Computer Maintenence Question

[Frank-0-Sport]

Greetings ....

On Saturday Dec 20th, at around 5:00 PM. I left home for a brief out-of-town trip. I did not turn my desktop computer off.

I returned home some seven hours later, and found that my computer was turned off. I attempted to turn it on, only to get a pop noise that came from the back area. I felt the back area - it was quite warm.

I am not experienced in many computer maintenence areas, but I am making an educated guess that the immediate problem maybe a failure of the power supply and CPU fan. If this assumption is correct - and assuming that no other internal components have been damaged - then the first order of business would be to replace the power supply and CPU fan, then attempt to re-start the computer. The success or failure of that will determine what I need to do afterwards.

Feel free to supply opinions and personal experiences.

Thanx-A-Lot, Frank-0-Sport

[PiKapp23]

I work in IT and have done so for about 15 years. It definitely sounds like it's probably the power supply. Power supplies are usually not that that expensive, so there are worse things that could be wrong. The CPU fan could be a problem, but I doubt it (unless you know it wasn't running before). The 'pop noise' you heard is symptomatic of a blown power supply. Just replace and try it again. If you are still getting nothing at all, then you may have an issue with system board and at that point you're talking about a more severe issue (not to mention more expensive). As a test of power supply, some will allow you to disconnect them completely from system board (just pull it completely out of machine) and plug it in, then turn it on. If the fan in the power supply doesn't come on then that's probably the issue (there are also some that are designed to do nothing unless they are connected to system board, unfortunately).

[Andyall]

PiKapp is spot on, it's the power supply (+1 to his/her rep). Frank, if you don't know what you're doing with the innards of a PC, ask your computer geek friend(s) to replace the power supply with one that will handle the power requirements for your system.

Note that it's possible if the power supply blew it *might* have taken out part of the motherboard, ram pr proc as well. However, the good news is that every time i've had a blown P/S on one of my personal systems, only the P/S needed to be replaced.

Good luck.

[Frank-0-Sport]

Greetings ....

Thanks for the replies. I posted this question at several locales, and all say basicly the same thing - test the computer's power supply, then replace it if needed. Also, test and replace anything else that might not be working.

Because of the holidays as well as financial priorities, it will probably be the first full week in January when I get the machine checked.

Thanx-A-Lot, Frank-0-Sport