is my pc trashed?

[ponkomeister7]

my old pc got struck by a lighting but i can still turn it on,but it has no display. i do hear sound, but not the sounds i heard before it got struck, if only the gpu is dead then should i upgrade it? its got a lga 775 mobo i want to get a modded xeon and a radeon hd 7850 and get more ram.the specs are: intel pentium e5200 (i believe) 2 gb ram and a gt 8500.

 

[Martell1977]

Try using the onboard graphics unit. If it has one, there should be a port on the motherboard for it.

 

[ponkomeister7]

alright i'll try.i really want to upgrade this with an xeon and a hd 7850 or a 750ti cause i can upgrade it for 125$ here

 

[shrapnel_indie]

my old pc got struck by a lighting but i can still turn it on,but it has no display. i do hear sound, but not the sounds i heard before it got struck, if only the gpu is dead then should i upgrade it? its got a lga 775 mobo i want to get a modded xeon and a radeon hd 7850 and get more ram.the specs are: intel pentium e5200 (i believe) 2 gb ram and a gt 8500.

It sounds like you have what would be considered no budget, for any real upgrades considering the age of the parts you're looking at.

Is there anything that looks physically damaged? If the answer is no, that doesn't mean that there isn't. I had an old external modem that bought the farm years ago due to a lightning strike. Nothing visibly wrong, but feel the chipset inside of it, and it was ultra hot to the touch when it never was before. (I don't recommend using your hands now days to test that way.)

Also, you said it don't make the same sounds it used to. A good functioning PC will have one short beep on startup, before loading the OS. If the sounds you heard were beeps, and you hear different ones, how many, and how long of beeps do you hear?

Try the on-board graphics as already suggested, if your CPU and motherboard has it. If that works, your GPU may have bought it. But with a lightning surge hit, there could be much more dead, or will be very shortly.

 

[ponkomeister7]

yeah i did hear a short beep then some noise,after that the noise stopped but it smelled bad, i think i did hear the proccesor heatsink work though,also the pc hasn't been cleaned in about 6 years.i think i only didnt hear the gpu fan

 

[shrapnel_indie]

yeah i did hear a short beep then some noise,after that the noise stopped but it smelled bad, i think i did hear the proccesor heatsink work though,also the pc hasn't been cleaned in about 6 years.i think i only didnt hear the gpu fan

Well, there is a good chance something was damage by the lightning strike, and then died when you powered it back up. You may need to open your case to see if there is visible damage not hidden by heatsinks and that. (chips that seem cracked open, or caps (those little cylinders) the same or look like they got goo all over them or around them. anything that looks burnt...

 

[ponkomeister7]

yeah i did hear a short beep then some noise,after that the noise stopped but it smelled bad, i think i did hear the proccesor heatsink work though,also the pc hasn't been cleaned in about 6 years.i think i only didnt hear the gpu i dont see anything visually damaged

 

[ponkomeister7]

Is there any chance that only the gpu die?

 

[Martell1977]

Is there any chance that only the gpu die?

Yes, but the only way to tell at this point is to try the onboard and see if the computer is even detecting the GPU anymore.

 

[ponkomeister7]

i opened and cleaned the pc i checked very good for anything damaged, there wasn't anything i'll try booting it in an hour

 

[Martell1977]

You likely wont see it, a lot of damage types wont have visible markers. There might be scorch marks near anything damaged, but there is no way to tell but to test it.

 

[shrapnel_indie]

It's true, the vast majority of the time, the energy from the strike only lasts enough to do the damage without leaving visible scorch marks or visibly damaged parts. of course, the closer the strike, the more likely to see physical damage. In your case, it was close enough to burn out parts without visible traces then. Now it's on to testing individual component assemblies.

 

[ponkomeister7]

i turned it on,also opened it up to see if the gpu and cpu fans were spinning,everything was working normally.