PCs - don't ya Just Love Them ..... grrrr :)

Zydor · Post by **Zydor** » Tue Sep 03, 2013 1:28 am

I'm in a Vent Mode - had a PC issue with main PC, and this time decided to get someone in as it was a weird fault:)

- Mid Jun my main PC had gone down, motherboard likely gone *poof*

- Spend 3 weeks messing around with a local repair guy I used before, including ordering up a new Motherboard, and fitting it.

- Fire it up, still *poof* turns out after 5/6 visits he was clueless .... still not working ..... grrrr :(

- Mid Julytakes PC to local PC Shop I have used before.

- Week later, after stripping it down totally, they diagnosed not only the original motherboard had gone (and correctly replaced), but the 1500w PSU had gone as well (taking the original motherboard with it, and was the cause of the drama in the first place), evidenced by burnt internal cable connectors on one PSU lead....

- Don't need 1500w any more so goes on the hunt for an Enermax 1200w, the same maker, as they are excellent PSUs ( this was only my third PSU in 25+ years, all Enermax) - discover Enermax 1200w are out of production, replacements are 1350w.

- Find an end of line Enermax 1200w, but its on a Bucket Shop Supplier (Imperial), used them before, so I order up using PayPal and Bank Card as "safety" as they are not the most reliable as such in terms of speed of supply.

- I wait three weeks, no PSU, long story short I chase, and get the feeling they are about to go bust, so I put in a PayPal claim, which PayPal accepted, waited the statutory 10 days, and got a PayPal refund authorised.

- In the middle of that, I order up another Enermax 1200w via SCAN Computers - £30 more than Imperial, but beggars can't be choosers, and Scan are a reliable Tier One Supplier.

- Arrives and sent to PC Shop a week ago as a "non-urgent" repair to complete the rebuild, as I have been using my wife's PC since June whilst waiting to get mine sorted out.

- They ring two days later, the new PSU is faulty ........ ARRRRRRRGH :evil:

(Meanwhile refund from PayPal arrives)

- Send PSU back to SCAN, they test it and acknowledged tonight it was faulty, now awaiting search for Enermax 1200w or refund....

One of those things at the end of the day - Scan Computers have always been very good, and Enermax PSUs are arguably one of the most reliable out there - they've never let me down before, so I'm sticking with Enermax.

The Beat Moves On

*Sigh*

Zydor · Post by **Zydor** » Sat Sep 07, 2013 4:24 pm

The "Case of the Broken PC" rumbles on ......

Phone call this morning from the local repair shop - the Motherboard I got from EBuyer to replace the original board that I had fitted is faulty ........

"Double ARRRGGGGGGHHH"

I've now initiated a claim for RMA/Repair with GigaByte as the 28 day period for returns via EBuyer has well gone.

You just know that Gigabyte will yell "EBuyer's Problem" .... bets anyone ??

PCs ..... don't ya just love 'em rofl

Post by **UBT - Timbo** » Sat Sep 07, 2013 4:26 pm

Hi Zydor,

Sounds like a right old carry on

I know the feeling though - having been building my own PC's since about 1989, starting with a 286-16MHz/640k+2Mb expanded add-in board/20Mb HDD, then to a 486-33MHz/16Mb/40Mb HDD and then over time to AMD K6's, Celeron 266MHz, a dual Pentium 111 800Mhz, Pentium 4 (533 FSB) 3.06GHz and more recently with a Q6600 2.4GHz and now an i7 3820.....

In all that time I've had 2 mobo's fail, and maybe 3 PSU's.....but in all cases, none of the components had been overclocked or used for "taxing" stuff, except some SETI@home and now BOINC.

Personally, I'm of the opinion that if you can make a PC last 3-4 years without an issue, then you're doing well....in my case, the oldest PC still crunching is my P4 (from early 2004, which was recently upgraded to a new 3.2 GHz/800MHz FSB CPU (bought cheap on fleabay).

Having said that, my old dual CPU P3/800 MHz has just been re-built and it's now a Vortexbox media server...attached to a 4Tb NAS box !!

Hope the problem has now finally gone and the story ends well.

regards
Tim

Zydor · Post by **Zydor** » Sun Sep 08, 2013 5:36 pm

Hope the problem has now finally gone and the story ends well.

Quite literally - the only bit not replaced yet apart from the 3960x CPU (vast majority on warranty) is the G,Skill RipJaws 16Gb RAM, even a connector slot on one of the two SSDs had gone (physically cracked) and needed a new 512Gb SSD.

Local Repair Shop (great guys - bunch of Geek PC Enthusiasts doing their own thing with a Shop in the local Village http://www.trustedpcman.co.uk/index.php ) have assured me the RAM is ok.

I'm not holding my breath rofl - and on current form we'll likely find cracks in the PC Case let in moisture from a burst pipe in the loft that dripped in water and zapped the 3960x CPU when the final rebuild happens just to make a perfect disaster lmao :toothy10:

Post by **UBT - Timbo** » Mon Sep 09, 2013 11:53 am

Zydor wrote:....I'm not holding my breath rofl - and on current form we'll likely find cracks in the PC Case let in moisture from a burst pipe in the loft that dripped in water and zapped the 3960x CPU when the final rebuild happens just to make a perfect disaster lmao :toothy10:

It would only be a perfect disaster, if the repairman trips over the shop cat, and drops the PC case (a day after the shop insurance ran out), which (when the case hit the concrete floor) caused it to buckle, splitting in two the mobo and memory slots, damaging the DVD/Blu-ray drive, and wiping out the multi-Gb hard drives, upon which were all your (un-backed-up) music and photo's, as well as all of your "work in progress" Masters thesis on "Time and where it all goes"...

regards
Tim

Zydor · Post by **Zydor** » Mon Sep 09, 2013 3:09 pm

In the words of the Late Great Louis Armstrong:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Aba0lVdE2c

Louis knew where it was at, and what's important in Life. He left an enduring legacy, a magical man .....