Computer comes alive after 36 hours - Team-BHP

sujaylahiri · 19th May 2008, 09:19

We had a power surge/spike in the afternoon and all the appliances/gadgets in the house restarted on their own. However my home computer froze with a blank white screen and none of the buttons would work (shutdown/restart). Finally I had to kill the power supply to shut it down.

But when I tried to start it up again it was dead. The motherboard's green light was on but none of the fans/beeps/drives ever worked. I tried all the known techniques (draining power by holding the power button, resetting the CMOS, trying out different power supplies etc.) but to no avail. So I went ahead and ordered a new motherboard.

But about 36 hours later today, when I came home, the computer was already switched on on its own and functioning perfectly. I could restart it and it looked like nothing had ever happened.

What do you guys think could have happened? My friend says that some of the capacitors on the motherboard could have taken some time to discharge. What do you guys say? Also should I still go ahead and replace the motherboard or is it still good. It's about a year old.

PS: I have already ordered a UPS now. Didn't have one before.

aaggoswami · 19th May 2008, 10:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by sujaylahiri

We had a power surge/spike in the afternoon and all the appliances/gadgets in the house restarted on their own. However my home computer froze with a blank white screen and none of the buttons would work (shutdown/restart). Finally I had to kill the power supply to shut it down.

But when I tried to start it up again it was dead. The motherboard's green light was on but none of the fans/beeps/drives ever worked. I tried all the known techniques (draining power by holding the power button, resetting the CMOS, trying out different power supplies etc.) but to no avail. So I went ahead and ordered a new motherboard.

But about 36 hours later today, when I came home, the computer was already switched on on its own and functioning perfectly. I could restart it and it looked like nothing had ever happened.

What do you guys think could have happened? My friend says that some of the capacitors on the motherboard could have taken some time to discharge. What do you guys say? Also should I still go ahead and replace the motherboard or is it still good. It's about a year old.

PS: I have already ordered a UPS now. Didn't have one before.

The motherboard capacitors should be drained by taking off the BIOS batter and then holding on the power button. This will drain all the capacitors's all energy.
I have heard this problem for the first time. In my case the motherboad was gone.

alpha1 · 19th May 2008, 11:01

Shouldn't we all sue the electric utility companies for destroying our appliances?

I have seen many cases where Fridges/ACs/Heaters/TVs have blown because of spikes and surges.

sujaylahiri · 22nd May 2008, 00:15

The funny thing is that I already had a surge protector installed. Despite of that my computer got the spike/surge.

bigman · 22nd May 2008, 00:40

Not sure if this is 100% true but sometimes you get static build up (maybe b/s), turn the pc off at the power supply and hold the on/off button and it will power up for 1 sec or so. Apparently this gets rid of the static and computer performs as normal.

This is what the techs at medion told me to do when my pc would not get past the bios screen. Worked a treat although not 100% convinced about the resoning behind it.

19th May 2008, 09:19	#1 (permalink)
sujaylahiri BHPian Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Windsor ON Canada Posts: 708	Computer comes alive after 36 hours We had a power surge/spike in the afternoon and all the appliances/gadgets in the house restarted on their own. However my home computer froze with a blank white screen and none of the buttons would work (shutdown/restart). Finally I had to kill the power supply to shut it down. But when I tried to start it up again it was dead. The motherboard's green light was on but none of the fans/beeps/drives ever worked. I tried all the known techniques (draining power by holding the power button, resetting the CMOS, trying out different power supplies etc.) but to no avail. So I went ahead and ordered a new motherboard. But about 36 hours later today, when I came home, the computer was already switched on on its own and functioning perfectly. I could restart it and it looked like nothing had ever happened. What do you guys think could have happened? My friend says that some of the capacitors on the motherboard could have taken some time to discharge. What do you guys say? Also should I still go ahead and replace the motherboard or is it still good. It's about a year old. PS: I have already ordered a UPS now. Didn't have one before. __________________ I'm Mr. Brightside. Last edited by sujaylahiri : 19th May 2008 at 09:23.

22nd May 2008, 00:15	#4 (permalink)
sujaylahiri BHPian Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Windsor ON Canada Posts: 708	The funny thing is that I already had a surge protector installed. Despite of that my computer got the spike/surge. __________________ I'm Mr. Brightside.

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19th May 2008, 11:01	#3 (permalink)
alpha1 BHPian Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: pune Posts: 99	Shouldn't we all sue the electric utility companies for destroying our appliances? I have seen many cases where Fridges/ACs/Heaters/TVs have blown because of spikes and surges.

22nd May 2008, 00:40	#5 (permalink)
bigman BHPian Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: NA Posts: 519	Not sure if this is 100% true but sometimes you get static build up (maybe b/s), turn the pc off at the power supply and hold the on/off button and it will power up for 1 sec or so. Apparently this gets rid of the static and computer performs as normal. This is what the techs at medion told me to do when my pc would not get past the bios screen. Worked a treat although not 100% convinced about the resoning behind it.