PC Power supply

The light is simply wired to the standby output of the PSU.

I've seen bad motherboards cause this, could also be the power button or the wiring between that and the motherboard. The other time I saw this the graphics card was not fully inserted in the slot.

I have seen that symptom caused by bad RAM, overclocking the CPU, corrupt BIOS. Sometimes a bad PSU will pop the MB's regulation system too. You will find that most E-machines are considered disposable due to the their low cost. Make sure the replacement PSU is pin compatible with the old one. Just because the connectors are the same, doesn't mean the the pins are carrying the same voltages.

I would remove all cards (not RAM) so the system is bare bones, and see if it generates a no video card error. At least you know the system is doing POST (Pre Operating System Tests) at that point. You can also try to move the RAM to a different slot, as failure with ram in the first 64 megs or so will cause the system to refuse to do POST. Sometimes moving it will clean flaky contacts. The ram should run in any slot, providing it meets the specs for that slot. Some MBs have 2 different kinds of slots on the same board. Of course if the ram is bad, then it may not boot at all.

I had one guy complain that the system he built would come on then immediately go off, so it *had* to be defective cpu or the like. It turned out that he had not mounted the CPU heatsink and fan properly, and it was up on one side. The cpu heated up very quickly, and shut the system down to protect itself. Gotta love those AMD CPU safeguards. Once the problem was rectified, the computer ran like a charm, and he is still using it today.

- Tim -

This is a very common Emachines failure mode ! About three years old ? M/b CPU, PSU usually. Very often other items are taken out as well. Unfortunately the little led only means the the sb power is there.

Sounds like a plan. Thanks.

BTW when I was growing up with the PC-AT, POST was Power On Self Test.

Charlie

Agreed. I don't recall the model no. but I had to deal with an emachines pc with the same issue. Change the motherboard AND the PSU. If you don't you'll probably find the original PSU kills the new board as well. The cpu will probably be ok.

I used an Asrock board for no particular reason other than the job needed doing quickly and it was what the local computer shop had in stock. You will find that when you boot up the computer Windows XP (I assume that is what you have) will not be happy because the motherboard and therefore lots of onboard hardware has changed. All you need to do to fix this is get your XP installation cd, boot up with it and do a repair install.

Yup. Do a Google on 'Bestec' and 'Emachines'. Many tales of woe.

Greetings Charlie & others..

Regarding: "My son has an E-Machine T3828 that will not power up. Unfortunately he is around 100 miles away so I do not have more information."

In spite of a good deal of speculation here which VERY well may be right on the mark with the anomaly, until which time that someone (you) can put your hands in that PC to isolate what is causing the issues - it's guess work at best. Especially at 100 miles of distance.

Something to consider, what is your time worth to fuss with it vs. doing what Baron, Tim & Adrian suggest in just replacing the motherboard & CPU. This is presupposing that this system is not under warranty. Now days, with mail-order and fast delivery what it is, it usually doesn't cost that much to remove and replace the entire inside of the system. You've already got a new power supply, consider the cost of going ahead with the rest of the repair/upgrade. Regardless, as indicated, until it can be put on the repair bench, it won't 'compute' on several fronts.

Cheers, Mr. Mentor

To the best of my knowledge it is still Power On Self Test.

Mike

On Fri, 25 Apr 2008 13:22:02 -0400, "Charlie Bress" put finger to keyboard and composed:

Use a multimeter to monitor the PS_ON pin (pin 14, green) in the ATX PS connector. It should go low when you press the front panel power switch. The +5VSB pin (pin 9, purple) should measure +5V.

See

If PS_ON doesn't go low, then something is wrong with the motherboard. In this case it won't be the CPU or the RAM because neither are powered in standby mode.

- Franc Zabkar

To avoid any more remarks, let me say that I looked up POST in my Winn Rosch Hardware Manual, (circa 1989), which was a key reference book for many techs. It states that the term POST is indeed "Power On Self Test".

My POST description came from years of talking to newbies about when the system checked it's status. They could not comprehend that it happened right after the power on, but they could understand that it happened before the operating system loaded, hence the phrase "Pre Operating System Test".

I guess I just got too used to using it.

- Tim -