Strange Computer Problem

[Peerzy]

Or order some cheapy power supply from ebuyer a 400ww one for like £10, will always come in handy as a test model or for later projects.

[tesco]

Best idea would be to take the power supply from your good computer and put it in the messed up scomputer, see if it boots. Simple, if the computer boots, it is casue of teh pwoer supply, if it doesn't boot, it is some otehr component messing up (motherboaard or cpu most likely, although it could also be a hard drive, video card, or cd rom drive shorting out.

[lee551]

i'm not really comfortable with ripping the power suppy out of my "good" computer to test the other one. i have an old gateway 233 and i might use that one's psu. i'm not going to do this right away. maybe in a few days or something when i feel more techie

first i gotta figure out how the hell to take a powersupply out! i assume you unplug everything, take out all screws holding it in place, and pull?

[clocker]

Originally posted by lee551@30 June 2004 - 20:30

i assume you unplug everything, take out all screws holding it in place, and pull?

That will do it.

[lee551]

Originally posted by clocker+1 July 2004 - 03:35--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (clocker @ 1 July 2004 - 03:35)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-lee551@30 June 2004 - 20:30

i assume you unplug everything, take out all screws holding it in place, and pull?

That will do it. [/b][/quote]
great. thanks for your help everyone. when i do replace the psu i&#39;ll let you know how it went/results.

[tesco]

Originally posted by lee551@30 June 2004 - 22:30
i assume you unplug everything, take out all screws holding it in place, and pull?

actually, after those screws come out (with most cases*) the power supply "falls" outta place...so you might wanna hold it.


* - With my old HP&#39;s case the power supply has a special bracket attached to it which require that the power supply be sorta swinged out...back end towards motherboard and it will slide outta place.

[lee551]

update:

today i had nothing to do so i pulled an old 200w power supply out of an old computer i had. removed the current powersupply from the problematic computer & installed the 200w one. i only plugged in the mobo, 2 hdds, & floppy, not either of cd drives ( i figured its only 200w, dont wanna overload it ). hooked up its own mouse, keyboard and my monitor, fired &#39;er up, and wow&#33;, no restarts&#33;

however now, it just says "Checking NVRAM" and does nothing. the first time i turned it on it said "Checking NVRAM... Update OK" but now it just says "Checking NVRAM." did i miss a plug? is something else wrong?

i also noticed the burning smell again. this time i left the computer on and sniffed around in my case, and i think it is coming from my heatsink fan

what now?

[tesco]

Could just be dust or something in it....

How long have u tried waiting for the nvram thing?

[lee551]

its been on about 2 minutes now. still nothing. the hard drive light stays on constantly.

and that smell, ugh, whew. it gets really bad. it smells like burning chocolat i dunno how else to describe it.