Worst PC Build Screw Ups - Page 11
Forum Overclocking : General Discussions - Worst PC Build Screw Ups
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well guys just last night i had a major screw up. i was bored and decided it would be a good time to clean out the hsf on my ferrari 4005 laptop. and in case you don't know, getting to the side of the hsf where you can do the most cleaning requires taking almost everything apart.
Well disasembly went smoothly, i even kept track of the 30+ screws and took pictures of how wires were routed and stuff. I then proceed to blow out all the dust without a hitch. now reasembly is where the problem always happens. as i put everything back together i was trying to make sure all the connecors were seated properly and all the screws were tight, but as i found out later i missed one of the connectors (it was 3am).
So i have everything but the keyboard attatched(it was pluged in though) and press the power button. It posts as normally and the windows xp loading screan appears, then i get a wiff of something, look down in the keyboard opening and see the evil smoke.
after immediatley pulling the power i begin disassembly to see the extent of the damage and which board got fried. to my disappointment there was a blackened component on the mainboard, but it was right next to a connector for the usb daughter board so i decided to take a look at it, and i found one of the pins bent and touching another pin.
i then decided it was time to sleep (although i had this horrible feeling in my stomach so it was hard to sleep, i was fearing buying a several hundred dollar mainboard). this morning i woke up early (again bc i couldn't sleep) and went back to work. i figured that since the comp was booting, that the component must only be related to the usb plug i decided to take a chance and run the thing with the pin fixed and the connector unplugged.
Luckily it works and i am typing this on it now with no problems, other than i now lost 3 of my 4 usb ports, the internal bluetooth, and also the connector hooked up the right speaker so i lost that too. but i can live with that compared to buying an expensive mainboard. now why couldn't this have happened instead while i was building my parents cheap system last year, it always happens to the expensive stuff.
well it looks like this thread finally slowed down, i was begining to wonder if anybody was going to read about my screwup.
...so would anybody know where i can get a motherboard repaired. i looked around and it looks like a new mainboard for the ferrari 4000 is $400+ if i send in the mine, w/o the trade its $700+, so i think i will just live w/o my usb ports and such. although i am thinking of opening this this back up one of and trying to figure out the pins on the burnt connector and trying to get at least my bluetooth, and speaker working again, and possibly one or two usb ports.
There is only so many screw ups that can be had.
BTW, you're better off just trading it in.
| Quote : There is only so many screw ups that can be had. |
No way. The possibilities are infinite.
So most likely when this thread finallly does "die" there will be someone that grave digs it?
22 pages of content, most of it on-topic, is a pretty good run, My guess would be that in a few weeks more people will mess up bigtime and post their very funny, yet sometimes sad, experience here.
Thats my insight...
Until then, we wait, and lurk....
This is a screw up on my Dad's part. Personally, I have been building computers now for about 10 years. I have received faulty hardware but never actually burnt out a component (at least I said it was faulty when I RMA'd it lol).
Anyway, a few weeks ago, my Dad calls while I am at work. I am in a meeting so I check the message when I get out and he asks that I call him because he had taken the HSF out of his system to clean it. Bad idea. Now he wants me to come over to put it back. He calls back again before I do and says he has attempted to put the CPU back himself, and that it will not fit. The first thing I ask is did you release the lock on the socket? He says yes, but then he says that when he took the cpu out he forced it. The HSF would not budge from the CPU so he just pulled the whole thing out. Well, apparently one of the pins from the CPU managed to pry off. It is only a 3.2GH chip, a new on was about $80 on NewEgg, not that big a deal.
So, about a week later the chip arrives and I think all is good. But no, of course my Dad tries to install it himself before I can get over there to do it. He calls after failing to get it to start. I make it over there later that night and I realize the CPU isn't even flat on the socket. I take the CPU out and the first thing I see is that the pin holds on the socket are also bent. How could that heppen? At this point I am thinking he has to get a whole new MB too, so in a last ditch effort I just force the CPU and lock it. It boots up fine to my relief. But how long it will last is anyones guess.
Not the worst screw up but def' an annoying one.
Well I guess I should contribute so...
I have been lucky with hardware and havent ruined anything of mine yet... and I have not always been close to carefull either. At my shop though,... thats a different story.
