computers need ventilation, who knew?

BlackSwan of Memphis

So, if anyone noticed......I have not posted since Thursday.

And the reason for that is my computer died Thursday afternoon.

Earlier in the week, my daughter spilled water on the keyboard. Well, let me tell you, we have been through so many keyboards in the last couple of years. Try as we might to keep liquids away, it doesn't always work with these guys.

Anyway, we thought that the keyboard done and fried the motherboard.

Nope.

The power supply died, caused by lack of ventilation which caused it to overheat. Which killed the power supply.

Now, about a year and a half ago, our brand new (at the time) tv was killed by a liquid substance. The kind of tv it is, Magnavox, has a lot of the little chips towards the front where there are hundreds of itty bitty holes. (Do you see a common theme here yet?) We took it into some guy in the area, got it back, and can't use our dvd player or video games because it is lacking the AV channels. So, we took a lesson from that, and checked our computer into Best Buy, the Geek Squad took care of it and I got it back last night.

So, if your computer is Not getting air, move it to someplace where it will.

Anyhow, I see there were some posts made to a few of my threads, my apologies for not getting back, but it's tough to do without a computer.

How was YOUR weekend?

greendawn

The keyboard has nothing to do with an overheating computer. It was a coincidence that the two breakdowns occured together. However at least with windows operating systems there are usually warnings in the case of overheating either at the power supply point or the processor. Good it wasn't the processor that got burned. It's a good idea to open the CP tower and blow away the fluff and dust every few months.

BlackSwan of Memphis

Well, I knew that the keyboard wouldn't cause it to overheat.

The computer just died and I was trying to figure out what it might be, I had just figured it was the keyboard.

However at least with windows operating systems there are usually warnings in the case of overheating either at the power supply point or the processor.

Warnings huh? What kind?

greendawn

It's the "Intel Active Monitor" it's icon, an umbrella with green, yellow, red colours, should be present in the tray at the bottom right of the monitor. When there is trouble it opens a window on the screen in which the troublesome part flashes. There is also an audio alarm going off at the same time.

BlackSwan of Memphis

Hey I don't see that!

I see 6 icons and none of those match that description!

greendawn

Whoever built your PC should have arranged it so that this monitor would be active something that would be known by the said icon being present in the tray. My PC was set up like that otherwise it would have been burnt long ago. There were several overheating incidents two years ago, the processor ventilator was stuck. There must be a way to activate the monitor on every start up but I don't know it.

Lady Lee

My power supply died last week also. I bought a new one for 40$ CAN and installed it myself for free. It shouldn't have taken the repair guys more than 1/2 to fix it. I did mine for about 1/2 but I had only done that once before and I had a geek showing me what to do so the repair guys should have done it in a lot less time

The power supply has a fan on the back that provides cooling to the innards of the computer.

If the power supply dies the computer won't do anything and spilling water on the keyboard should not have caused the blackout in the power supply. It is pretty safe where it sits at the back of the CPU.

Just make sure the fan at the back is not in a space where it is blocked by a wall. Just pull it forward a few inches if your desk faces the wall

BTW Mine has plenty of room for air flow and it just died. Sometimes they just do that from old age and constant use

Lady Lee

I don't have the icon either so got no warning

Lee <of the going hunting class>

Hecklerboy

Allot of computer desk have an area for the computer tower to sit. The bad part is the the back of the computer desk is solid and doesn't allow for ventilation. So be sure that the back of you computer desk is open to allow for ventilation. This may involve cutting away some of the material behind the computer area. That's what I had to do.

BlackSwan of Memphis

Greendawn: Hm, I have a book on Windows xp and I'm going to look it up. If it's there somewhere there must be a way to activate it.

LadyLee: Well, considering I've never been on the inside of a computer and had zero clue what was going on with it, I never would have guessed that it was a power supply. My first reaction was the keyboard because it seemed to coincide. The power supply ran about that, include installation and the initial cost to look at it. Plus, I had them clean it out, out of fear that I might just screw something up.

The good thing is, my husband is learning a lot more about computers and will probably take a class. He is very tech savvy. He works on a computer at work (geared for newspaper production) and is getting the hang of things. I am hoping that as he figures things out, he will be a bit more helpful with the computer. I had the computer too close to the back wall of the desk (it was underneath it) and that's what did it.

Sheesh next to you guys I feel like a dingbat!

computers need ventilation, who knew?

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