[SOLVED] Help bringing my old pc to life again

[Rufokami]

Hello to all of the Tom's Hardware community. After researching and looking around the whole internet, I decided to come here in hopes that you can help me. I'm sorry for the wall of text beforehand, but I'm really desperate!

I will try not to make this post too long. I have a rig I made back in 2012 which purpose was to work on 3D & Video, as well as being able to play most of the games at that time. It was a gift from my father, so i appreciate it as much as you can imagine. Well, turns out that after all this time, it's starting to die on me. I had to change the GPU (a GTX 540 Ti, like 5 years ago), and the disc (around 2-3 years ago, when I bought a Barracuda, which lasted me A YEAR, I bought my actual one like 2 years ago). So now these are the actual specs:

• AMD FX8150 BE 3.6GHz
• ASUS M5A97 with latest BIOS (r1605)
• 3x4GB DDR3-1333 HyperX Limited Edition RAM (have one in, two sitting around rn)
• Toshiba P300 1TB HDWD110 SATA Drive
• TT NiC CPU fan cooler (300 I think?)
• XFX PRO750W Core Edition 80+Bronze PSU
• MSi GeForce GT 740 4GB (if I'm not mistaken)

I know you would be horrified to imagine the amounts of bottleneck problems it has, but I'm a freelancer with no job atm (I'm lucky I can still bother my parents for a while more), no money either and totally noob to OCing, so basically, I don't have any means to get a new shiny rig nor a lot of options to refurbish my rig. I tried throwing back the CPU with some info I found on stock values, but I might have done some bad stuff. So now, I have some messages on the starting screen, and also noticed some other interesting stuff:

USB Overvoltage detected
CPU Overvoltage detected (both of them not at the same time)
When I connect the mouse into an USB, it reads a mouse AND a keyboard, with no keyboard connected.
If I connect a pendrive, the system reads it with no problem. But when I connect an HDD, the discs start making a sound like they're not getting enough power and aren't found on explorer. I tested the 3 I have on other devices, everything fine.

And I'm trying to figure if it's my mobo which is dying. I tested voltages on the PSU, and I tried every RAM card on the sockets, but they seem ok. I also considered faulty drivers, but somehow Windows isn't fixing the issue.

The thing I'm most concerned with is backing up all my info, which I'm doing whenever I can start the computer, but as for the components... As I said before, I can't afford a new rig for the life of me, so if you could lend me a hand in solving this, maybe I could afford to buy a new component, to extend the life of my rig a little bit more, at least until I save enough to build a new computer.

 

[Math Geek]

it appears you can access another pc to check if the drives are working. i'd use that other system to back up your data. plug the drive into it with the data and an external or second internal drive to back up to.

this will get that issue out of the way.

the rest seems like issues in the BIOS. once all is backed-up try going into the BIOS and setting it back to defaults. this should undo whatever you did that is causing issues. t

this would be my first try. all the various errors all seem to point to bad settings in the BIOS. if that does not wrk, then can look into the possibility of the mobo itself going out on you.

 

[Rufokami]

Thank you for the advice! Sadly, the info drive is internal, and I don't have a case to connect to my notebook. Other devices I have are a tablet and a smart TV, where I tested the drives in. All working. So I discarded faulty drives (thankfully!).

I tried resetting the BIOS already by unpowering, removing the battery, inserting a new one, then the screen said 'overclocking failed! Press F1 to access BIOS settings', to which I went in and pressed 'Load Optimized Defaults'. I tried starting the computer, but I got the same USB Overvoltage message, which forced a shutdown.

Weird thing is, yesterday night I tried starting the computer with just the mouse connected, and the starting screen said '1 mouse, 1 keyboard', but I had no keyboard connected! And strangely enough, the computer started with no problems. I'm losing my head 😱

 

[Math Geek]

that does seem to point to the mobo itself then. when a part goes bad, it is usually restricted to certain symptoms. but when multiple erros all pointing in different directions happens, then you have to start looking at the motherboard.

https://www.newegg.com/p/pl?N=100007625 600138080 600641738

newegg still has some am3/+ boards. so replacing it should not be too hard. the question is, realy, is it worth the money for such an old system. but that's a question you have to answer.