Myself, I have issues with the removal of the stupid mouse/keyboard ribbons inside laptops. Each brand has a different way of unlocking the ribbon so I can remove the cable, and I always break them off. Its not a big deal, but very anoying.
The worst scew-up at my shop that I can think of is when the owner (a tech wannabe) removed a processor from it's socket before getting ready to add a custom HSF a customer requested. He pulled out the processor and broke one of the pins right off. This was an expencive Intel processor and I dont know how he did it, but he got the people to buy another one at their expence. So after a few days without a computer, they bring in a replacement processor they purchased locally for around $400 and the owner of the store tried to put it in carelessly... and broke another pin. Now mind you, he is not incompetent, and hes not bad with computers... it just so happends that he should stay the fu** away from CPUs... or anything else with pins. Either way I remember him telling the customer that the motherboard killed this processor too, and they would be beter off with a new comptuer due to electrical dmg.
I do not agree with those ethics but he does pay the bills (or did anyway). One of the techs took the processor and reatteched the pin and said it works great in his home machien o.0.
I'll post more as I think of them.
Ah and another one my co-worker mentioned while working at CompUSA.
His co-worker received a computer that needed to have the OS reinstalled on it. The computer was set up so that 1 hard drive contained all his business data (ah you see where this is going already), and one hard drive had the OS / Programs and everything else. The tech assigned to this job decided to back up the OS Hard drive and wipe it.... well he did back it up, but he wiped the wrong drive. As policy states, CompUSA is not responsible for data loss. The store called up the guy and let him know what happened, and that it was an accident and he was not angry because he backed up the HDD to another HDD and was willing to bring it in. Compusa said they would put the files onto his old HDD for free... but the same tech was still assigned to his computer. Well.... as we all know, some times if the hard drives are the same size, its hard to tell which drive is which..... and guess what......
He ghosted the now blank drive onto his backup HDD, erasing the data again. Needless to say there was a lot of yelling at this point and I forgot what my co-worker said was the resolution.
ah, that reminds me. I have done that twice, back a few years ago I use to have two 120gb maxtors one for os and one for files. Now, for the OS i set it as NTFS and the one for files was Win32. I went though dos to format and you know what happens when you boot into dos with an NTFS partition. Needless to say, the disk that stored my files was set as C: and I lost everything thinking that C: was still my OS. I did have a backup but it, for some reason, didn't back up everything.
I was pissed. now is use partition magic so that will not happen again. Or i just disconnect the other drives before I reformat.
I would be pissed if it was someone else that did that to me, i would never bring my pc into a shop. I hope he learned from his mistakes, I know I have.
So thats how you got 2k posts so quickly.
You respond with a " o_0 " face every time someone posts.
Clever, very very clever indeed. what happens if the person replies with a
" 0.o say no to underscores!!! " post?
Worst PC build mistake....
Forgetting the heatsink on a Duron processor.... while testing the motherboard and video card on the carpet, and drinking 90proof alcohol and painting the case with flammable green paints.
Nothing could go wrong..
That's funny, cause I was thinking of posting the same thing lol.
Flammable paints, are you trying to burn down your house?
YES
The Duron exploded in flames catching the carpet on fire, which ignited the paint fumes and spread until it reached my vintage 90proof New Mexican Tequila, and exploded in a ball of fire. Needless to say, being a red bellied Texan, i have over 40,000 rounds of ammunition, as well 3 full barrels of gun powder. Its too bad I live next to an orphanage.... because they are now all homeless orphans... stupid DURONS.
Yes.
Was building a computer for a mate when I was 15 and he demanded a P2 even though I had only ever built AMD's....
Was amazed by the size of the dual fan heatsink, and unfortunately there appeared to be a piece of the locking bracket missing. Was under time pressure so just used an elastic band to hold it on whilst my mate nipped to the shop to get the bracket...
Pssszzzzttttttttt.... smokey smokey time.... 
I'm not sure but I think my sorrow over the loss of all that good liquor and that Duron instead of those homeless kids marks me as a bad person....
Well, not being an AMD fan I can smile. as for the alcohol, you can just go buy more unless you spent all you money building that machine.
Not at all.
But what I didn’t mention was that on the other side of my "house" was a Sam Adams brewery. I say house in quotes because it really was a storage shed... with carpet....
