Member Avatar for Buxtreme

A while back, I turned on my tower, it began to boot, and soon thereafter turned back off again. Confused, I attempted to turn it back on again, and it did nothing. I thought my power supply had gone, but have since had that replaced, and I'm not receiving any signal whatsoever from the tower.

How should I go about pinpointing the problem? Is there any way, short of having another tower to switch out individual parts with, to do so? Any recommendations would be much appreciated :)

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by bigozone

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A few focused checks will separate a bad motherboard from something else without swapping the whole machine. , and have already covered the broad obvious things; the next tests below are the practical, low-cost steps that are often missed and will give a clear yes/no on the board itself.

  • Try the power-switch header: unplug the front-panel power lead and momentarily short the two power-on pins on the board with an insulated screwdriver. If it starts, the case switch or wiring is at fault.
  • Confirm the CPU power feed: ensure the separate 4/8-pin EPS (CPU) connector is present and fully seated. A plugged-in 24-pin alone can give standby LEDs but won’t run the CPU rails.
  • Bench the board: remove the motherboard from the case and power it on on a nonconductive surface with only PSU, CPU+cooler, one known-good RAM stick and, if needed, a video card. This rules out shorts from misplaced standoffs or the case.
  • Clear CMOS: remove the coin cell or use the clear-jumper method for a few minutes, then try again. Corrupt settings can sometimes stop POST.
  • Add diagnostics: connect a simple PC speaker or a POST card so you can catch beep codes or POST codes that give a concrete failure area.
  • Visual/power checks: inspect for bulging or leaking capacitors, burn marks, or blown fuses on the board. Even a new PSU can be faulty—if possible use a PSU tester or measure rails before concluding the motherboard is dead.
  • Safety: always unplug mains before moving components, avoid ESD, and don’t bridge pins you don’t intend to.

If none of the above produces fans, beeps or POST activity the motherboard is very likely the failed part. In that case replacing the board (or having it inspected by a shop for capacitor repair) is the realistic next step.

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Member Avatar for coolraj003

The thing is you can disconnect all the devices and then start testing them by connecting them one by one to pin point the problem, but if your mobo is gone then you will need another working machine to test your devices. As it does not even doing anything then it would be your mobo most likely.

Try starting it up with different RAM sticks and see if that is the issue, check the connections as well to see if they might have come loose. Just try to tie up all the loose ends and see what you end up with.

Raj

Member Avatar for Buxtreme

Thanks for your response :)

I completely disconnected and reconnected everything, to no avail. I've removed the RAM stick I had in there, and I'm curious as to whether the machine would run with only the RAM that was provided as an internal part of my video card.

I did notice that when I reconnected the power supply to the motherboard, a green LED by the power connection for my power button on the motherboard lit up for just a second. Could this mean that the motherboard is still alive, or does this function work independently from the rest?

Beyond that, no news to report. There is still no response whatsoever when I attempt to power up the machine. Thanks for your thoughts!

Member Avatar for coolraj003

Well even if the LED lights up for a quick second it still could mean that your mob might have a bad capacitor which could be end of it. I dont think that the pc would do anything without the actual ram, the vidoe cards ram is not utilised by the mobo to do anything. That is only to be utilised by the video card itself. But just powering up should have taken you to the bios with nothing else connected apart from mobo, ram and psu.

Raj

Member Avatar for Buxtreme

Failure at this level narrows it down to the mobo or the power supply, right?

Member Avatar for coolraj003

umm, yes it could lead to that as well but i'd say there s no harm in checking other components either. But it seems to me that your mobo is playing up, powers upply still could be fime, just get it checked to be sure though and then see what do you require to get your systme back up and running again.

Raj

Member Avatar for sittas87

Buxtreme it will be realy helpfull if you can try to remember what you did/what had happened before the problem accured.Yes it might be your mobo but lets try to determine that for sure.also when you say you get no response do you mean theres no cpu fan spinning?is the power supply fan spinning?disconnect and reconnect the power supply from the mobo ass well

Member Avatar for bigozone

one quick question,,,,

when trying to power up w/ ram removed did the PC give any POST BEEPS at all?

i would try removing all cards from the PC (except video),, and unhooking all floppy/hdd cables from the MB.. then try to boot... if problem still occurs try w/ RAM removed also...

usually when ram is missing the PC will beep in some fashion if the MB is functioning enough to actually see the missing ram,,,

but i have seen faulty modems and other addin cards cause PCs not to boot at all....

maybe this will help,
bigO

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