Wont start up

[rufusdufus]

Recently my pc has been having issues starting. I had come to the conclusion that the issue was to do with the actual start or reset button because often if you jiggled it around it would fire up and once I actually unscrewed the button array and had a look around under neath for loose wires. I found none but when I put it all back together it starte working again for a while. Today it wouldn't start at first , then started up again after a few tries. I checked my gpu was seated (removed then re seated) and while I had it open I removed my wi fi adapter and a usb 3 card. Re assembled everything and it fired up fine. I heard a bit of fan contact so I shut it down to move whatever was chafing and that was it, wont start at all. How can I establish if it;s the start switch. I tried starting it by shorting the cmos pins but that doesn't work. Does that mean it's a different more serious issue ?
W10 64
i5 4690K
R9 380X
16GB Ram
Corsair CS 850M psu
I will buy a new case if I can be sure it's the button, if I stripped the wires behind the start button and touched them together would it work if the button is faulty ?
Thanks for any advice

 

[jay32267]

To determine if it's the switch you need to jump the switch wires.

Sometimes you can remove the wires from the switch and jump them if the have quick disconnects.

Sometimes you can just jump them with the switch connected.

You can also jump them at the MB if you know where to do it.

You can also cut them or strip them an jump them as you mentioned.

Just make sure you are jumping them right.

MB documentation will tell you this...or usually I can tell by just looking at the switch.

 

[neatfeatguy]

I had my MB fail on me one time after doing simple cleaning. I unplugged the power and disconnected all cables to the I/O on the MB. I moved the tower to the table, removed the side panel. I cleaned out the case fans and blew out the GPU fan/heatsink. I blew out the radiator for the H100i as well. I didn't remove anything and my system wasn't warm since it had been off all day and I only used canned air like I have many, many times before. I plugged everything back in and the system wouldn't power. I tested multiple PSUs and even did all the steps outlined below, but in the end the MB was dead.

If you can't get your system to power up, you need to test another PSU on it. If you don't have one, then your best bet to see if you can pinpoint a possible problem would be to pull everything out and test it on a cardboard box.

It is possible with playing with things you somehow caused the system to no longer being grounded or maybe just a loose cable.

You need the MB, CPU with fan/heatsink installed, 1 stick of RAM, PSU (connected to the 24pin MB power and 8pin CPU power). This is all you need to see if your system will POST. You can always connect your monitor to the on board video output if you want, but it's not needed.

Set the MB on a cardboard box. Install the RAM (see MB manual to see if a specific DIMM should be used), connect the PSU 24pin and 8pin power cables. Double check you have everything connected and plugged in. Power on the system (you may have a power button on the MB or you may have to use a screw driver to power the system on - search google for this method if you're not sure how).

If the system doesn't get any power, it's going to be 1 of 2 things:
1) dead MB
2) bad/dead PSU

If you don't have a spare PSU or a multimeter to test on it, you can try the paperclip test on the PSU. Google how to do the paperclip test on a PSU. If the PSU does power on (doesn't mean it is good) then most likely it's not the PSU.

If the system powers up - good. Next is to power it off and then install the rest of the RAM, GPU and main OS HDD/SSD. Make sure all proper power cables are connected to everything and power the board up again. If it boots into Windows, you're golden. Your system is working. If it doesn't, you need to further pinpoint where the problem is.

If you made it this far and everything works properly outside of the case, time to move it all into the case and try to power on the system.

 

[rufusdufus]

To determine if it's the switch you need to jump the switch wires.

Sometimes you can remove the wires from the switch and jump them if the have quick disconnects.

Sometimes you can just jump them with the switch connected.

You can also jump them at the MB if you know where to do it.

You can also cut them or strip them an jump them as you mentioned.

Just make sure you are jumping them right.

MB documentation will tell you this...or usually I can tell by just looking at the switch.

Yes mate, we were both right and thanks for the reassurance your answer gave me, it is appreciated. Fired up so quickly made me jump. Will order one of those cheap last years glass doored corsairs tonight if my R9 380X will fit. Cheers

 

[rufusdufus]

I had my MB fail on me one time after doing simple cleaning. I unplugged the power and disconnected all cables to the I/O on the MB. I moved the tower to the table, removed the side panel. I cleaned out the case fans and blew out the GPU fan/heatsink. I blew out the radiator for the H100i as well. I didn't remove anything and my system wasn't warm since it had been off all day and I only used canned air like I have many, many times before. I plugged everything back in and the system wouldn't power. I tested multiple PSUs and even did all the steps outlined below, but in the end the MB was dead.

If you can't get your system to power up, you need to test another PSU on it. If you don't have one, then your best bet to see if you can pinpoint a possible problem would be to pull everything out and test it on a cardboard box.

It is possible with playing with things you somehow caused the system to no longer being grounded or maybe just a loose cable.

You need the MB, CPU with fan/heatsink installed, 1 stick of RAM, PSU (connected to the 24pin MB power and 8pin CPU power). This is all you need to see if your system will POST. You can always connect your monitor to the on board video output if you want, but it's not needed.

Set the MB on a cardboard box. Install the RAM (see MB manual to see if a specific DIMM should be used), connect the PSU 24pin and 8pin power cables. Double check you have everything connected and plugged in. Power on the system (you may have a power button on the MB or you may have to use a screw driver to power the system on - search google for this method if you're not sure how).

If the system doesn't get any power, it's going to be 1 of 2 things:
1) dead MB
2) bad/dead PSU

If you don't have a spare PSU or a multimeter to test on it, you can try the paperclip test on the PSU. Google how to do the paperclip test on a PSU. If the PSU does power on (doesn't mean it is good) then most likely it's not the PSU.

If the system powers up - good. Next is to power it off and then install the rest of the RAM, GPU and main OS HDD/SSD. Make sure all proper power cables are connected to everything and power the board up again. If it boots into Windows, you're golden. Your system is working. If it doesn't, you need to further pinpoint where the problem is.

If you made it this far and everything works properly outside of the case, time to move it all into the case and try to power on the system.

Thanks for your very detailed response, I appreciate the effort you put in to helping me. I would have followed your advice but first I thought it important to eliminate the Power/reset array because of the issues it had been having recently. My next step would undoubtedly been to follow your instructions but luckily this time it was in fact the power button and as the case is around 5 years old I will order a new one tonight or tomorrow hopefully getting it by the weekend. Again thanks for your advice.