Power supply woes, Not enough watts? or Blown mobo?

OOTay · Jun 16, 2010

Hey everyone long time no posts,
I just have encountered an issue with my power supply/computer today and cant really put my finger on the problem and fix it without some clarification. First off I was cleaning the whole system out today, getting rid of dust and taking fans out etc. I was using a shop vac to suck the dust off the motherboard and fans and the power supply. I guess I must have held the vacuum to long over the fans on the power supply and induced some voltage from spinning the fans or from static electricity. Because when I reassembled the computer and flipped the PSU Switch nothing happened, then it made a high frequency noise and then a fan light flashed. After that I figured all systems go, so i pressed the power button and nothing happened at all.

So after that I figure that its toast and ill try a reserve 300w psu (a 120w downgrade from my thermaltake 420w psu). I didnt connect hardly any fans but did connect my 3 hard drives and motherboard along with vid card and dvd drive, lol. It booted up just fine and went into windows 7 and it started to recognize all my accessories and hdd's. Then I go to plug my joy stick it in about 1 minute after that and boom, it shut off to a high frequency noise and no power to the computer at all. Probably from lack of power i assume.

So my question is, Did I fry just my power supply or did I fry something major? Thanks for reading my post

panchoman · Jun 16, 2010

with the 300w watt psu, it's possible that it might be a lack of power. but for the first time, it's still baffling me why it would cause that. it's possible that the vaccum might have ripped out a cap or something... try and see if with minimal parts (no joystick etc), the system with work with the 300w psu.. then atleast you can pin point that it's the 420w psu, and not the mobo and the likes. If the 300w psu is giving you trouble, it might be that something might've gotten tore off your mobo or something.. though getting to windows 7 with a damaged mobo would be hard..

morpha · Jun 16, 2010

I seriously doubt that you induced enough voltage spinning fans with a vacuum to blow a psu. Most PSU's have a tolerance towards that sort of thing. But I guess it could be the cause.

As for the second psu it sounds like it overloaded. I've had that happen before with my own psu's. The thing runs fine for a few minutes or until the graphics card shifts into high power 3d.

Your concern now should be acquiring another DECENT psu, and hoping you did no damage to your other components.

scaminatrix · Jun 16, 2010

Did you plug joystick into usb on the back of the mobo, or on the front panel?
If you plugged into the front panel you may have incorrectly plugged in the front panel usb cables into their headers on the mobo.
That may be why it turned off when you plugged joystick in?

OOTay · Jun 16, 2010

Thanks you guys for the insight. Its funny you should mention the usb because I did plug the joy stick into the front panel and the cable was disconnected and reconnected during cleaning. So it is possible that it wasn't properly connected. That being said would that cause any damage or the whole computer to shut off and make a high frequency noise like the psu overloaded?

Also what's a good brand of power supply that's reliable? I'm looking for around 500watts of power.

Thanks guys!

robn · Jun 16, 2010

OOTay said:
...I did plug the joy stick into the front panel and the cable was disconnected and reconnected during cleaning. So it is possible that it wasn't properly connected. That being said would that cause any damage or the whole computer to shut off and make a high frequency noise like the psu overloaded?

Yeah definitely a possibility, if it got plugged in in such a way to cause a short circuit. PSU overload protection is designed for spotting shorts especially.

OOTay said:
...Also what's a good brand of power supply that's reliable? I'm looking for around 500watts of power...

But if the PSU is dead: Corsair, Antec, Seasonic, Silverstone, FSP, Tagan... anything with a 80Plus certification and not super cheap.

scaminatrix · Jun 16, 2010

OOTay said:
Thanks you guys for the insight. Its funny you should mention the usb because I did plug the joy stick into the front panel and the cable was disconnected and reconnected during cleaning. So it is possible that it wasn't properly connected. That being said would that cause any damage or the whole computer to shut off and make a high frequency noise like the psu overloaded?

