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Question

PSU problem? any help appreciated

Mar 31, 2015 8:37AM PDT

Hi there!

Thanks in advance for any help you can give to me..

My home built pc has been working perfectly for the past 2 years. Today the pc made a windows registry update and shortly after (say 5-10 mins) the pc closed down and would fire up for a split second only - afterwards.

I removed the PSU and used a paper clip to test the PSU and the fan started up, i connected the PSU to my hard drive, disc drive and they both started up without shutting down. When I connected it to my motherboard the lights of the board light up, but when I power on the motherboard it starts for a split second, shuts down and then will not power on at all afterwards unless I leave it for a 30 seconds in which it repeats the same process.

Could this be a bad power supply unit although it did seem to work well when powering disc and hard driveindependently. Motherboard has not been moved or bashed around, was brought brand new, Asus deluxe z77.

Also to mention that the heat sink fan spins and cuts out with the rest of the equipment on powering up. There is very little dust in the heat sink fan..

I have also removed the ram and tried to boot the mother board and cpu independently with the same result..

Confused, would be a shame if motherboard was faulty as it was new, undamaged and could not see why there would be a problem from nothing happening to it.

PSU is a corsair CX 430
i7 3770k processor
16gb corsair vengeance ram
Velociraptor harddrive
Samsung disc drive

Thank you as any help and advice is appreciated !

Discussion is locked

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Clarification Request
More about the hardware might help
Apr 4, 2015 9:30PM PDT

You've chosen a MB and CPU designed for overclocking. You didn't mention a video card either so I'm wondering if you have one and your PSU was already spread thin. One way to check would be to remove the video card and see if on board (if you have them) graphics work. The PS shutting down before boot means an overload was probably detected. You trim back the need for power to see if anything changes. There is also the green wire shorting test but we don't want to try that if you are, in fact, drawing too much power.

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Answer
(NT) Did you try building the PC without a case for a test?
Mar 31, 2015 8:42AM PDT
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Case?
Mar 31, 2015 8:49AM PDT

Without a case? how would the case be an issue here? ... Happy When I built the PC i built it within the case but it has worked ever since..

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Sorry
Mar 31, 2015 8:55AM PDT

But I just completed a 20 post back and forth about why we built such or move such out of the case. So I am going to shortchange a few today on this one. It's something we do to sniff out a common issue.

That is, we know it's a common problem so the test is simple. Try it on a chunk of cardboard with the least number of parts.
Bob

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Answer
PSU load
Mar 31, 2015 9:07AM PDT

While you did test alone of separately, the final real test is the actual PC build in its entirely. That means the PSU can't supply the full amps or voltages required on a sustained level. often enough with the cpu fan twitch or monetarily spin, the PSU is the culprit. You can also get lucky and the PC actually boots after repeated tries, but fails again later. IMHO, I wouldn't hesitate to replace the PSU. The more you play with it "as is" you could compromise other components during the repeated power-ups during this time.

Robert, offered to test the PC w/o the case. That usually means you isolate any possible shorts or bare areas that now over time have caused an issue. It also allows quick and easy access to test anything. That's up to you, you may find if you continue to play w/o buying anything, especially the PSU(or swap out) all kinds of issues if not related to root cause. You can make a bare PC or minimum PC to check it if it boots at all. If it remains non-booting there is also the mtrbd. to contend with, that it finally failed. All these other quick tests may help but overall only real experience in repeated finding will allow a tech to narrow it down. Yes, many a tech swaps away or uses KNOWN good components to narrow it all down.

tada -----Willy Happy

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okay!
Mar 31, 2015 9:19AM PDT

I will see if a new and working power supply will make a different here and I will abort playing around with it until I get this item whilst also setting the build up outside of the case. Thank you all for advising me on what to do! Much love! Happy

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Why do you think it's a hardware problem?
Mar 31, 2015 2:26PM PDT

I thought this all happen after an update. Personally the first thing I would do is to reload the OS.

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Answer
(NT) If the PSU is under warranty..why not try the mfg Corsair ?
Apr 5, 2015 2:44AM PDT