My computer, she has died :(

[hyperian]

I tried to boot my machine this morning and she didn't want anything to do with it. At first she tried to boot but my screens wouldn't detect and video input, leading me to believe that the graphics card might be at fault. So I unplugged the card, used onboard video and everything seemed to work until I tried to reboot. The mb wasn't receiving power and wouldn't even switch on. After a couple of attempts power returned but she would only stay on for a couple of seconds before the boot process would stop and she'd sit idle with no fans spinning.

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated before I throw her out the window.

 

[Drake2007]

Start with the PSU

 

[hyperian]

I bought a new hard drive a few days ago and it has been working fine, but I think it might have died The machine seems to boot and run fine if I unplug the drive.

EDIT: changed the jumper settings on the drive and now she detects. This is fubar. Will keep an eye on the PSU and see what happens.

Thanks for the help.

 

[Drake2007]

Conflicting jumper settings on IDE drives won't affect the behaviour of the machine like that.

 

[Gadget Man]

Probably the PSU can't handle the power requirements of the extra drive.

 

[Chevron]

Bingo.

 

[PostmanPot]

What parts and PSU? It would be quite hard to believe the new HDD is overpowering the PSU as SATA drives only use ±8 watts...

 

[Earther]

PSU

 

[hawker]

First start with the PSU, then try and systematically eliminate other components that may be causing problems.

 

[hyperian]

It's a BFG 550W, which is definitely capable of powering everything. I've only got a 8400 card, which doesn't draw much either and I have no ROM drive. I'm guess the SATA power cable was faulty. I'm using an IDE-to-SATA power adapter now and everything seems to be running fine. Strange ...