 

[Rufokami]

that does seem to point to the mobo itself then. when a part goes bad, it is usually restricted to certain symptoms. but when multiple erros all pointing in different directions happens, then you have to start looking at the motherboard.

https://www.newegg.com/p/pl?N=100007625 600138080 600641738

newegg still has some am3/+ boards. so replacing it should not be too hard. the question is, realy, is it worth the money for such an old system. but that's a question you have to answer.

Sadly as it is, yes. I don't have enough money to make a new rig, and I need my computer to work on stuff so I can earn money to buy a new one! It's a infinite loop haha.

In that regard, do you have any recommendations in a mobo? I don't know if there's one I could trust on having.

 

[Math Geek]

the one you have now has worked for you this long. i'd stick with that one myself

https://www.newegg.com/p/2MG-000B-001W2

$119 isn't bad for old stock like that.

 

[ScrewySqrl]

this is the least expensive 970 Mobo (AM3+):


https://www.newegg.com/asrock-970m-pro3/p/N82E16813157582

AS Rock is a very reliable brand, and this will be a good motherboard to use.

 

[punkncat]

Something that stood out to me, and perhaps was addressed somewhere I missed.

You mentioned that you went in fooling around in settings on the BIOS side in an attempt to OC without knowing what you were doing.
I would recommend clearing CMOS, get into BIOS and reset all default values and see if those warnings go away.

Being broke or not, throwing money at this rig is as good as just burning it.

 

[Math Geek]

Something that stood out to me, and perhaps was addressed somewhere I missed.

You mentioned that you went in fooling around in settings on the BIOS side in an attempt to OC without knowing what you were doing.
I would recommend clearing CMOS, get into BIOS and reset all default values and see if those warnings go away.

Being broke or not, throwing money at this rig is as good as just burning it.

was my first suggestion as well, but he did say he already did that. is why i moved on to the mobo as a whole. nothing else i've ever seen would cause such a variety of errors.

 

[Rufokami]

Something that stood out to me, and perhaps was addressed somewhere I missed.

You mentioned that you went in fooling around in settings on the BIOS side in an attempt to OC without knowing what you were doing.
I would recommend clearing CMOS, get into BIOS and reset all default values and see if those warnings go away.

Being broke or not, throwing money at this rig is as good as just burning it.

I actually followed some steps in an attempt to NOT OC my CPU. I tried throwing back to stock the OC values with a guide here in TH if I'm not mistaken, because the computer was shutting down due to high temperatures. And the guy that built me my pc said to 'not worry about temperature'.
I don't know what do you mean with clearing CMOS, but I took the battery out and then install a new one for the BIOS and then reset the config to 'optimized defaults', then saved.

And yet, warning doesn't go away. I was able to log in to Windows though, so I'm backing up right now.

 

[Math Geek]

this one is rather interesting. i'm not 100% convinced it is the mobo, but after resetting the BIOS did not help, it leaves little else.

i can't think of anything else that could be wrong with it really.

 

[Rufokami]

Hello again, I came back after backing up everything (I bought a case for my drive and could store all the vital info), so now I'm looking for mobos.

the one you have now has worked for you this long. i'd stick with that one myself

https://www.newegg.com/p/2MG-000B-001W2

$119 isn't bad for old stock like that.

I noticed that one, but says it's refurbished and I don't know if it is reliable enough to buy it just like that? I'm considering taking the risk, else I'll just might buy the AsRock that the other user mentioned... I'm not sure. Thanks for your kind help in advance.

 

[doolittle]

One thing I would try, get a BIOS battery (CR2032) and see if that will bring the mobo back to life - usually under $5 might be worth it. Have seen many strange problems that occur with a dead bios battery.

 

[Rufokami]

One thing I would try, get a BIOS battery (CR2032) and see if that will bring the mobo back to life - usually under $5 might be worth it. Have seen many strange problems that occur with a dead bios battery.

I already tried changing the battery... 😕