Plugged in PC and sparks came out.

Ok, my friend went over to his other friends house. They plugged in the PC into a Surge protector and when he turned it on, sparks came out of where the mouse plugs into the case in the PS/2 cable's end. Now the PC won't turn on. I suck at troubleshooting; So I need your help with this. Could it be the Power Supply? I'm going over to his house tomorrow to replace the PSU with an extra one that he has, but I want to know what else we could do. Or if replacing the Power Supply will damage it further (in case the motherboard is fried). Would also appreciate some speculation as to what could have happened.

No swearing.

Thelemac

My guess is that in transporting the computer that something came loose and shorted out when you plugged it in. Since sparks flew there is a good chance the mobo is fried. If you try another psu, I would first take the mobo out of the case, eliminate anything extra, place it on cardboard and then try sparking it up. Sorry, bad choice of words. Good luck.

Not The Magic Smoke!!!! You Let The Magic Smoke Out!!!

you're Flanker from TF aren't you?
http://www.tech-forums.net/showthread.php?s=&threadid=72596

Lol, "Sparking it up."

Thanks, I'll try that.

BTW: "Magic Smoke?" lol.

Hi, Apokalipse, lol.

Here too. These guys don't give a hoot though...lol.

We figured that after a tragedy you needed to laugh. Hey, it's that or cry.

Flanker,

Try resetting the CMOS. Most motherboards come with onboard protection circutry, so you may be in luck. Take the board out of the case, place it on an anti-static bag and give it a shot.

S-N

OK, thanks Super Nade, I'll try that too.

One more question, when this happened, the case was sitting on a metal table, could that have had an effect such as improper grounding?

reminds me of my poor NF-7 S when i fried it while trying to check voltages with multimeter, POOF, dead

yowzers,
try another PSU a=nd do try super nades suggestion. Hopefully, you didnt burn out everything. maybe a cpu /memory can be salvaged

xFlankerx said:

OK, thanks Super Nade, I'll try that too.

One more question, when this happened, the case was sitting on a metal table, could that have had an effect such as improper grounding?

Click to expand...

if the house wiring is proper, the PSU is grounded. (earth)
if i recall correctly, if the rig is hooked up right, the chassis, case and the whole negative DC has very little resistence (difference in voltage potential?) between negative DC and earth ground. in other words, unless i am severly mistaken, the negative rails, chassis, and case are more or less an earth ground.

its been a while since ive looked at it, and this seems to be correct from what i remember playing with the multimeter - however this should be confermed independantly, as my memory is fuzzy about it.

oh, and to answer your question, if you had any metal to metal (not painted or insulated) contact between the computer and the metal table, the table would be grounded as well.

ummm, heres where the situation gets tricky, and theres more than meets the eye. i reccomend having a look at various articles here : http://www.google.com/search?q=grou...ient=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official
it may not be related, but still really valuable stuff to know concerning grounding issues.
especially this article http://www.epanorama.net/documents/groundloop/basics.html

xFlankerx said:

OK, thanks Super Nade, I'll try that too.

One more question, when this happened, the case was sitting on a metal table, could that have had an effect such as improper grounding?

Click to expand...

Quite possible. Infact absolutely possible

If you flip your motherboard around, you will see a lot of solder points. They are not meant to be shorted. A metallic surface is the most dangerous enemy here. One may argue that the metallic surface was painted. But there may be small scratches and/or the paint may contain metallic compounds, both of which could be very dangerous. That is why I always recommend an anti-static bag placed over some non-conducting bubble wrap or foam.

Don't fret if you burned the MoBo out. It could serve as an interesting piece of hardware to experiment on. If its dead, look for visible cases of discoloration. Once you find a burnt out component, you could always find a replacement off digikey.com or any other electronics hardware supply store.

If it is completely irreparable, you could use it as a leet coffee table or hang it up as modern new-age art

Good Luck man!



S-N

to clarify: are we talking just the case sitting there or solder points of the actual mobo on the table?

During transportation from one place to another your system can condezate some steam (and with that to make short circyt) from the air because of the different temperatures . So when you transport you should leave the system at room temp for one hour to even the temp of the system with the room .
But now you should check all parts too see if any of them syrvived .

Molester said:

Not The Magic Smoke!!!! You Let The Magic Smoke Out!!!

Click to expand...

Yeah... *sniff* The PSU, the mainboard, and possibly other components, are all probably toast.

Nade said:

Don't fret if you burned the MoBo out. It could serve as an interesting piece of hardware to experiment on. If its dead, look for visible cases of discoloration. Once you find a burnt out component, you could always find a replacement off digikey.com or any other electronics hardware supply store.

Click to expand...

(Emphasis added.) Also true. Since you did see sparkage, you will probably see some sort of visible damage to the mainboard.

And they always do make nice pieces of art!

Moved to General Hardware.

Please be aware of the different sections that we have and post accordingly. Thanks.