New PSU destroyed my SSD and HDDs!

[jerick2143]

I'm having problems with my PC power supply and all my storage devices. I'll start from the beginning.

So Thursday night me and my friend were playing terraria together. While playing, my computer crashed and brought up the blue screen that tells you how long until it will reastart. Now the only times I had seen this screen was a few months before when I was trying to find a stable overclock for my CPU. So I thought it was weird but I wasn't very concerned. My PC restarted and I loaded up the game and as soon as my game started loading my friends world it crashed again. It showed the same blue screen and restarted. This time it did not boot into windows instead all my screen had on it was the "no signal" message. All the leds and fans were on and working fine. But it wouldn't boot into windows or the BIOS. After reading articles online I decided to try a new power supply. I ordered a new one and when it arrived I installed it. As soon as I flipped the switch on the PSU I heard a pop. Then a few seconds later I heard another pop. So I knew something was wrong so I thought I might as well turn it on to see if it has any functionality. On my screen it showed a message that said something about a failed startup and it gave me the option to load the BIOS. I did so and when checking out the components I noticed that the BIOS was not detecting any of my storage devices. 1 SSD and 2 HDDs. By this time I noticed a burning smell and after further inspection I found out that the SSD was the cause of the smell. I took out the SSD and decided to try a new power cable on the HDDs (one that came with the new PSU). This made no difference. I even tried one of the hard drives in another (much older) computer and it didn't even detect it. So that's where I am. The SSD didn't have anything irreplaceable on it; it mainly had the OS. The first hard drive (1tb) had mostly games that I could redownload. And the second hard drive (500gb) has thousands of family photos and my fathers accounting records. We do not have extra copies of these things.

What I want to know is what happened? Was the first PSU the cause of the crashes and the new one the cause of the broken storage devices?

Additional info:
I built this PC using all new parts earlier this year so I don't see why I should be having a problem with any of the components. The only old component is the 500gb hard drive which as around six years old. Also all the hard drives were powered using the same molex (I think that's what it's called) cable.

PLEASE NOTE all these parts are brand new except for the ones that I say are older.

So here's the system specs.
CPU: intel core i7 5.0ghz
GPU: nvidia GeForce gtx 1080 ti
MOBO: Asus prime z270-a
First PSU: corsair cx750m
Second PSU: EVGA 750 BQ
SSD: crucial 275gb
HDDs: 1tb seagate barracuda 500gb samsung (because it's old here's the model number) hd501lj
CPU Cooler: cooler master hyper 212 evo. With one extra 120mm fan.
I have 4 case fans. Note: one of these fans does not work unless i spin it while it is on. This never happened before the second PSU problem.
I also have a few USB items such as old dell speakers and an led mouse and keyboard. (Coolermaster devistaator combo)
Monitor: AOC u2879vf

I hope someone can help me find out what went wrong. And thanks in advance!

 

[Ralston18]

What went wrong started here:

" As soon as I flipped the switch on the PSU I heard a pop. Then a few seconds later I heard another pop."

Unfortunately, "new parts" does not mean "good parts". Everything is being made as cheaply as possible these days with minimal, if any, QA.

Along with fine print in the warranties to ensure that the end user can be somehow blamed....

Very likely that a six year old HDD may be nearing or at its' EOL (End-of Life). More vulnerable to catastrophic failure for any reason. E.g. power.

With respect to an old or a new HDD, a bad PSU or power cable could wreak havoc.

Some data may be recoverable. Connect the HDD to another computer.

Run the manufacturer's diagnostic software to determine what HDD problems, if any, exist.

Please remember that anything you do may cause further damage and/or data loss.

 

[BFG-9000]

Those are both modular power supplies. There is no standard pinout for modular cables where they attach to the PSU and can even differ between models of the same manufacturer, so I'm going to guess you got lazy and re-used the Corsair's modular cord on the EVGA. That could certainly fry the drives. The other possibility is the EVGA came miswired.

 

[jerick2143]

To BFG-9000

Yeah I did use the corsair cable. I had no idea that would cause any problems. I just assumed that the cables were the exact same. So if that solves the HDDs and SSD problem, then what was the first problem caused by? Just a bad PSU?

 

[BFG-9000]

5Ghz is overclocking, and chances are you simply did not run enough voltage to make things stable. Odds are both PSUs are fine.

I prefer 10 passes of IntelBurnTest and 24h of Prime95 to be absolutely sure things are rock-stable before I will let a machine out into production. Yes I may end up using more voltage and a lower overclock than most people, but then I never see those odd, intermittent failures.

One of the things we've learned from Windows Telemetry is that even unoverclocked machines @ stock have a failure rate that can be reduced by underclocking. So while most folks believe Intel is being too conservative in their ratings, so will undervolt or overclock past them, the truth is they aren't. See, Windows 10 telemetry was actually good for something!

I really hate how PSU wires are often all-black nowadays instead of following the standard colors for voltages--so you can't even see if wires are switched around. And that 500GB drive may just need a new PCB transplanted from as identical a used drive as you can find. If you can't hear it spin up with the new PCB then it's time to send it out to a recovery service.