Help! My son nuked my computer :(

[lakedude]

So I just had a couple of ideas.

Maybe the dual shock controller is what is fried and dragging the system down? Unhook all but the bare minimum (MB, CPU, one stick of RAM, onboard video) with no GPU, or dual shock controller, and no hard drive and see if you can at least get a BIOS screen.

You don't need esata, just another home system with regular sata ports to check your HD. I bet the HD is OK.

Hmmm Rhode Island is a bit far for me to make a service call...

 

[abbadaba]

So I just had a couple of ideas.

Maybe the dual shock controller is what is fried and dragging the system down? Unhook all but the bare minimum (MB, CPU, one stick of RAM, onboard video) with no GPU, or dual shock controller, and no hard drive and see if you can at least get a BIOS screen.

You don't need esata, just another home system with regular sata ports to check your HD. I bet the HD is OK.

Hmmm Rhode Island is a bit far for me to make a service call...

Thank you for your responses lakedude they have been very helpful.

Only other system in the household is a laptop.

The ps2 controller mouse and keyboard are all shot. When plugged into my wifes laptop the ps2 controller does the same perpetual vibrating thing. The wireless keyboard receiver is recognized by windows as malfunctioning and the mouse does nothing.

Monitor, hdtv, printer (usb), speakers which were all plugged in and on at the time of the incident are fine. Those items I checked on day one, didnt actually try the input devices on another machine til today. Basically everything that was on usb besides the printer is dead. (wonder if my media card reader will work?)

I have already tried stripping all unessential parts but there isnt much to leave out besides a tuner card. mobo doesnt have onboard video so i have to use gpu.

It is clear to me that the mobo is fried and I've already ordered a replacement. The system wont even blink when assembled because the mobo is not getting the power on signal to the PSU.

 

[tracerbullet]

I like the plan too. Cheap mobo to give it a shot, if that doesn't work build a new one.

(And I hope the mobo works because if you're like me at all you'll be tempted to buy a cpu or other parts as well, lol. That said I think there's a real good chance it will)

 

[daveybrat]

I forgot people couldn't take a joke.

If that's your idea of a joke, you need some help.


Glad your son is alright and good luck on the rebuild!

 

[Eureka]

Basically what happens when you plug in the USB into the power outlet is that you sent AC current through the grounding plane. Anything on the plane would be exposed to nice high AC voltages. Anything that takes its power from the USB port or grounding plane would likely be fried.

I'm surprised your printer wasn't fried, but if it was off while the PC was on that may have protected it.

Monitor's connection is through the video card, that buffer may have protected it (current would cycle through the card and not through the cable).

I would have hoped that it would just take a direct path to ground and blow up your PSU (thereby saving the rest of your devices), but it looks like the CPU and RAM might be fried too.

And this is why you should plug up all outlets with those little plastic pieces, especially if you have little kids. Incidentally, my mother did not do so, and I discovered electricity at a young age when I plugged a penny into a power socket. Somehow I survived and became an electrical engineer 20 years later.

 

[RadiclDreamer]

I forgot people couldn't take a joke.

Thats a terrible joke.

 

[Ketchup]

I forgot people couldn't take a joke.

That's what the letters "jk" are for. Hard to take a phrase like that as a joke over the internet.

That must have been your first day on the internet.

jk

 

[Mixolydian]

That's what the letters "jk" are for. Hard to take a phrase like that as a joke over the internet.

That must have been your first day on the internet.

jk

Seemed pretty obvious to me that something so ridiculous would have easily been interpreted as a joke. Guess not. Carry on.

 

[lakedude]

Basically what happens when you plug in the USB into the power outlet is that you sent AC current through the grounding plane.

Yep

Anything on the plane would be exposed to nice high AC voltages.

Only if the ground plane became ungrounded somehow. That is the whole point of ground. It is of course possible that the accident did cause an open in the ground and then what you say would be true. Otherwise ground is at zero potential regardless of how much voltage you apply.



If the RAM and CPU are shot it really isn't worth fixing because of the high price of DDR2.

 

[abbadaba]

Basically what happens when you plug in the USB into the power outlet is that you sent AC current through the grounding plane. Anything on the plane would be exposed to nice high AC voltages. Anything that takes its power from the USB port...

I'm surprised your printer wasn't fried...

The printer doesn't take its power from USB, maybe that helped?

New motherboard should be here late tomorrow. Got the multimeter today and I will test the PSU tomorrow. We'll see how it goes. Worst case I'll have learned a lesson and get to have fun shopping for a new build.

EDIT: 11.9, 5.2, 3.3 PSU is just fine. Just waiting on UPS.

 

[lakedude]

Hope it works out. Lets us know.

