PSU or Mobo problem?

What you hear going off is probably the motherboard or power supply capacitors losing their stored charge.

For some reason your motherboard or power supply needs a cold boot to properly start.

I would probably reset the BIOS using the reset jumper to see if it would boot normally first but ...

.. I feel like the power supply is probably the issue. Get a cheap one at a local electronics store (that can support your peripherals) test it and return it.

Issues like this are always a major pain in the ass to troubleshoot.
 
I'm 110% sure Epox is low grade garbage.



And the SmartPower series has a history of malfunctioning after a short time.
 
Ixiterra said:
Shocking the power supply will not hurt it though. They are simple and dumb components. Shocking the motherboard, on the other hand, causes problems like described in the OP. :)

Have you been inside the computer at all recently, Rev?
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I haven't seen a psu fry a board in years. 99% of the time things like this come up it is the psu. Listen to Dmaul. He knows his shit.

Rev: There isn't a way to test this without swapping gear for the most part. Hardware guys like Dmaul and myself follow the K.I.S.S. method. Keep it simple stupid. You start with the easiest and most common fixes first. Then you work your way down the line to the more complex and costlier issues.

If you are looking for some magic diagnostic to isolate the problem here you will not find one without having the extra gear/testing equipment handy.

Do what they said. Go get a damn psu and swap it. If the problem goes away you found the solution. If it does not then either live with it or keep looking(mobo next probably).

Honestly, if its a pain in the ass for you getting another psu then don't even bother. Leave the damn machine on all the time like most people do or deal with the power down routine.

Sure it has the possibility of getting worse in the future. It also has the possibility of doing this the next 10 years until it dies. It all depends on how much time and energy you want to spend on it. If it was mine I would swap the psu out. If that did not help I would say fuck it and live with it.
 
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Rayn said:
I would probably reset the BIOS using the reset jumper to see if it would boot normally first but ...
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This is free and easy. i try this first

Rayn said:
.. I feel like the power supply is probably the issue. Get a cheap one at a local electronics store (that can support your peripherals) test it and return it.

Issues like this are always a major pain in the ass to troubleshoot.
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yes they are. I'll see what the local best buy/walmart/microcenter have.

Curious, off hand, do you know what type of battery a mobo would use? Its the circular thin kind
 
Odio said:
I'm 110% sure Epox is low grade garbage.



And the SmartPower series has a history of malfunctioning after a short time.
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I am not sure how they are now, but when i bought this board Epox was top grade gold. Epox has always built great stuff. The Antec SP is also good. Ive had them since 2005 with no problems since.


Odio said:
It's a 3.3v lithium battery.
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DMAUL said:
cr2032
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So a 3.3v Cr2032 Lithium Battery. These are like $5 at wally world. i'll pick that up and check
 
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just get a fucking new power supply
you can get a decent one for like 15 bucks on newegg
stop being such a retard
if your system draws a lot of power you can still get a good one for less than 50 bucks
 
Rev_Night said:
the good ones are $60+. What pos heater/toaster are you looking at for $15?
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For diagnostic purposes who gives a shit. If the system powers up and down properly you found the cause and can then purchase a better psu.

The one you used for testing can then be used as a short term, returned, or kept in the closet for future testing.

If the battery is the cause this would be the first time I ever heard of that being the issue. Since I play the odds that is not someting I would be looking at.

Keep
It
Simple
Stupid
 
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Rev_Night said:
the good ones are $60+. What pos heater/toaster are you looking at for $15?
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antec basiq 350 or a raidmax 380
both are from reputable companies and are fine for most non-power-hungry computers
edit: looks like the raidmax is up to 20 on newegg and the basiq is MIA
 
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Try swapping out the PSU's power cable, I ran into a situation just like this once with a cable that went bad. Also check the capacitors on the mobo to see if any of them are leaking; Epox I believe was one of the manufacturers that was hit by the bad capacitors years ago.
 
Several companies were hit by it. I believe it was Abit that made headlines when they were sued over it. Long time ago.
 
The CMOS battery will not cause this issue. It's only purpose is to keep your CMOS settings and time when the computer is not plugged in.

The only real simple thing it could be is the case power switch, but that's also unlikely. Those things usually either work or they don't, and since you said it's not always been a problem, it's probably wired correctly.
 
--my work monitor has a power cord, ill try that.

--How can i see if any of the capacitors are leaking on the mobo?
 
yeah it's potentially the motherboard but you can return most psus within 30 days for a refund on newegg
give the cheapest option a try
a dying psu is likely to fry other stuff when it eventually goes out and 939 stuff is a pain in the dick to replace
 
I've had similar issues (10-20 at a time) here at work. We had older nforce4 gigabyte motherboards and antec truepower 430W psus.

After a couple years, the 5V line would become inconsistent. Instead of sticking at around 5V when using a power supply tester, it would flicker around between about 4.5V and 5V every quarter second or so. We occasionally encountered a "can't turn it on any more" problem when moving people around because we unplugged the systems. If they remained plugged in for a while, however, they would work fine.

Anyways, my issue was kind of backwards from yours, but I'd say replace the power supply. It's probably sending a shitty 5V output and the motherboard is too sensitive to turn on.
 
Rev_Night said:
--my work monitor has a power cord, ill try that.

--How can i see if any of the capacitors are leaking on the mobo?
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The capacitors are the little soda can shaped thingies on the motherboard. They should be pretty consistantly cylindrical shaped. If you see the (flat) top buldging out or leaking brown shit out of it, the capacitors are going bad.
 
Rev_Night said:
--my work monitor has a power cord, ill try that.

--How can i see if any of the capacitors are leaking on the mobo?
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Brownish substance leaking from the top or bottom that looks like a leaky alkaline battery.

CapsCrop.sized.jpg
 
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