Dell Inspiron 545 Not Booting

singhtjay

New Member
My Inspiron 545 does not boot. Power button shows no light when it is pressed. The mobo light and the power supply led are on when the computer is plugged in, however pressing the power button does not turn the computer on. Again the power button does not light and no fans move. I disconnected the mobo from the power supply (the 20/24 pin cable) and placed a jumper connecting the green wire to a ground wire. After plugging the computer in, the PSU came on, then while the PSU was on, I connected the cable back to the mobo and the cpu fan came on for one second, then the computer turned off. Motherboard light stayed on. I then removed the power button cable from the computer and re-tried, same thing happened. I cannot find the power button jumping diagram online, and the power button contains multiple cables that attach to the motherboard so it is hard for me to pinpoint which prongs to jump. Is this a power button issue, a PSU issue, or a motherboard issue? Any suggestions? All help is appreciated. Thank you

-Tj

If the specs mean anything:
Intel Core 2 Quad (not sure what version, can't check now either :( )
4GB 1333Mhz Ram
Mobo: It's a dell one, LGA 775
GPU: Nvidia 9800 GT
 
Update: Tried again and the green LED no longer turns on, but the mobo light still comes on. Found the power button jumpers too, no response when I jumped though. I'm starting to think this is a PSU problem, however if anyone has any suggestions or information please reply, all help is appreciated. Thanks :)
 
Okay so I removed my graphics card and tried rebooting, the computer did boot (power button didn't work, but the amber sleep led came on, I booted it by jumping the green and black cable). Fans everything was working. Does this mean my card is bad? or the PSU doesn't have enough power to power the board etc?
 
The only way to know is to test the card in another machine/test the computer with a known good power supply.
 
Same one in the computer initially, the 9800. I took it out and did the test to see if the computer would turn on. Then put that card back in.
 
There should be 4 diagnostics lights on the back of the pc. Series of amber and green should tell you whats going on. They are labeled a,b,c,d usually.
 
Back
Top