[kjpweb]

Ok, I built a PC about a year ago which has been working great. Yesterday I switched out the hard drive with a new SATA drive and now it will not power on at all. I switched it back and same result. I have an Abit Fatal1ty AA8XE Socket 775 Motherboard and the rest I think in irrelevant, if you need more info I can tell you anything about it. The board has a power button directly on it, that doesn't work either. The lights on the MB work which means it is getting some power. Any ideas on what to try to trouble shoot this problem? I don't have extra parts to try and swap out. Thank you for your help!

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well about the only thing you can do without extra parts is try removing everything except the processor memory and video... even disconnect the drives.... if that works then slowly add parts back till it fails....

if that works, do it again adding the parts back in a different order to see if it fails on the same part each time.. if it does that part is probably bad.... if it doesn't work or it fails on a different part then you need to start replacing parts or take it somewhere that has spares and let them figure it out... first suspect part would be power supply then video card then motherboard and/or processor or possiblly memory....

Oh as an after thought you could visually inspect the motherboard ( and any card for that matter ). You are looking for any obvious physical damage or bulging capacitors... the capacitors in question look like little cans on the board... if they are bulging or leaking then that part is no good....

[shard92]

well about the only thing you can do without extra parts is try removing everything except the processor memory and video... even disconnect the drives.... if that works then slowly add parts back till it fails....

if that works, do it again adding the parts back in a different order to see if it fails on the same part each time.. if it does that part is probably bad.... if it doesn't work or it fails on a different part then you need to start replacing parts or take it somewhere that has spares and let them figure it out... first suspect part would be power supply then video card then motherboard and/or processor or possiblly memory....

Oh as an after thought you could visually inspect the motherboard ( and any card for that matter ). You are looking for any obvious physical damage or bulging capacitors... the capacitors in question look like little cans on the board... if they are bulging or leaking then that part is no good....

[kjpweb]

Thank you Shard, I will do what you suggest and post back with my findings.

On another note, if you have a sec, I was thinking about replacing my 400W PSU anyway. What wattage would you suggest for my system with some online gaming usage?

Abit Fatal1ty AA8XE Socket 775 Motherboard
2048MB PC4200 DDR2 533MHz
Xmidia GeForce 6200 Turbo Cache 256MB
Intel Pentium 4 519 3.06GHz / 1MB Cache / 533 FSB / Socket 775
Western Digital 320GB SATA Hard Drive

Thanks again!

[shard92]

You could try this site to get a rough idea or wait for someone elses opinions ( I'm not a gamer--- most of my machines are rather low-powered deals )


http://www.journeysy..._calculator.php

[shard92]

P. S. this is just a rough guide and just select what is closest to your setup... also remember in general a pci express card will draw more power...than agp

Edited by shard92, 30 January 2007 - 02:44 PM.

[kjpweb]

Bought an Antec 550W PSU, threw it in there and it worked after I cleard the MB. So I guess that was all that was wrong. Thank you for your assistance!