 

[slayernine]

In this situation there's really no substitute for taking the machine in to a qualified shop.

It could be something as simple as the PSU, or it could be everything in there, and without the ability to swap parts, it's going to be impossible to tell.

Hope it's not too bad, and glad your son is alright.

I seriously doubt the PSU is the issue since the surge would have started at the USB port and then into the motherboard. It probably took out the PSU as well but it wouldn't follow the natural direction of electrical flow through the computer.

 

[Eureka]

Yep

Only if the ground plane became ungrounded somehow. That is the whole point of ground. It is of course possible that the accident did cause an open in the ground and then what you say would be true. Otherwise ground is at zero potential regardless of how much voltage you apply.



If the RAM and CPU are shot it really isn't worth fixing because of the high price of DDR2.

I'm still thinking of what would happen...this scenario intrigues me. Ideally the ground plane in the PC is tied to the same ground that the AC outlet is at (under the assumption this is the same circuit breaker.

You plug the USB cable into the neutral port of the outlet. Since neutral is tied to ground and the PC is tied to ground, nothing should happen.

You plug the USB cable into the hot port of the outlet. You've basically created an intense short from 120+ to ground through the PC's ground plane.

It shouldn't affect the PC components because all of the PC components should now be boosted by 120VAC, making the differential relative to each part the same as it was before the short.

However, I don't think it works that way. The 120 VAC going through ground is now cycling at 60 Hz back and forth between 0 and 120V. DC-DC isolation isn't meant for that kind of massive jump and you'd have insulation failures all along the path back to outlet ground.

Not to mention, those small components are still at 3.3,5,or 12VDC and it won't suddenly compensate for an instantaneous jump to 120VAC.

I don't think the ground is going to protect it in this case.

 

[abbadaba]

Hope it works out. Lets us know.

She's breathing again!

Installed new mobo, and all old parts. Left out the gpu and tvtuner card for now. System fired right up and started to load windows. Different mobo / chipset so windows of course went WTF and started a repair installation. So now it should just be a matter of getting the new drivers/chipset squared away and reactivating windows and so on.

My replacement keyboard is still in the mail so I cant do much yet, lol.

Obviously the CPU, RAM + HDD must not have suffered any catastrophic damage to get this far. I have a feeling the add in cards are OK too.

My completely pulled out of my ass explanation (I'm a banker not an electrical engineer so this could be waaay off base) is that the charge obviously blew up anything on usb that wasn't grounded (mouse, keyboard, game controller) but the motherboards ESD protection saved the cpu / ram. The PSU was unaffected so my theory is the printer saved the day, it was connected on USB and the fastest way to ground may have been that way, the printer is grounded with a 3 prong plug of course.

 

[tracerbullet]

Cool!

You may be thinking of it already, but if not - there are programs such as Memtest86 for RAM and Prime95 for CPU's that test these components. Most talk here is around using them to be sure that an overclock is stable, but you may wish to give them a go to check your components as well after things are up and running, "just in case".

 

[fixbsod]

Slightly OT but since the OP got his issue resolved I thought I'd pop this question --

I had thought USB ports were pretty much 'fork-proof' such that you could literally take a fork to them and not cause any power issues. However, some months back I wanted to charge my smartphone which uses a micro USB on one end to a regular USB on the other. It being early and I wasn't really awake I was taking the micro USB end, with the other end not plugged in to anything, and trying to plug it into the USB port on the computer.

I have an external hard drive connected which spins down when not in use and so I hear that start to spin up and then my PSU clicked like it does when it turns off / on and the system instantly shut-down. I really wasn't sure what happened -- I thought plugging something into USB caused the shutdown as I did hear the ext hdd spin up. So I thought I'd confirm this by purposefully trying to stick the micro USB into the computer USB (stupid I know, but I also wasn't sure I had the wrong end being so tired -- plus who the hell can ever get a USB plug in on the first try) another whirl with the USB micro plug confirmed that this was why the computer shutdown, this time I got a 'USB power surge' warning from W7 notifications and no shutdown. No actual damage praise the heavens, but again I had thought USB ports were sposed to be pretty fool proof. This was a USB 2.0 port, not a 3.0.

 

[VirtualLarry]

I've plugged in USB2.0 plugs into the port upside-down and wondered why they didn't work.

 

[lakedude]

She's breathing again!

Awesome-sauce!

My replacement keyboard is still in the mail so I cant do much yet, lol.

Been thinking that your case might have a problem with the front USB ports. Maybe just use the rear ones, just to make sure. Where were all the things plugged in on the old MB?

 

[lakedude]

I'm still thinking of what would happen...this scenario intrigues me. Ideally the ground plane in the PC is tied to the same ground that the AC outlet is at (under the assumption this is the same circuit breaker.