This problem has killed mobo's completely before. Remove any front panel usb/firewire cables from mobo headers, cross fingers and try it again

As for PSU's, robn's got you covered there

OOTay · Jun 16, 2010

Thanks guys, ill give it a try when I get home from work today, really appreciate all the great suggestions/ideas.

de.das.dude · Jun 16, 2010

I dont think you induced any sort of voltage at all. these are brushless DC fans and not possible to induce any voltage.

You must have blown dust into the fan's ball-bearing/axle for which it cant move.

tip: When cleaning a fan with a vaccum(i doubt if this method really cleans it), always blow air in a direction opposite to that of the fan when running (you will fin this direction etched on the fan's sides). This ensures no dust enters the bearings.

Any graphics card should be run with more than 400W of PSU.

OOTay · Jun 16, 2010

Ok all is well, the USB External cables were in wrong and did shut it off. So I disconnected mostly everything except the essentials and it booted right up. Now im gonna get a new power supply and everything will be a-okay.

Big Thanks! to everyone for helping me sort all of this out!

scaminatrix · Jun 17, 2010

No worries man
Is the PSU definately knackered? AFAIK That problem's only killed mobo's or was the PSU gammy before?

Processor	Amd Athlon X2 4600+ Windsor(90nm) EE(65W) @2.9-3.0 @1.45
Motherboard	Biostar Tforce [Nvidia] 550
Cooling	Thermaltake Blue Orb-- bunch of other fans here and there....
Memory	2 gigs (2x1gb) of patriot ddr2 800 @ 4-4-4-12-2t
Video Card(s)	Sapphire X1950pro Pci-E x16 @stock@stock on stock
Storage	Seagate 7200.11 250gb Drive, WD raptors (30/40) in Raid 0
Display(s)	ANCIENT 15" sony lcd, bought it when it was like 500 bucks
Case	Apevia X-plorer blue/black
Audio Device(s)	Onboard- Why get an sound card when you can hum??
Power Supply	Antec NeoHe 550-manufactured by seasonic -replacement to the discontinued smart power series
Software	Windows XP pro SP2 -- vista is still crap

System Name	Krogoth
Processor	AMD Ryzen 5 5600G @stock
Motherboard	Gigabyte B550 AORUS ELITE AX V2
Cooling	Stock CPU cooler + 2x Intake 120mm @ 8v + 2x outtake 120mm @8v
Memory	G.Skill Ripjaws V 32GB (2x16GB) PC4-28800 DDR4
Video Card(s)	MSI Radeon R9 290 Gaming 4GB GDDR5
Storage	1x 4tb WD HDD, 1x1Tb Intel m.2 SSD
Display(s)	2x 27" IPS on swing arms. @UHD
Case	Antec Solo II
Audio Device(s)	HyoperX Cloud 2 Wireless Headphones
Power Supply	I forgot.
Mouse	Logitech G302
Keyboard	Lenovo legion K500 RGB
Software	Windows 11 64bit

System Name	Benny
Processor	Phenom II 1055t @ 3.3GHz; 300x11; 1.380v; NB 2700; HT 2400
Motherboard	ASUS Crosshair IV Formula (2002 BIOS)
Cooling	Thermalright TRUE 120 Black + 2 Xilence Red Wing PWM 120mm (push/pull) + polycarbonate fan holders
Memory	8GB GeIL Ultra 2133MHZ C9 running at 1600MHz @ 7-7-7-21 1T 1.5v
Video Card(s)	MSI Twin Frozr II GTX470 @ Stock w/CPU fan cable-tied on, as one of the GPU fans broke.
Storage	60GB OCZ Agility3 (OS);500GB WDC Grn; 1x1TB WDC Blk (Backup)
Display(s)	ASUS PA823Q
Case	Silverstone Raven 2 (all cables custom sleeved with velcro mod on side panel...)
Audio Device(s)	X-Fi (Onboard) + Harmon Kardon HK6100 amp powering JVC HA-RX700's with Zalman mic
Power Supply	Corsair HX650W
Software	Win7 Pro x64
Benchmark Scores	No benchies so making this space useful! Corsair M90, Logitech G19. Phobya FlexLight LED's (gawjus)

