Technology, Support, and News Forum

[Xstream Profile]

A friend brought me his pc to fix. It is an HP pavillion a604x. Won't power up at all. There is a flashing green light on the back of the PSU. So, first things first, I unhooked everything from the MB. floppy, cdrom, HDD, all Cards, re set the memory. Still nothing. So I unhooked the PSU and tested it by shorting the 14 pin to a ground wire. Dead. I replaced it with a working PSU, still not powering up the MB. Then I bypassed the power button, shorting the MB power up pins, no change.
So its not the new PSU, or the drives. Has to be either the CPU or the MB, right?
Found a MB on Ebay for $56, anything else to try before I buy it?

[yeshuas]

If you have another place (another computer or MB)to test the CPU to see if it is bad or not.

When you try booting with the memory out do you get any beeps or anything?

Do you get any beeps at anythime?

[Xstream Profile]

No, both my pc's are p4's not AMDs, so no place to test the cpu. Also, there are never any beeps with or without the memory. just dead.

[yeshuas]

Unforturnately it could be either the MB or the CPU or both

[Xstream Profile]

that's what I figured. The mb is $56 and the cpu is $30. Still cheaper than a new pc. I'll see what he wants to do. thanks!

[Nativedude Profile WebsiteICQ]

I always thought that the PC would still power on with a bad CPU just wouldn't POST or anything

[Xstream Profile]

wierd how it happened. Apparently, their 15 year old son got into some trouble online ( he didn't say what KIND of trouble ) and lost his pc privileges while his parents weren't home. So every time they left for work, they removed his power cord ( yeah, I know, like we all don't have 5 extra laying around ). Anyway, after a couple of weeks of removing and replacing the power cord, it quit working and since the PSU is fried, I figure they must have damaged it that way somehow.

[leo27 Profile]

i would say it's more than likely the motherboard. Bad ram would cause post beeps, and i'm pretty sure a bad cpu would cause beeps aswell.

[NT50 Profile]

when he fried the PSU it probably also fried the MB.

I have seen this several times in my repair years

[kd1966 Profile YIM]

when he fried the PSU it probably also fried the MB.

I have seen this several times in my repair years

Yes, in general, but not always - when you fry the PSU, likely you have at least damaged the MOBO, probably to the point it won't boot. Seen it myself several times and verified by plugging in good working PSU's to the MOBO in question when it appeared the PSU was working.