Need help with dead MOBO

[JorgePontes]

After deciding i was gifting my girlfriend my old PC, which had its parts (GPU and MOBO+CPU) both stored in different anti-static bags, i started to assemble an open bench so i could see if everything was working properly.

 

I dusted the motherboard off and connected everything. It was an Intel i5 7500, PowerColor Radeon RX 480 Red Devil and a Gigabyte B250M-D3H plus a brand new MSI MAG A650BN, ATX, 650W, 80+ Bronze PSU.

 

Everything was placed on top of the card box from my current MOBO. Once i turned it on (by using the screwdriver method on the PWR SW pins) something on the top part of the MOBO sparked. I immediately turned the PSU off and removed it from the wall. A strong burnt smell started to surface. I dusted the top area a bit more and tried again, but this time a fire almost the size of a candle flame appeared, which them proceeded to slowly die.

 

I looked closer and i could properly see where the damage was. It is near the PSU port on the PCU header. Something must have shorted around there. Images and videos attached here.

 

Now to my questions:

 

- the MOBO is guaranteed to be dead, right?;
- could this short have caused any damage on the connected CPU, CPU COOLER or PSU? I only smelt the burnt smell around the aforementioned area and could only see that damage, no other was apparent;
- what could have caused this? I dusted it off, maybe something i didn't dust off? It was outside the CPU header, so it wasn't from dust inside of it. Could i be a faulty pin? This MOBO+CPU combo hasn't seen use since September 2022, but was properly stored inside of a anti-static bag.

[Shimejii]

Unless you have the skill to replace those components or send it to a proper repair shop, it be dead.

 

Sounds like either the power plug shorted something in that area, there was a bridge between them from the cleaning, or something else that we wont know.

[JorgePontes]

12 minutes ago, 8tg said:

Looks like you blew a surface mount fuse, though going for round 2 for some ungodly reason after seeing a spark definitely killed your board.

As to the cause? It could be a whole ton of things, bad contact on the eps connector, some kind of debris bridging 12v to ground around there, depending on the psu you might have plugged in cables in the wrong orientation. I don’t know if that MSI unit is like that but there’s some power supplies where you could plug in eps to pcie on the psu end and they’re not the same pinout. Most are the same pinout though so I doubt that.

The PSU was brand new, i had just opened the mail to receive it, so i doubt it was that. But I am sure that i did connect the correct cable, the PSU is not modular and it was labeled as CPU, not PCIE.

[JorgePontes]

Do you guys think that buying a new MOBO compatible with that CPU will suffice? Because if so that can be arranged. I'm just afraid if there's any damage to the PSU CPU cable and/or to the CPU itself.