Processor	i7 920 @ 3520MHz locked on 1.04V, all features on
Motherboard	Biostar T-Power x58 + ASUS U3S6 + Broadcom WiFi
Cooling	Akasa Nero S on the i7 + 2 Akasa Apache case fans
Memory	24Gig Kingston HyperX DDR3
Video Card(s)	XFX GTX260 216 XT
Storage	240Gig SanDisk SSD, 750Gig Spinpoint F1
Display(s)	BenQ E2200HD
Case	Coolermaster Elite 334
Audio Device(s)	Realtek(!) with M-Audio AV40 + Wharfedale SW150
Power Supply	Antec EarthWatts 650
Software	Win7 64 Pro / Fedora KDE
Benchmark Scores	wPrime 32M 7.265sec - 3DMark2001 57673 - Intel Linpack 50.6237 GFlops

System Name	Benny
Processor	Phenom II 1055t @ 3.3GHz; 300x11; 1.380v; NB 2700; HT 2400
Motherboard	ASUS Crosshair IV Formula (2002 BIOS)
Cooling	Thermalright TRUE 120 Black + 2 Xilence Red Wing PWM 120mm (push/pull) + polycarbonate fan holders
Memory	8GB GeIL Ultra 2133MHZ C9 running at 1600MHz @ 7-7-7-21 1T 1.5v
Video Card(s)	MSI Twin Frozr II GTX470 @ Stock w/CPU fan cable-tied on, as one of the GPU fans broke.
Storage	60GB OCZ Agility3 (OS);500GB WDC Grn; 1x1TB WDC Blk (Backup)
Display(s)	ASUS PA823Q
Case	Silverstone Raven 2 (all cables custom sleeved with velcro mod on side panel...)
Audio Device(s)	X-Fi (Onboard) + Harmon Kardon HK6100 amp powering JVC HA-RX700's with Zalman mic
Power Supply	Corsair HX650W
Software	Win7 Pro x64
Benchmark Scores	No benchies so making this space useful! Corsair M90, Logitech G19. Phobya FlexLight LED's (gawjus)

Power supply woes, Not enough watts? or Blown mobo?

OOTay

panchoman

Sold my stars!

morpha

scaminatrix

OOTay

robn

New Member

scaminatrix

OOTay

de.das.dude

Pro Indian Modder

OOTay

scaminatrix

System Name	Monke \| Work Thinkpad \| Old Monke
Processor	Ryzen 5600X \| Ryzen 5500U \| FX8320
Motherboard	ASRock B550 Extreme4 \| ? \| Asrock 990FX Extreme 4
Cooling	240mm Rad \| Not needed \| hyper 212 EVO
Memory	2x16GB DDR4 3600 Corsair RGB \| 16 GB DDR4 3600 \| 16GB DDR3 1600
Video Card(s)	Sapphire Pulse RX6700XT 12GB \| Vega 8 \| Sapphire Pulse RX580 8GB
Storage	Samsung 980 nvme (Primary) \| some samsung SSD
Display(s)	Dell 2723DS \| Some 14" 1080p 98%sRGB IPS \| Dell 2240L
Case	Ant Esports Tempered case \| Thinkpad \| NZXT Guardian 921RB
Audio Device(s)	Logitech Z333 \| Jabra corpo stuff \| Some USB speakers
Power Supply	Corsair RM750e \| not needed \| Corsair GS 600
Mouse	Logitech G400 \| nipple \| Dell
Keyboard	Logitech G213 \| stock kb is awesome \| Logitech K230
VR HMD	;_;
Software	Windows 10 Professional x3
Benchmark Scores	There are no marks on my bench