No power

[ypsilad]

My son’s e-machine has turned up a lemon-surprise. After replacing the hard drive at 14 months, and one month of further use, the dang thing refused to answer the start switch. I checked the start switch-OK. Checked the power supply by shorting the “power good” and “power switch” leads of unplugged 20 pin connector and testing all voltages-all OK I did notice an odd thing when computer fans came on after a replug-in of the 20 pin at one point. I turned it off and it didn’t come back on. I removed the MB and with nothing but CPU and a stick of memory, had no luck, all dead. I cleared the BIOS, nothing. Strange thing two happened when all fans came on briefly as I barely put the 20 pin into the slot on the MB. I reproduced this oddity several times over the next few days, having best results with 20 pin slightly tipped. Internet advised swapping out CPU and memory at this point, but had nothing even close to Athlon XP and DDR memory. I got the bright idea that maybe shorting out the PG and PS leads while 20 pin was plugged in would do something, and it did. Everything came on with a clicking noise and red led on MB blinked (no speaker on machine). I put everything back together, with monitor connected, and got the same clicking noise and blinking light. However, in a moment of inspiration, I hit the start switch and the computer booted directly to the XP Loading page, clicking stopped and red led was steady. The short can then be opened. On restart the startup is normal with e-macines splash, etc. I can only enter BIOS on restart. I have rigged up a toggle switch where I can short the PG and PS until I press the PS. Question. What did I do? Harmful? Does this point directly to an unfixable MB problem, as the hassle of restoring XP looms over a new MB, not to mention trying to find a match. Machine works fine after startup and have run it all day for several days monitoring a stock ticker tape. Any insight from the experts would be helpful at this point.

E-machines T2615
AMD Athlon XP 2600
ECS L7VMM2 Rev:1.0A Socket 462
VIA KM 266
512MB DDR
80 GB Western Digital HDD
Micro ATX

 

[AMDCam]

AWWWWWW man! That is crazy, that's exactly what happened to me with that fan start up thing and they won't do it again. I thought I shorted out my board because of doing that, but if you get yours running PLEASE tell me, I gotta wait a couple days for a new power supply, and if I don't return the mobo by monday if it's shorted out, I gotta buy a new one. About your problem though, sorry to get side-tracked, it looks to me like maybe there's something wrong with the mobo, but more likely maybe something's unplugged or the HD is causing interference. Like if you accidentally hit your graphics card as you were messing with the connections, it might have been disconnected and not boot up. Also, that hard drive might either somehow not be compatible with your system, or more likely, could be overloading your power supply. I didn't know HD's use varying amounts of wattage, but if you got a 7,200rpm drive from a 5,200rpm then maybe it's sucking too much power. But I'm having the same problem as you, so if I find anything else out about how to fix this stuff I'll let you know.

 

[AMDCam]

Alright, looks like I didn't read your whole thing there, I just got excited about your power flash experience thing. Can't help you on telling you if it's good or not, you outsmarted the hardware so you're a step ahead of me. I'm still waiting for a new PSU since mine couldn't keep a steady current, so I guess our problems are a little different after all. Just wanted to say you should probably ignore that last thread from me. Thanks though man, you indirectly helped me out with the motherboard power flash, because like I said, I thought I shorted it out but if you do it every time you start up, I guess it's not that bad.

 

[Scrat]

Have you vacumed between the back of your MotherBoard and the case at all? Some times a build up of dust etc can pull a power rail to ground and cause you all kinds of weird problems. Also carfuly inspect all the components on your Motherboard for any signs of damage physical or heat related.
Check the rear side of the MB for damage too. Also check the wiring coming from the front power switch to the MB... is it still pluged in? is the insulation on the wires still ok/unbroken?

Do you still have the MB manual? does it say what the RED LED represents?
Can you find out where exactly the 'Clicking' sound is coming from?