Anyway, the brewery also went up in flames. This wouldn’t be so bad, but I had tapped their production line for endless amounts of free sudds.... FREE BEER.
Well, with my house shooting off 44cal. long rifle ammo, screaming homeless orphans, and a beer factory on fire, Mr. Bush issued a national disaster warning and release 5.5 million dollars of federal funding. The morons at FEMA who received the cash figured it was there to put out the fire, and promptly tossed it at the brewery.... well it burned up of course.... not only losing 5.5million dollars, but spreading the fire into the business district destroying main street, and the suburbs.
Try googling my town... San Thyre. You won’t find it. After the great fire of San Thyre, the state of New Mexico, and the US Government disavowed any knowledge of this place. We are now classified by number.... we are area 54.
You get 1670 results for San Thyre none of which discribe your city(or shed), the government must control google then.
.... um no.
You get 0 results for "San Thyre". You must search with the name of my town in quotes.
Also, just like area 55, area 54 doesnt exsist.... although we do have broadband internet access here.
I hate to use it but, 0.o....
| Quote : But what I didn’t mention was that on the other side of my "house" was a Sam Adams brewery. I say house in quotes because it really was a storage shed... with carpet....
|
I liked your yarn up top the point of it being a carpeted shed. Tapping into free beer was the giveaway.
| Quote : You get 1670 results for San Thyre none of which discribe your city(or shed), the government must control google then. |
I thought the govt owned Google? Or is it the other way 'round?
God I hope its the other way around. As soon as the gov owns Google....thats it... the world belongs to them and the birth of big brother (the real big brother) is here.
And everyone that looks at porn on Google immediately stops....
| Quote : And everyone that looks at porn on Google immediately stops.... |
...Google hits decrease by 50%...
Google's revenue drops by 90%....
LMAO!!!! o yeah and congratz with the 2K
Thankees... *bows to audience*
O.o
Sorry just had to.
This one happened about two days ago. Placed my work PC on a "flat" surface by the window, turned around to close the door, heard a horrible sliding sound followed by a very unpleasant metallic crash.
Approx. a 2m drop onto gravel.
Total damage: 1x case and 1x optical drive. Oh, and 256MB DDR400 caused by the optical drive sliding back and breaking it. Replaced w/512MB. total now 1GB. Whoopee.
I'm particularly impressed with the HDDs (2x WD 80GB SATA). Untouched.
For some odd reason, the 512 I had in the other socket now has a very odd quirk. The BIOS tells me I have 1GB, 512MB in socket 2 and nothing in socket 1. Board will NOT boot if the damaged 512 is not in, or if something else is in its socket. Board also will not boot if the other socket is empty. But the BIOS and OS and everything else sees 1024MB... weird, no? Also, the system wasn't the most stable I'd ever had, but after the crash it's stability is impossibly good. Wyrd.
and people wonder why they depict 'real' specialists as those making things work with a good whack in the movies... Looks like there's some truth in this.
| Quote : O.o |
o.0
Hmmmm, I need to go drop my 256meg system where you dropped yours, then I can have my computer think it has 1gig of memory. 
I dont think that faking your system into haveing 1gb of ram actualy improves performance.
Hmmm, I say we need benchmarks to prove or disprove this theory. Think of it, no more having to buy expensive upgrades, just throw the computer off the roof....
The Ultimate Boost for your PC: special upgrade, the
GRAVITY WELL
only for $99.95!
In case of damaged casing or complete PC, Gravity Well (r) (tm) and (c) can't be held accountable. We promise only that your PC will reach Terminal Velocity for a little while.
Hell, we're not responsible for anything... you're the idiot that threw your computer off the roof....
too bad web browsers only use 72 dpi resolution, otherwise we could really give a new meaning to 'fine print'.
I've seen guys in the Other post smaller than that.
Like this...
Or this...
Or the mother of all small prints, like this...
it's not the size that counts, it's what you do with it.
However I had to tax Firefox's zooming abilities quite a lot to read you (I wonder how IE users would deal with it?)
Cry in terror and shame?
| Quote : I've seen guys in the Other post smaller than that.
|
*Bastage*
Ya real small there DaSick... ...
That was the point. Bastage's should never be in small text.
You need to start linking to joke pages, like the flash "owned" pages or something like that.
Not my style. I prefer bitting wit and sharp, cutting, thinly veiled insults.
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