PC new build help. (in Off-topic)

I'm done. Can't figure this out any more. Mate of mine is building my Dad a new PC.

All was going well, but there were some teething issues with it powering up. New PSU, RAM and some other sundries swapped in, and a all connections taken out and reseated, it worked fine. For about a week.

Tongiht, he bought it over to my folks place, we plugged it in. Nothing.

There's power getting tot he board (LED on MB lights up) but when you try the power switch (or the MB power switch), nothing. No fans start, nothing.

We've swapped out PSUs, RAM, Graphics cards. Taken the MB out of the case to see if it's shorting (granted we only had RAM and PSU connected for that, and the MB doesn't have any on board graphics), but still nothing.

MB is a Foxconn Blackops.

Any suggestions for what we try next? I'd hate to just give up and assume the MB is faulty. Especially as it's been working for the last week.

:(

It may very well be your MoBo bro I have seen this happen a lot. Usually it is because the PSU is bad to start and it takes out the MoBo.

Suggestion put your PSU on another Comp and see how it works for a week or two. If this junk comp gets shorted or craps out then you have a winner. If you had a PSU Tester than it would be optimal but more often that not ppl do not have one.

Get onto the PSU provider and tell them you need a new one and that it shorted your MoBo out, more often than not they will replace the PSU and MoBo because they do not want bad PR.

I bought this one from Best Buy.

714 including tax. How much is the one your mate built?

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=9366633&type=product&id=1218092152998

About that much. But in pounds. ;)

The best thing about buying from best buy was that I had the Blue Screen of Death when I first bought it.

Returned it without difficulty for another which has been problem free for 3 days:)

My last PC was an HP from Best Buy.

I will neither buy another HP, nor buy another PC from Best Buy.

I on the other hand have never had a bad experience buying a computer or having one repaired at a Best Buy.

Go figure.

My problem is more with the computers I have bought and the products they currently offer in that department than the service at Best Buy. I use them for pretty much everything else.

HP, on the other hand, I could not be more dissatisfied with.

If you have a test rig to play with, I suggest swapping in both power supplies and testing the supplied voltages with a multimeter. I know it's a pain, but ruling out a PSU failure would greatly simplify your list of possible faults.

My money is on the motherboard, for what it's worth.

Classic case of the MB touching the backplate. Check if the MB is indeed touching the backplate. It is probably causing a short somewhere that prevents the PC from starting.

Make sure you used all the spacers.

Something else you can look for (I did this today XD).

Does it have case fans? are they the kind that plug into a 4-pin hard drive plug? Are all the the wires still connected? If one isn't, and you have it plugged into a drive, then it wont be terribly happy about that and wont start.

XD

We took the Mobo out of the case, and it wouldn't start (and we took the backplate out as well for good measure!).

My mates got it atm, he threatened to be workign on it all night, lol. At this point, the only thing we can think of it the Mobo itself having a problem. :(

I had a similar problem a few years back. The mobo was blown, so we replaced it. The 2nd mobo also didn't work. Turned out that the processor was blown, and it was shorting out the mobos on bootup.

I just recently built a new PC (maybe a week ago) and when I first put everything together and hit the power button I got nothing. I checked the PSU in an old PC and it seemed to run just fine, so then I thought it was possibly the mobo and I would have to return it for a replacement. I had gotten frustrated with it so I avoided it for a day and went back to trying to find the problem. Turns out I plugged the power button from the case into the wrong plug on the mobo...

/facepalm