Buddys Cpu

[Homie]

My Friend has a 1.7 gig p4, 256 meg sdram, 2 60 gig hd's, and a ati all in wonder 7500 all with a decent ups and Antec case and psu.

Yesterday (watching a divx movie) i was at his house and his panasonic monitor started smoking, at the same moment i heard the whole cpu slow down and it seemed like the graphics card fan just about stopped. Thats when i jumped up and shut it down. didn't have much time but I swapped out the monitor and booted it up and nothing. Just wondering if anyone knows what caused this and what they think could have happened. Im guessing the vid card or mobo is fryed. But i think maybe there could be a couple problems. I probably won't be able to work on it for a few days so plez help lol homie

 

[Petros]

Sounds like a power spike out of your wall plug to me, because two things recieving power directly from it both went belly up at once.

 

[Homie]

I was thinking it could be that, but there both plugged into a pretty decent ups....

 

[albybum]

UPS,Surge protectors, and similar products cannot stop surges due to lighting because of it's tendency to jump across broken circuits and the speed at which it travels.

A heavy power surge can have the same behavior, did anything else in the building die?

 

[Petros]

Originally posted by albybum
UPS,Surge protectors, and similar products cannot stop surges due to lighting because of it's tendency to jump across broken circuits and the speed at which it travels.

A heavy power surge can have the same behavior, did anything else in the building die?

^^ what he said Lightning can jump literally miles through air. Did you have any fuses blown somewhere between the wall plug and the UPS? The fuse should come before the battery in the path from the outlet on the wall.

 

[Homie]

Hasn't stormed here for weeks, we were in the other room when i came in a smelled the monitor burning. Which had to been within mins of it happening, Then It seemed like the graphics card was making a weird hum and the Fan got slower, I hit the power a second after seeing that. Let it sit for a min, looked at everything at it looked fine, switched monitors and tried it again. No luck, but then it was late and i had to get going. Homie

Thanks for your help guys btw

 

[Taurus]

my first thought was the monitor shorted somewhere inside itself and sent a massive current down to the video card and, eventually, mobo.

that's my theory.

 

[Sazar]

Originally posted by taurus
my first thought was the monitor shorted somewhere inside itself and sent a massive current down to the video card and, eventually, mobo.

that's my theory.

smoking monitor certainly a possible short... thats for sure...

short == power spike possible as well I spose

certainly seems as though the card is buggered though...

hopefully the mobo is not fried as well... if possible homie... try out a different cheapie vid card in the rig and see if it works...

the AIW 7500 is still in stock and being sold... ie not a legacy product... if it is built by ati or some other company.. and not OEM... it may be possible to rma/replace the card...

normally lifetime of the card warranty covers the product for the shelf lifetime of the product... ergo what I posted above

hopefully he will be able to get a new card... if it is fried...

the monitor... dunno bout that...

 

[Bootsy]

**note: now that you have a dead monitor, dont go fiddling around inside it, the fumes are toxic in the tube.

 

[Homie]

ok thanks, I got a old ati Rage 128 pro agp card I can try tonight. Hopefully everything is ok, though. Yeah the all in wonder is only coming up on 2 years from a local bestbuy store,if he still has is reciepts lol it may still be on a plan. Thanks about the monitor info, probably already got to close to it the other day, I take it your not supposed to put it in the trash either. Ill let u know guys know what happened tomorrow. Im going to test the power supply and check out that damn ups. It seemed like the whole thing lost some power and got quieter when the monitor was cooking.

 

[albybum]

**Extra Note: PC Monitors can retain deadly high voltage and high amperage even 6 months after it was last used... aka... don't mess around inside

 

[Homie]

Well I tried out 3 other graphics cards, 2 agp and 1 pci with no luck. Pretty sure the damn mobo is fried.

 

[Taurus]

you have tried all these with a different monitor, correct? sorry, just have to make sure.

 

[Sazar]

Originally posted by Homie
Well I tried out 3 other graphics cards, 2 agp and 1 pci with no luck. Pretty sure the damn mobo is fried.

sounds like a shame

I know what its like... florida currently has been thundering for around 8-9 straight weeks... lotsa dead rigs out there

I'll wait for your reply to taurus though

 

[LeeJend]

Two possibilities if there were no storms at the time.

1). The monitors high voltage supply went and arc'ed back into the PC through the vid card to the MB.

2). The UPS kicked in and went overvoltage as it tried to fill in. If that happened I'd expect the UPS to be dead too.

In either case the Monitor or UPS manufacturer can be held liable for the collateral damage. If they are big name brands figure out which one went and start calling the manufacturer and raising hell. A buddy of mine got a new MB, RAM, and P4 out of a fried Antec power supply.