Legit Reviews

When I try to start one of my computers the fans spin up and the Power LED just flashes. Has anyone seen this or encountered this issue before? I am thinking it's the motherboard even though it's only a little over a month old. But it is a cheap/POS ECS board that was "free" with a Phenom I bought from Frys. I have ordered a new motherboard and cheap Antec power supply.

Tried the memory one stick at a time in different slots?

Dan

Also not bad to try the drive cables and other cards inside. Plug in and out one buy one and see what is the problem.

The RAM is fine, I tested it first. The only thing connected internally to that box is an old IDE HDD. I am writing this post with a box I threw together last night with the same drive. So that only leaves three things, the power supply, motherboard or the processor itself. I honestly won't be too surprised if it is the CPU. Frys sale people processors that have no business building their own computers. The CPU I got with my combo was a return and the sales guy assured me they check returned CPUs thoroughly. I told him I didn't want to get home and find bent pins and he told me it wouldn't. Well he was full of s**t, seeing as the CPU had 3 bent pins that I had to fix. It looks like the numbnuts who tried to install it first didn't take off the thermal compound protection piece when he/she was trying to put the heatsink on. I guess I'll have a solid answer by mid next week. I tried to find an ATX PSU tester locally and failed so I just ordered the Antec Basiq 350W for little more than a tester ($20).

My vote is the CPU.

2 reasons ..
1) In light of your last post
2) Sounds like the board itself is alive because it's still smart enough to power the fans and give a blinking light.

Here's why I don't think it's the CPU:
After getting the PC put together I tortured the hell out of it to see that it was stable. The blinking light issue came about after I restarted the PC. I don't remember if this was before, during, or after our power conniption (basically our power kept cycling every two minutes or so for 30 minutes). I've had PSUs and motherboards go bad before but I've never seen this behavior... So maybe it is the CPU. I'm not too terribly worried about it since the box is a backup of a backup and the only time I use it is to surf the web or encode some video to leave my box open to do whatever it is I am doing.

Just an update...
It was either the power supply or the POS, I mean ECS motherboard. I installed the new PSU and mobo today and all seems well. I'm just glad that it wasn't the processor.

you know, i really had to dig back in my memory to when i built my first computer, I got my cpu/motherboard as a deal form Fry's also..coincidentally it was an ECS board too..I'd say it was more the motherboard in ur case, but better to be safe than sorry(on buying the psu and mobo)..u never know with those Fry's parts

Glad to here it wasn't the procesor. Though after seeing the bent pins I would have brought it back to fry's to exchange.

i had the same problem a long time in one of my system, in my case it was the PSU who suddenly decided to not deliver enough power to start the CPU!

XstollieX wrote:Glad to here it wasn't the procesor. Though after seeing the bent pins I would have brought it back to fry's to exchange.

At the time I was working 7 days a week and didn't have the time to take it back. On top of that I'm lazy.
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