Motherboard stopped working, looking to upgrade PC

[Ryan1701]

Hello!

After a few issues with graphics and sound, my PC decided it was time to die. Pressing the power button had no effect and a work colleague tested the power supply etc for me and determined that the motherboard seems to be broken.

The motherboard was a Z68 EXTREME4 GEN3 INTEL Z68 (SOCKET 1155) DDR3 MOTHERBOARD which appears to have been discontinued - I wonder if anyone might be so kind as to point me in the right direction for a replacement board, or any advice on one that might allow me to do much the same things and keep my existing hardware? The PC has a large cooling fan, hard drives and a Geforce GTX if this helps - I would happily take the opportunity to upgrade necessary components/case if needs be, though.

Any assistance is gratefully received!

 

[orbitalwalsh]

Hello!

After a few issues with graphics and sound, my PC decided it was time to die. Pressing the power button had no effect and a work colleague tested the power supply etc for me and determined that the motherboard seems to be broken.

The motherboard was a Z68 EXTREME4 GEN3 INTEL Z68 (SOCKET 1155) DDR3 MOTHERBOARD which appears to have been discontinued - I wonder if anyone might be so kind as to point me in the right direction for a replacement board, or any advice on one that might allow me to do much the same things and keep my existing hardware? The PC has a large cooling fan, hard drives and a Geforce GTX if this helps - I would happily take the opportunity to upgrade necessary components/case if needs be, though.

Any assistance is gratefully received!

whats full spec's of your PC and monitor you use?

also what do you use PC for ? and any budget in mind ?

 

[Ryan1701]

Thanks for your response! I can see:

4 x 4GB DDR memory sticks
EVGA GeForce GTX 780 SC

it has a large cooler master as well! (a colleague who will be able to help me identify components more professionally will be in work shortly.)

In the past I've mostly had the PC hooked up via HDMI to the TV in the living room, mostly used for playing media and video games (Witcher 3 level of graphics at the highest) - budget wise I'd be happy to spend up to £500

 

[Ryan1701]

Power supply appears to be this or very similar:
EVGA 600 Watt 80 PLUS Wired ATX PSU

 

[chippy08]

Does your old motherboard not display any hints to the iissue of whats wrong or does it not light up at all.

 

[Ryan1701]

No hints, unfortunately - power supply works fine independently but no lights or signs of life whatsoever when hooked up to motherboard, even using the switch on motherboard itself

 

[chippy08]

I have the same motherboard myself still going strong. But anyway its either buy a 1155 motherboard secondhand or buy new cpu motherboard and memory.

 

[Ryan1701]

Thank you - I'm guessing I'd need to match the type of motherboard pretty exactly if I could find a second-hand one available somewhere?

 

[Akagi]

Not at all, any Z68 or Z77 board with a PCI-E slot would do just fine.

It may be worth trying to boot the PC in a "barebones" configuration (one stick of RAM, no graphics card, etc) to see if it powers on that way. Could help diagnose the issue.

Also reset the CMOS/BIOS, there should be a little button on the rear IO to do that, if not, remove the motherboard battery for a few minutes, put it back in, and retry. Should be a little button cell like a watch battery.

 

[Ryan1701]

Thanks so much for your advice and further troubleshooting, I'll see what I can find out now!

 

[chippy08]

Have you not got a spare psu you can try, also and how did you test the psu.

 

[Ryan1701]

PSU was tested with "paperclip" method, another known-working PSU is also unresponsive when connected to this motherboard

 

[chippy08]

PSU was tested with "paperclip" method, another known-working PSU is also unresponsive when connected to this motherboard

Sounds like its Dead but try what you have been asked just in case.

 

[Ryan1701]

Work friend stripped the whole PC down and managed to get it to power on momentarily but has just gone to put it all back together for me and it's dead again - arg, nightmare!

I imagine that I'm best now just taking whatever components can best be salvaged and buying a new PC if there's no way to identify what's going wrong?

 

[Quartz]

Work friend stripped the whole PC down and managed to get it to power on momentarily but has just gone to put it all back together for me and it's dead again - arg, nightmare!

This sounds as if there might be a short in the case. Take everything out of the case and put it on an insulated surface and see if it powers on.

 

[Danny75]

Change out the motherboard battery as well. CR2032 lithium coin cell.

Some CPU coolers are known to cause shorts, and in fact you mention it's a CoolerMaster and that's one (Hyper212X I believe) I had a shorting issue with. Take the cooler backplate off when you breadboard it outside of the case. Just rest the cooler on top of the CPU without actually mounting it.

 

[Ryan1701]

Guys, thanks so much for this advice - a colleague is going to help me try the troubleshooting that you've provided and fingers crossed I'll have some success!

 

[chippy08]

Guys, thanks so much for this advice - a colleague is going to help me try the troubleshooting that you've provided and fingers crossed I'll have some success!

Where do you live Ryan maybe someone on here who is local to you can help you even quicker to get it sorted.

 

[Ryan1701]

Thanks so much for all of your help, everyone - we ended up building the computer up outside of the case and it worked fine. We found masking tape had been put very deliberately on several of the legs connecting the motherboard to the outside of the metal case (!?) but ended up removing these, built everything back up inside the case and it seemed to work just fine - total mystery!

The only thing that would cause the PC to fail to boot was reseating the wireless card so I've gone ahead and replaced that with a wireless dongle. Heatsink had also come a bit loose but all in all a bit of a mystery still

 

[Ryan1701]

Now dead again, nightmare