Bad power supply or what?

[raaskarr]

PC won’t start. Ran fine but later in the day, I tried to start it and nothing. Today, I pushed the start button and it lit for just a blink and went out. I suspect power supply but the blink threw me off. I would like to test it before I buy a new one. How do I do that? I own a few instruments but I do mostly car stuff.

Also, before this happened, I heard a little mechanical noise like maybe a hard drive click. The hard drive is only a couple months old. Was that a warning?

[Bruce]

was it a warning - hard to tell.
if it was a hard drive ‘click’ than probably not.

could just be a simply case of the power supply dying.
and the only true method to test that theory is to get your hands on another, hopefully before you buy one.

so… any access to a friend, neighbour, family or work PC?

[raaskarr]

nope. I think you just seconded my opinion. If I buy one and it doesn’t solve the problem, I can put it on eBay for about half of what I paid.
A shop will charge me at least that much to tell me what we already know. Maybe. I’ll let you know if there is a new(other) power supply for sale.

[phillpower2]

Sorry but you have post on a tech forum asking for help but have provided zero information about your computer or it`s hardware, this makes it impossible for anyone to even hazard a guess as to what is going on.

Is the computer a custom build or brand name such as Dell or HP, if a brand name, provide the model name or series number (not serial) if a custom build post the brand and model name or number for the CPU, MB, the RAM (including the amount) add on video card if one is used and the PSU (power supply unit) providing these details will enable folk to better help you.

[raaskarr]

Be quiet case, be quiet 650W PSU, I7-7700K CPU, gigabyte z270 mb, gigabyte rx560 gpu, Samsung 512 GB SSD, Seagate 1T HDD. I looked on YouTube at some ways to test PSU but it won’t do anything. I plan to open it in a day or two.

[raaskarr]

More info. Samsung EVO960 Nvme, g skill 16 GB RAM. I took it out of the case and plugged it into a wall socket. The fan won’t turn on. Is that pretty conclusive?

[Bruce]

simply plugging a removed power supply into a wall socket will never get the fan to spin, the unit needs to be tricked into thinking the power on button has been pushed.

and there’s a paper clip trick to do that, but that test is VERY non-conclusive.
you may get the fan to spin but the PSUI could still be useless.

there is only one valid test - another power supply unit.

[raaskarr]

That’s what I’m hearing. I’ll let you know the outcome soon.

[Bruce]

@raaskarr - any update?

[raaskarr]

Still trying to borrow one. I only know one other builder.

[Bruce]

OK, keep us in the loop.

[phillpower2]

To avoid us having to ask for an update every couple of days we will close this thread until the OP has the time available to work towards resolving the issue, PM a member of staff when you are ready and the thread can be reopened.

[Bruce]

re-opened by OP request
I tried a new power supply and PC still won’t start. It runs for a few seconds and stops. And then it starts again and stops.

[Bruce]

sadly, if the power supply went pear-shaped, it’s not unheard of for other parts to get fried, particularly the motherboard.

I would be pulling it all apart and reassembling on a piece of cardboard.
looking at each part for any obvious signs of damage - but really, they are not usually the obvious.
only reassemble to core components to get the PC into BIOS, so only one stick of RAM, no graphics card if the motherboard and CPU supports embedded graphics, only one drive, no mouse - that sort of thing.

at this stage we just want to have the PC stay on, and get into BIOS.
if we can achieve that, then we can add more bits and try to get Windows to load.

[raaskarr]

Did what you said. Pulled GPU, unplugged HDD second drive, unplugged optic drives, removed battery to clear CMOS. Removed second memory stick, reseated the other. What I miss? Same result. Power on a couple seconds, off, then on. Only thing I didn’t do was remove CPU.