Fried Computer of the Day

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After reading the "clean your damn computer!" post we made yesterday, forum member Banditt sent me this picture with the following explanation:

I worked on a PC yesterday and thought you might get a kick out of this. Almost every fan on the machine was locked up due to being insanely dirty. The system would only turn on for a few seconds, show the post screen, and then lock up. After a little poking around I found that the heatsink on the Southbridge was so insanely hot you could have cooked on it. It went into thermal meltdown mode and got the heatsink so hot it burnt a nice ring around the chip. I’ve seen a lot of burnt cores in my time but never one that left a perfect outline like that.
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I always found it pretty cool that a device so small could emit so much heat. First time I've seen a perfect ring like that. Scorch marks, sure, but not a ring.
 
apply power to anything conductive without adequate dissipation and this is the result, no matter the size :D
 
I new NVIDIA chipsets ran a little hot, but that is wow. :eek:
 
Ring around the collar, you can live with. Ring around the toilet, you can live with that too. Ring around your chipset, nope.
 
Hmm... I could see myself doing a PSA on this: :p

"Phoenix here. I can rise from my own ashes. Your computer cannot. Clean your case!"
 
I've seen them as dirty as the OP video with one that I found that had two living cockroaches and well as dead ones inside.

This is why when I find a computer on the curb I check it out outside just in case.
 
Nice, but I've seen far worse. I don't know that I've ever seen a perfect scorch ring like that, though I've seen chipsets peel apart in layers, and bubble at the surface. :eek:
 
I've seen worse. Namely my Athlon 700 ( at 1250mhz ) that I had running on a vapochill I won here a [H]. The chill control malfunctioned and so the compressor never got cold enough before the chip turned on. It melted the chip and the plastic clam shell. It go so hot the solder melted and the resistors fell off the back of the PCB and dripped along with the plastic to the bottom of the case. A very sad day.
 
I recall in the old pentium days I saw a pentium 90 "melt" a motherboard. Man those things got hot
 
When I owned my shop several years ago, I saw some shit I never thought possible. I had a Big rig driver bring his PC in for Repair. He said the thing was making a rattling noise and wouldn't turn on. So I open the computer and massive smell of came out of it. It smelled like motor oil and burnt electronics. I then noticed that something was dripping off the side of the case I just took off. I ask the man if it had gotten wet or anything and he replied no. So I asked him what the hell this stuff was that was dripping of. He said "I well it was making a lot of noise so I thought when my Big rig does that I just get a can of DW40 and spare to around and that usually makes the noise go away." Yes that man I emptied an entire can of DW40 in his computer case and wondered why it would not turn back on. DW40=conductive liquid = Fried Electrical components. Redneck FTW.
 
I want to apologize for the horrible Spanglish and below is my post in proper edumicated English. :eek:

When I owned my shop several years ago, I saw some shit I never thought possible. I had a big rig driver bring his PC in for Repair. He said the thing was making a rattling noise and wouldn't turn on. So I open the computer and massive smell came out of it. It smelled like motor oil and burnt electronics. I then noticed that something was dripping off the side of the case I just took off. I ask the man if it had gotten wet or anything and he replied no. So I asked him what the hell this stuff was that was dripping off. He said “well it was making a lot of noise so I thought when my Big rig does that I just get a can of DW40 and spray to around the area and that usually makes the noise go away." Yes that man emptied an entire can of DW40 in his computer case and wondered why it would not turn back on. DW40=conductive liquid = Fried Electrical components. Redneck FTW
 
how about voiding all smoker warranty and support by law,
some boxes get taken outside and hit with air from a compressor then kept under a vent hood just to work on them
 
Just curious here... When you buy a Dell/HP/Gateway, etc... does it say anywhere in the manual to do a routine dust cleaning? I lay the blame of this of the manufacturers as well as the lazy owners.
 
TBQH, my nForce4 Ultra, that had a working fan, ran really hot.I wouldn't take much for that chip to flare up.
 
SGTGimpy said:
I want to apologize for the horrible Spanglish and below is my post in proper edumicated English. :eek:

When I owned my shop several years ago, I saw some shit I never thought possible. I had a big rig driver bring his PC in for Repair. He said the thing was making a rattling noise and wouldn't turn on. So I open the computer and massive smell came out of it. It smelled like motor oil and burnt electronics. I then noticed that something was dripping off the side of the case I just took off. I ask the man if it had gotten wet or anything and he replied no. So I asked him what the hell this stuff was that was dripping off. He said “well it was making a lot of noise so I thought when my Big rig does that I just get a can of DW40 and spray to around the area and that usually makes the noise go away." Yes that man emptied an entire can of DW40 in his computer case and wondered why it would not turn back on. DW40=conductive liquid = Fried Electrical components. Redneck FTW
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At least he tried!
 
Major_A said:
Just curious here... When you buy a Dell/HP/Gateway, etc... does it say anywhere in the manual to do a routine dust cleaning? I lay the blame of this of the manufacturers as well as the lazy owners.
Click to expand...

Manuals will tell users not to obstruct airways, especially laptop manuals. In the troubleshooting section of a Compaq V6000 manual I checked out from my pile of HP manuals, it says frequent shutdowns can be a result of overheating due to obstructed air flows, with the solution being to make sure vents aren't blocked and laptops are set on hard surfaces, not restricting surfaces (blankets, bed, pillows).

So technically it does mention it, but only from outside of the computers. It says nothing about using canned air to blow dust out of the vents.

Most people know about it, I would venture. Canned air is pretty much a household item. I doubt if anyone goes beyond blowing air through their rear exhaust though.
 
Eisenblut said:
Yep. Too little is bad but too much is just as bad.
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thermalicing3xe.jpg
 
SGTGimpy said:
I want to apologize for the horrible Spanglish and below is my post in proper edumicated English. :eek:

When I owned my shop several years ago, I saw some shit I never thought possible. I had a big rig driver bring his PC in for Repair. He said the thing was making a rattling noise and wouldn't turn on. So I open the computer and massive smell came out of it. It smelled like motor oil and burnt electronics. I then noticed that something was dripping off the side of the case I just took off. I ask the man if it had gotten wet or anything and he replied no. So I asked him what the hell this stuff was that was dripping off. He said “well it was making a lot of noise so I thought when my Big rig does that I just get a can of DW40 and spray to around the area and that usually makes the noise go away." Yes that man emptied an entire can of DW40 in his computer case and wondered why it would not turn back on. DW40=conductive liquid = Fried Electrical components. Redneck FTW
Click to expand...

The product is still WD-40 ;) WD = Water Displacer, the 40 is because it's the 40th formula they tried.
 
I wasn't aware you could even fry a south bridge.
 
Canned air is so expensive after awhile. I've been contemplating buying a MetroVac but reviews by people who have bought it also suggest that it blows hot air after 4-5 mins of use.
 
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meadgamer said:
Canned air is so expensive after awhile. I've been contemplating buying a MetroVac but reviews by people who have bought it also suggest that it blows hot air after 4-5 mins of use.
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Get one, it's awesome. We had one at the PC repair shop I used to work at, and I recently bought one myself. Totally worth it, and it pays for itself pretty quick when you consider the price of compressed air.

I haven't noticed any hot air issues. I highly recommend it.
 
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early NVidia chipsets ran very hot on South bridge chips, I had 2 nforce2 boards where I added heatsink myself just to let them cool abit
 
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