You plug the USB cable into the neutral port of the outlet. Since neutral is tied to ground and the PC is tied to ground, nothing should happen.

Yep

You plug the USB cable into the hot port of the outlet. You've basically created an intense short from 120+ to ground through the PC's ground plane.

Yep, well not 120+, 120VAC

It shouldn't affect the PC components because all of the PC components should now be boosted by 120VAC, making the differential relative to each part the same as it was before the short.

Nope

However, I don't think it works that way. The 120 VAC going through ground is now cycling at 60 Hz back and forth between 0 and 120V. DC-DC isolation isn't meant for that kind of massive jump and you'd have insulation failures all along the path back to outlet ground.

maybe

Not to mention, those small components are still at 3.3,5,or 12VDC and it won't suddenly compensate for an instantaneous jump to 120VAC.

It isn't the voltage that is the problem, it is the current.

Nitpick:

120VAC is RMS (sorta like average) the voltage actually fluctuates about +/-170V or 340V peak to peak.

I don't think the ground is going to protect it in this case.

maybe

When the short to ground occurred current spiked according to E=IR or I=E/R where R is a very small number making I a very big number.

This situation would not last long before something gives. A circuit breaker or fuse might blow or a wire or circuit board trace would burn up or some combination.

Assuming the ground circuit stayed in tact the voltage never jumped up because ground will drag voltage down, not the other way around.

If some part of the ground circuit did burn up, the circuit from the computer's power outlet to the burn will be and will always have been at zero potential. The part of the circuit from the open to the air conditioner outlet will be energized and fluctuate as you described, assuming a fuse or circuit breaker didn't blow first.

 

[abbadaba]

Awesome-sauce!



Been thinking that your case might have a problem with the front USB ports. Maybe just use the rear ones, just to make sure. Where were all the things plugged in on the old MB?

The three dead input devices and the printer were all plugged in the back.

While waiting for my keyboard I spent last night finishing up the physical build. Installed radeon and tv tuner card and the machine still booted and everything seems to be fine so far, though I didn't leave it on long.

The new mobo is mini atx so it was a tight squeeze, old board was normal atx. The cpu power connector is about 1cm from interfering with my large heatsink/mount. And I forgot to install the rear case fan before snapping on my heatsink, then I couldn't get the dang thing off because there wasnt enough clearance between the clip and the back of the case lol. Managed to get it done though.

I may have some questions this evening about getting the repair installation going and getting back into windows. Worst case I'll have to buy a new hard drive and do a clean install, then transfer files.

 

[tracerbullet]

Worst case I'll have to buy a new hard drive and do a clean install, then transfer files.

If you have the time, even though it's a PITA, that's almost always the recommended course of action. Windows doesnt' seem to have the "half life" that is used to where this was mandatory, and it should just amount to some driver changes for the motherboard, but it's a nice opportunity to get rid of anything and everything that builds up over time that you don't need (internet add-ons, useless things that run in the background, any possible viruses, etc.).

 

[lakedude]

The three dead input devices and the printer were all plugged in the back.

Oh good that makes it much more likely that your case is OK.

 

[jjsbasmt]

I'm disappointed that none of you posters mentioned the possibility that even though the components may be working today, there's a good possibility that some of them may fail in the near future - as component life can be significantly shortened by a "hit" that they took during the event. I would have gone with Virtual Larry's recommendation. Since you have the system running again taking tracerbullet's suggestion could be very helpful. I'd keep an eye for any little anomalies that might show up. Very relieved that your youngster is fine.

 

[abbadaba]

Typing this from the rebuilt rig.

Post above duly noted, despite my success the remaining parts could have had their operational life reduced.

Windows repair installation couldn't figure out which way was up. Googled around and ended up having to load the drivers for the new motherboard through the command line with some haxxor bullcrap - something like DISM /Image:C:\ /Add-Driver /driver D:\ /recurse blah blah. Was a pain to figure out the correct syntax.

After that I was greeted with my normal desktop and everything seems to be fine other than reinstalling drivers.

Windows hasn't even prompted me to reactivate (yet?)

Thanks all for the advice folks.

 

[Ketchup]

Thanks all for the advice folks.

Glad to hear everything is up and running and the youngster is ok. Windows 7 is supposedly more relaxed on activation than Vista and XP, so you could very well be fine there.

As for other parts being on the brink of death, I wouldn't worry about that too much. Hopefully you have a good backup plan in place (right) and we know the most important (read - expensive) parts are working fine. Heck, I've got an old IBM Pentium II system running 24/7 at the office, and except for the hard drive (an old noisy scsi I got rid of), it's still doing fine.