Burnt pins on ATX after 5 years overclock

WDeranged · 2 May 2015 at 20:34

My i7 950 (gigabyte ga-x58a-usb3) has been at 4ghz for years and lately it's started hanging on pre-post. All the PWM fans blow full speed and the screen is black, yanking out and re-insterting the ATX block brings it around but the BIOS is usually corrupt and restores from backup.

I've noticed the 12 volt pins in the white socket (motherboard side) are burnt and the yellow PSU cables don't look so healthy, my PSU is a Corsair 1000w and the PC is still stable according to stress tests, it just dies on reboot sometimes.

As a precaution I moved the pump/fans off the motherboard and cleaned the burnt plugs with contact cleaner but it hasn't improved matters. Anyone know what exactly is going on?

Images over 1,280 pixels wide should be placed in spoiler tags as I've done for you.

Cheers

Surveyor

PiKe · 2 May 2015 at 22:06

Only reason you would get connector burn like that is due to resistance. Possibly that wire has been broken in the molex for a while and making bad contact. If you re-crimp it with the proper tool, it should be fine.

MeFox · 2 May 2015 at 22:11

At least it lasted for the money, good that you found out and it did no more damage

WDeranged · 2 May 2015 at 22:22

PiKe said:
Only reason you would get connector burn like that is due to resistance. Possibly that wire has been broken in the molex for a while and making bad contact. If you re-crimp it with the proper tool, it should be fine.

Thanks for the reply, I hope you're right. I'd been running the chip at 1.35v with vdroop adjustment as high as it would go and I wondered if that might be to blame. I also had the water pump and all my fans running from MB power.

MeFox said:
At least it lasted for the money, good that you found out and it did no more damage

Yeah I'm glad I found the problem, I'm just hoping I can sort it out and squeeze another year out of the old box :eek:

Blackbadger · 2 May 2015 at 23:22

You can also see what looks to be green corrosion from the copper where the shielding looks to have has broken off, it is possible that that it got wet from a leak or splash at some point.

It looks like you may have had some arcing as three of the cables and socket are burnt.

Those areas shouldn't get so hot unless there is a problem.

Personally I'd either trim the cable and try and re-crimp or get another PSU if it isn't modular.

WDeranged · 3 May 2015 at 03:01

I'm pretty sure I'm capable of re-crimping it but I have no idea what tools I'll need, can you guys offer any advice?

Blackbadger · 3 May 2015 at 10:57

You'l need a crimping tool. Wire srtrippers.

And something like this. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/24-pin-AT...864?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item33a09660e8

You can ignore the extra sleeving section unless you want it extra pretty. Cut away a good inch of your existing cable until it stops being brittle.

Be sure to make propper notes of where each cable is going.

Good luck

WDeranged · 3 May 2015 at 12:21

Blackbadger said:
You'l need a crimping tool. Wire srtrippers.

And something like this. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/24-pin-AT...864?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item33a09660e8

You can ignore the extra sleeving section unless you want it extra pretty. Cut away a good inch of your existing cable until it stops being brittle.

Be sure to make propper notes of where each cable is going.

Good luck

Excellent info, cheers!

Blackbadger · 3 May 2015 at 13:39

That ebay item isn't probably the exact item you need btw.. - So have a search for the correct matching part.. It looks to be a 24 pin ATX. male/female connectors can be confusing, sometimes the females have the willy... :eek:

However from the image shown you'l need the other gender.

pete910 · 3 May 2015 at 13:59

Not sure if that picture us the true reflection on colour but that looks to me as if it's been wet/damp to corrode like that. :confused:

WDeranged · 3 May 2015 at 15:31

The green gunk is a recent thing, I reckon some contact cleaner hadn't fully evaporated when I plugged it in

WDeranged · 9 May 2015 at 20:27

Well I managed to re-crimp just the burnt pins (one was almost black) as there was enough slack on the cables to spare. I'm glad I haven't had to re-do the whole connector as I've realised what a hassle the job would be, just getting the pins out is a nightmare :eek:

I Haven't had any issues since replacing them so hopefully I can get another year out of this PC, many thanks for the advice!

WDeranged · 11 May 2015 at 23:13

I Noticed a pin on one of the black cables had almost completely snapped inside the connector, wtf...lucky I had the ocd urge to yank on all the cables before boxing up the pc for good.