Small computer problem

[ghosty]

This morning I went to turn on my computer, so I turned the power switch on in the back.. then pressed my power button on the front of the case. It turned on then right away turned off. Like it flickered on then off immediatly. Anyways so I turned the switch in the back off.. back on and tried it again.. the same thing happened. Now there is a tiny switch under the power switch on the back of the case, it is red and it says 115. I slide it over to the right and it said 230.. so I tried turning the computer back on.. it turned on but I had no picture on my monitor.. I pressed the power button again and shut the computer off. I slide the red switch back over to the left till it read 115 again. Turned the computer back on and it was fine. Does anyone know #1 what this red swtich is.. and #2 what might have happened. Reccently I installed another case fan into my housing and it plugs in via the power supply.

Hope someone can help me, thanks

 

[morijuana]

the red switch is for voltage selection..... different countries have different power systems - this could well chav up your machine.... as to whats up with your computer, buggered if i know.. i just like replying to forums

 

[ghosty]

I thought it was the voltage selection.. weird.. thats why I left a note about the fan cause I thought that might have had some impact on the voltage that I need or something.


anyways any other help would be appretiated

thanks

 

[CamNeely]

All I can suggest trying are these: Leave the red switch on 115, Clear cmos, and try again, and make sure the cpu fan is plugged into the indicated motherboard adapter. Go through and double-check that all cards and ram are still seated properly. My guess is that the vid card may have popped loose, so give it a little pressure. If it's none of these, reply back and I'm sure 1 of the more knowledgable folks here could help ya. Good luck.

Dave

 

[AbsolutDealage]

This probem, IMO, is directly related to the new fan. If you were using all of the power that could be safely supplied by your power supply before the new fan, and then you introduced extra load on the supply, there are a few things that can go wrong. First, the supply will attempt to deliver enough power to all of the connected devices. If it cannot supply the needed power, it will start to bump up the voltages on all of the lines (i.e. 12v will become 13v, 5v will become 6v). This could cause some major damage. Depending upon your setup, your motherboard may have noticed this, and shut the computer down before anything major could go wrong (this is what you are hoping for). Anyway, you may have averted disaster, at least for now. My suggestion would be to go out and invest in a new Power supply. My guess would be that you are running an AMD or P4 setup and your power supply is not good enough.

This may not be the issue, especially if you are not running a high end system. But it cant hurt to get a new PS anyway

 

[ghosty]

right.. I am running an Athlon XP 1700+ on a ak77 pro a mobo. It has an Aopen power supply.. 300 W


How could I tell if the fan was causing extra drain on the power supply?

 

[AbsolutDealage]

you could look at your bios and see if it has voltage monitors for your +12v and +5v lines. If you have it it will be under a category like "PC Health Status" or something like it. Anyways, if you have that, then you can boot up with the fan attached. If the +5v line is above about 5.1v or the 12v line is above 12.2 or so, I would be worried about it.