How do I know if my motherboard or PSU is dead?

[Blessa]

ya

[upcoast]

http://www.techpowerup.com/articles/other/22

Shou8ld help you ^^^, disconnect it from mobo first.

Does the psu even fire up at all when you try to start the comp?

[Trace]

There are different ways to determine this. The easiest way is to plug in a spare PSU if you have it. If the system boots, you're probably looking at a dead PSU. When confronted with this problem in the past, I didn't have a voltage meter handy to test the PSU. Rather than going out and getting one, I simply bought a PSU from a local store and plugged it in. Had it not been the problem, I would have returned it to the store and known the issue lay elsewhere.

[Blessa]

Thank you, I have a friend coming over right now with his psu. I'll update my results later.

[_I_]

use your nose
smell for burnt components

unplug everything from the psu (fans, drives, mobo, fans, all connectors)
jumper the green wire to a black wire with a paperclip, if the psu turns on the psu is most likely ok, plug in a case fan to test, or use a multimeter, yellow = 12v, red = 5v, yellow = 3.3v
http://www.motherboards.org/images/articles/guides/20-pin.jpg

what psu and board/cpu do you have?
if its a msi amd board, try without the 4/8pin power plug near the cpu
if it turns on, but will not post or boot its blown vrms and you need a new board

[bear]

Originally posted by _I_:

jumper the green wire to a black wire with a paperclip, if the psu turns on the psu is most likely ok, plug in a case fan to test, or use a multimeter

Seen many toast psus jumper right to life and have enough juice to power something miniscule like a fan. Also multimeter readings on the rails are useless without a load on them . For the average person the best bet is just to component swap with known working parts.

[Blessa]

I discharged the pc by you know unplugging everything and holding the powerbutton or whatever. When I plug it back in and press the power button the LED inside the fan flickers then nothing works.

Originally posted by upcoast:

http://www.techpowerup.com/articles/other/22

Shou8ld help you ^^^, disconnect it from mobo first.

Does the psu even fire up at all when you try to start the comp?

my mobo is http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157364
and my psu is the Raidmax RX-530ss

[bear]

Originally posted by breadophile:

When I plug it back in and press the power button the LED inside the fan flickers then nothing works.

Seen that many times and is almost always the motherboard. Been working on it or anything recently? Small shorts from poorly placed case standoff or a loose screw can cause that and be easily fixed. If you cant find anything like that and your friends PSU doesnt fire it up then Id say its RMA time if its still under warranty.

[upcoast]

I've had a few mobos do that , fans spin up then nothing, was the mobo .

But you should try to rule out the psu first since it's the easiest to borrow and test.

[Blessa]

actually, well it might be the mobo's small short because before all of this i was installing a new hdd, when i was plugging in my keyboard and mice in the back, the mobo somehow moved and i heard some sort of a pop clicking noise.

Originally posted by PoopNowMexicanRobot:

Originally posted by breadophile:

When I plug it back in and press the power button the LED inside the fan flickers then nothing works.

Seen that many times and is almost always the motherboard. Been working on it or anything recently? Small shorts from poorly placed case standoff or a loose screw can cause that and be easily fixed. If you cant find anything like that and your friends PSU doesnt fire it up then Id say its RMA time if its still under warranty.

[Blessa]

So i figured out that I misplugged a fan into a weird socket.. and my friend helped me out. Computer runs! Thanks for the time guys!

[Wampum Biskit]

Originally posted by breadophile:

So i figured out that I misplugged a fan into a weird socket.. and my friend helped me out. Computer runs! Thanks for the time guys!

yep , that'll do it...lol