power outage

I was reading my e-mail, when my computer just shut off. It wont come back on. Nothing powers up,hard drive,fans,nothing.. I checked all wires and connections. the only sign of life is the "ram led" on the mother board stays on. Any ideas where to start?

This is a home built system. the board is a Gigabyte, K7 Triton. GA-7VKML.



Thank you for your time.

 

If all the connections are good (including power cord on both ends and the 110 volt outlet), would appear you will be looking for a new power supply.

 

So I can assume that, the "ram led light" does not indicate that the mother board is not getting power? In other words, if the power is not working, why would that one light still be on?

Thanks for your time and input.

 

I have had a few similar experiences in the past and each time I replaced the power supply to solve the problem.

A month or two ago, my system exibited the same behavior as yours except I don't recall the LED remaining on (or even if there was an LED on the motherboard). However, when I'd press the power button, I could occasionally get the machine to power up. Sometimes it would power up for only few seconds. Other times, it would boot and stay on for 1 minute, 2 minutes, 10 minutes, or even an hour, and then suddenly power off. When I checked my voltage monitor for the motherboard, the voltages were not remaining very constant. My Windows registry also got severely corrupted during this period, perhaps due to all the unexpected shutdowns.

Since it would occasionally boot, I suspected it might be something on the motherboard. I replaced the motherboard and the problem continued. Finally I replaced the power supply and I was back up and running.

The next time I run into this problem, the first thing I will try is a new power supply. They're available locally at Best Buy for me anyway.

At any rate, if you replace the power supply and that doesn't solve your problem, you have a backup power supply to install the next time you run into a similar problem. I already have a brand new backup 300 watt supply ready for the next time I run into this problem.

Next time I purchase a power supply, I'll buy one that's rated at 450 watts or better. The one that failed was 300 watts and I wonder if it failed because I was overworking it with all the peripherals I have on my computer (multiple hard drives, CD drives, case fans, etc.)

Please let us know what solves your problem.

 

Ok I will try a power supply. I suspected that might be it but the led threw me off. This is a 450w power supply. Should be enuff, maybe was defective.

thank you.

 

Thank you

Yup, was the power supply. Slapped a new 1 in and fired right up.

Thanks everyone for your help.

 

Thanks for posting back with the update.