Power supply issue has left myself and my friend stumped.

Airshiphead · January 11, 2021

So my friend switched his PC on this morning and found it to be non-functional. His power supply appeared to be the culprit. It's an EVGA 750W 80 plus Gold.

However, his CPU is ancient. A six core phenom II, and this is where we're thinking there may be an issue. He plugged in his girlfriend's PSU (another 750w 80 plus Gold) and that PSU fried within 2 minutes of plugging it in.

We think the rest of the PC is ok, but hard to tell right now as we don't particularly want to throw any more power supplies onto the sacrificial pyre.

My main question is this, when selecting a new power supply, is there any spec we need to be careful of to avoid incompatibility with his old CPU and motherboard?

CommanderAlex · January 11, 2021

Welcome to the forums!!!

Quote

His power supply appeared to be the culprit. It's an EVGA 750W 80 plus Gold... He plugged in his girlfriend's PSU (another 750w 80 plus Gold) and that PSU fried within 2 minutes of plugging it in.

You most likely have a short either with the processor or motherboard, most likely the motherboard failed and shorted out, then shorting out the processor. I would advise building a new computer as a replacement motherboard/processor is too costly when you can get a newer build with more performance for the same price.

WereCatf · January 11, 2021

5 minutes ago, Airshiphead said:

and that PSU fried within 2 minutes of plugging it in

That sounds a lot like there's a short somewhere on the mobo or some other device.

Personally, I'd see if I can scavenge some old, cheap-as-chips PSU somewhere and only plug the mobo + CPU, skipping all other peripherals and GPUs and everything, to it and see what happens -- just a hunch, but you'll probably find it still burning out the PSU.