An afternoon wasted - I am an idiot.

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supyo

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Mar 20, 2013
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Installed a Corsair H60 liquid cooler this morning. Install was easy, the rest of the day was a frustrating disaster. Now I feel like a complete idiot for overlooking the simplest thing.

My PC powered on fine but my i7-3770 temps were all over the map from 35-45.c idle to 90-105.c at full load. Clock speeds were all over the map as well.

I checked and rechecked everything. Reseated the cooler, repositioned the cooler and fan, thoroughly cleaned my rig, cleaned off the i7 and cooler and applied fresh arctic silver, even tried a different fan. I was about to RMA it and put my old cooler back on when I noticed something I should have checked from the very beginning.

The backplate had a small notch on one side. Two small black screws on the mobo that I didn't even notice were ever so slightly lifting the backplate up (maybe a millimetre at most). The black backplate, black mobo, and two small black screws nearly drove me insane lol.

I smacked myself in the head and repositioned the only thing I left intact the whole afternoon.

Idle temps are now in the low 30's and full load is 50-62.c

For the love of..

Have you ever wasted an entire day by overlooking the simplest thing?
 
Yup, wasted 6 hours flashing various ROMs to my girlfriend's S3 unsuccessfully because I goofed and didn't notice that I flashed an old version of TWRP recovery on her phone. I hate how there are a million different guides for every different phone; Super convoluted.
 
I recently moved my build from a test bench to a Corsair 750D. I turned it on and it wouldn't boot. I sat there wondering what was wrong.


I forgot to install the SATA cables :eek:
 
Don't feel like an idiot, because we've all done stuff like this.

Recently got an NZXT Kraken 41 cooler. It was hard getting the screws to attach to the backplate, like barely 1 or 2 threads. Then after 2 hours of fighitng it, I noticed I used the wrong screws, and the longer screws were in a small bag hidden in the box. LOL
 
Yeah.. I've spent some time stripping IDE cables and wrapping them all nice, only to forget to plug the darn thing in after working out some cable routing. Or for whatever hurry up reason I didn't get memory sticks in all the way. "Why do I only have 128 meg of Ram and not 256!! Let me see here.. *click* Oh.. whoops." Yup, those days. Now I'm too poor to upgrade and haven't had a chance to make a silly mistake. ;)
 
Configuring services on wrong servers
Not realizing that after delidding a CPU, a gap is left between the core and the heatsink (why only a few seconds?)
Running memtest for days testing an overclock I had not yet applied
Bit-by-bit reading of the wrong drive for purpose of backing up, WITH zipping and sending through a 100 megabit pipe
Forgetting I'm fixing a 32 bit Windows and desperately trying to install 64 bit drivers
Wrestling with a HR-02 Macho cooler for hours before I noticed one of the nearby capacitors prevented installation by being like half a milimeter too tall

Sometimes it's just days of aimless zombified bumping around
 
Oh and the recent comedy - accidentally downgrading to an older BIOS version because '8' looks a lot like 'B'. Looks like someone at MSI thinks in hex.
 
I know I have done similar stupid things. One thing I remember was that I was replacing the mosfets on my receiver. I forgot to attach a cable and was wondering why sound wasn't coming out one of my speakers. Took me a few days to catch that mistake.
 
Everyone has a story like that.

Show me a person who has never made a mistake and I'll show you someone who hasn't done a damn thing in their life.
 
HDriscoll said:
I recently moved my build from a test bench to a Corsair 750D. I turned it on and it wouldn't boot. I sat there wondering what was wrong.


I forgot to install the SATA cables :eek:
Click to expand...

This gets me almost 2/10 builds when I'm in a rush or too enthusiastically pumped to get a build completed. ;)
 
ive done the exact same thing with an H80i a couple of years ago. that damn notch didnt even see it until i googled shitty temps with H80i.
 
Had a new build with a Pentium 3258, everything assembled, it would not POST. Checked all the power and data cables over and over, reseated the CPU/heatsink and RAM. Started thinking dire thoughts about possible bad equipment to test. Then I realized I hadn't used the jumper to clear the CMOS. Facepalm. Perfect machine from that point on.
 
StaticShoes said:
Had a new build with a Pentium 3258, everything assembled, it would not POST. Checked all the power and data cables over and over, reseated the CPU/heatsink and RAM. Started thinking dire thoughts about possible bad equipment to test. Then I realized I hadn't used the jumper to clear the CMOS. Facepalm. Perfect machine from that point on.
Click to expand...

What board are you using? I recently had to do this on a MSI board.
 
2k3eblade said:
What board are you using? I recently had to do this on a MSI board.
Click to expand...

Requested board was the ASRock z97 Fatal1ty Killer. It'll be used for a time for light computing, then it'll become a game machine for another family member once they upgrade CPU & add a video card.(If this person behaves). :p
 
One does not simply attempt to wire 8 (eight) fully loaded lead acid batteries in series after a sleepless night.

A nice thick jumper slipped out.... of my... and... ummm...

I accidentally the whole.... errr...

The flash was so bright I was blinded and couldn't knock the jumper away at first. In an act of desperation I went gorilla on it and thankfully knocked it away.

For the rest of the day I had a green dot in my field of vision.

Louis Slotin, anyone?

 
Those saying no either have pride issues, or haven't really been working on things for very long
 
An old one - Rebuilding my Athlon XP system, put the mobo down on the counter. Picked it up, reinstalled it - No POST. No beeps, no sweeps, no creeps.

Took it out - Looked fine. Maybe bad PS? Nope. Bad RAM? Nope. Broken button? Nope.

Moving board around, there was a tiny screw LODGED in the back pins of a PCI slot. Board was dead.
 
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