's an update.

I got my new MoBo in the mail today, so I installed everything and nothing comes on at all and the fan still moves a centimeter or so. Is it safe to say that @hunkulese was right and my CPU is dead? If so, what would have been the cause of it? I only had it for a year.

@broomhitches: So you've hooked up a 4 pin speaker to the board? if it's the CPU, that would tell you.

@broomhitches: aw that sucks, i did the same thing on my first pc back in 2002 or so, but the other way around, i bought a new cpu when it was the motherboard that broke.

Troubleshooting is a pain in the ass when you dont have a spare rig to test individual components with.
Well, this new motherboard is pretty much guaranteed to work, unless you've had unbelieveable unfortune and gotten a doa.
Use its pc speaker beeps to figure out what is wrong, the manual or manufacturers website should have info on what beeps mean what.

@killacam said:

Yeah, I have a 4 pin speaker. I'm not getting any beeps, nothing is turning on. Both PSU's work just fine, according to my tester.

@broomhitches: if you want to test that the psu will actually run on its own, you can do the paperclip trick, with the psu connected to nothing more than a fan or a harddrive.

what you do is basically emulate the signal that goes from your computers power button, thought the motherboard and up into the 24 pin connector.

to emulate the power switch, you complete the curcuit using a metal object of some sorts, most commonly a paperclip. you do this like so ->

after that, i have a little suspicion, that the wall socket you are using, might be causing the power-supply to emergency shutdown itself, cause of too poor quality of juice.

Could you try hooking your computer up using a different wall socket perhaps?
And connect it directly into the wall, don't use any kind of extention or power strips.

Normally when it is something with the CPU you get at least some beeps.. If you tried @devildoll's test for the PSU and it works I am afraid it is indeed the CPU then. What you can try, and this is a longshot, to hook it up to another case or at least its power switch. To see if its not that for some weird reason.

@nictel: @devildoll: Sorry it took so long for me to respond. I tested my older psu using a paper clip and it turns on just fine my newer one didn't turn on, but I still need to try hooking up the paperclip and a fan to make sure.

I've replaced my CPU and MoBo and my PC still won't turn on. I'm thinking about buying new RAM, but I'm not sure if busted RAM would prevent a PC from at least turning on.

This is probably a dumb question, but is it possible that my PC case's on button is fried?

isn't 500w a little meager of a power supply for all that hardware?

@ripelivejam: Well, I was going by the power requirements on pcpartslist, and it showed that 304 was what I needed, so I figured 500 would be good. By the way, the 500w is my new PSU. My old one--that still works-- is a 700w Raidmax.

There are no dumb questions, and yes.

It's fine, more than fine really. Wattage is far less important than people think. The most important is to get a good quality power supply that puts out a stable voltage level.

Hey OP, I had a similar problem installing my Girlfriend's PC and it drove me fucking insane.

Try breadboarding (assembling all the components out of case, on a non conductive surface ((like a wooden table or even the box your motherboard came in))) and see if that turns everything on. If it does, then your case is causing a shortage...for me it was a set of dodgy brass stand offs that constantly shorted the RAM and Mobo.

It's a shame you've found yourself in this situation. Usually building a PC is fine...but when you get to situations like this, it's heartbreaking.

@samstrife: Definitely something to try, would be pretty nuts if this turned out to be the issue, since the pc had been working for some time up untill this happened.

Another possible short is the usb connectors.
If you haven't, try running your computer without any usb device connected, and also inspect all the usb connectors, or atleast the ones you tend to use, on the motherboard, and see if you can notice one of em being busted.

Does the MB give a beep code if you completely remove the RAM? I might try a barebones setup... only the PSU, MB, RAM and a video card if your MB doesn't have onboard video. You need to eliminate as many variables as possible.

Also, do you get that fan twitch when you connect the power cable into the PSU? That can signal MB problems if the system attempts to power up without you actually pressing the power button.

Well if it is a case related issue along those lines, it may have only taken a small bump or knock (from say a 2 year old child who likes to touch things) to trigger. Considering he's changed every part, it pretty much has to be an issue with the case...right?

Yeah, I haven't replaced the RAM or case.

if everything turns on.. you can hear all fans spinning its most likely something to do with your graphics cards, make sure you have all the proper PCI Express connectors (dunno if tech abilities) that 660 ti uses 2x 6-pins so make sure your PSU does have that. It seems like the GPU might be dead, with bad RAM, the machine will still post to a DOS screen.... you already replaced the PSU and the Mobo, so to me it seems to be something more on a visual level especially when you tested the drives or made sure their working at least

@vackillers: the problem is that it just turns on for 0.5 sec, and then dies again.