Bad PSU? : /

Long-ish first post, sorry

My computer was working fine a few days ago, but the mouse and keyboard kept freezing up, the only extra thing added was my sons MP3 player charging from a USB port. So I powered down and left it off for a bit, went to turn it back on and had a No signal display on the monitor, figured after awhile it was just the VGA connection so I decided to get a new mobo. (the old mobo was a biostar mini ATX, AMD Athlon 64 3500+, 2G RAM, onboard video) Got a new mobo (the brand slips me, right off) that had a AMD sempron 3000+ on it, socket 754, so I replace that CPU with my old one, toss in my vid card that I was never able to get to work on the biostar board and booted up, everything worked fine, save the USB ports weren't working at all, double and triple checked the connections, noticed that when the system powered up, the Ethernet port light would flash on and then back off, no power to it at all it seemed. So I replaced the CPU with the sempron and it booted up fine, still no power to the USB or Ethernet ports (normal keyboard worked, however). Shut down again to try and figure out the problem and upon restarting, once again, im back to having no signal to the monitor, the only thing I can figure is its the PSU? I was running a 500W PSU but the fan stopped so I switched to the 450W that came with the Case (no name brand, case was a XION). So could it be the PSU, after having tried more than one CPU, Mobo, and monitors, cables, just trying to figure out th is problem so I can get back online, thanks for any help : D

 

Welcome to the forum!! : )
the chances of the mp3 playing wrecking your psu or motherboard is almost zero. my moneys on a software problem. have you been using the same O.S wit each boot?

my friend toasted an xp os with a zen mp3 player. lol..

 

Thanks for the welcome

I don't think it was the MP3 player either but I think it was causing my USB keyboard and mouse to lock up on me, but either way, I changed the mobo and it worked, but I had no power to the USB ports ~at all~ and the light for the ethernet hub would flash on and go right back off, while trying to figure this out it went back to the no signal on the monitor problem. Since I put in a new mobo and it worked, with both CPUs im "guessing" its the PSU lol, I tried to get a reading with a DMM but I don't think im finding a very good ground, just wanting clarification before I go find a good PSU : / (my town sucks, huge extreme lack of computer part availability lol) Thanks!!!

 

Hoping to get a new PSU tomorrow, would like to feel a bit safer before buying it lol Can anyone clarify that this could be the problem? Thanks!

 

check the bios to see if the right volts and the usb is enabled. some mobo have this and others dont. if your com boots and everything else works its proababily not the usb.

 

well I can't check the bios anymore since I started getting the "no signal" on the monitor(s), it just started doing that right after the USB wasnt working. Thinking back now, thats what was happening the first time, the USB ports stopped working and then the "no signal" issue.

 

How did you ascertain it was 'no power'? Sounds like a bad board or no drivers.

 

The bad board thought crossed my mind, which is also why the first thing I did was track down a socket 754 board and replace the original with it. I got the same problems across both boards, no USB, no Ethernet port working and t hen no signal to monitor, I'm giving the new board the benefit of the doubt since it was new out of the box and yet had the same problems. Thanks : D

 

Well the new PSU didn't change anything, I still get the "no signal" to the monitor, I've tried both boards, each with 2 diff. processors (AMD Sempron 3000+ and Althon 64 3400+), so I'm completely lost, when I put the new board in, the system booted up and I could get into BIOS and use my USB keyboard but on the load up screen I couldn't. I emptied out the case and did find a screw floating around but I hope that couldnt, or didn't, fry anything : / Any ideas? Things to check? Thanks : )

 

Another update, the Biostar mobo still wont boot up, however, I got some new silicone heatsink compound, put it on the new mobo/CPU and it booted up, but was locking up at the BIOS screen (turns out I had a bad stick of RAM as well)(Also, running the Sempron 3000+ CPU that came with the mobo, debating on seeing of my Athlon 64 3400+ will work hehe). NOW, I apparently have 2 copies of XP on my HDs (neither HD will work solo, which is weird) So I get a screen asking me which copy of XP to run, I always choose the 2nd (1st always gives me an OS error). It takes me to the screen asking me if I want to load in Safe mode, etc, or start windows normally (this was after I had to power down a few times after choosing the 2nd and it freezing up on me) and it freezes there now. I also tried my windows recovery disk, thinking maybe a fresh install of XP would help but it freezes on "loading executive files". I'm so close now to being done fixing this thing, any ideas, help, anything!!!!!! thanks!!

 

So today I tried my HDs on a diff. computer, was able to piggyback both onto the existing HD and read them from windows, however, I use one HD for XP and the other for storage, when I tried both of my drives together (and the primary just alone) It just froze up on me and did nothing. Perhaps installing a fresh copy of XP on the secondary (no XP or OS on it) would work? Thanks

 

Well im lost, again lol, im guessing its a bad Motherboard, since I took a known good HD and plugged it into mine, it runs the POST and then freezes, nothing more, at all. Help if you can : /