PC Sherdog PC Build/Buy Thread, v6: My Power Supply Burned Down My House

[Dinkin_Flicka]

Would you happen to live near a Microcenter?

I do not. Don't think they have those in my area.

 

[Madmick]

Thanks for the recommendations, really appriciate the help.

Not sure if I'm to big of an ignoramous to put this thing together or having rotten luck with components, but going to drop this thing off at the Best Buy Geek Squad to have them make this bastard work. On Friday I ended up picking up the new GPU and a new PSU (MSI gold series 850w) at BB after work. Installed the GPU, swapped out the PSU, plugged it in and turned it on..... nothing. Tried a few times to cycle the switch, checked the connections, still nothing.

I had used most of the old cables for ease, so took all of those out and put the new connectors, plugged it back in and turned it back on. This time I got some lights on the mother and GPU, but no fans and it doesn't boot up. I thought maybe there is to much of a power draw with the GPU to fire up, so I took that back out along with the cables, tried to start it up again, and again I got some lights, no fans, and still wont boot up. It occuerd to me at this point that I had not powered it up since I got back from the PC shop that told me the old card was dead, and was worried that maybe it got damaged in transporting it around.

Pulled everything back out for the umpteenth time, put the original PSU back in with its original cables and it turned on just fine. Thankfully it's still working, but back to where I started. So now I have an appointment to drop this off tonight with the Geek Squad. I'm at my wits end trying to trouble shoot this thing and just want it to go.

I think what you had said was the culprit all along that an 850w PSU should be sufficient, and I should have jumped to 1000w just to be sure. Now I just don't have the time or patience. Will return the new PSU for a 1000w and have them deal with it.

What an adventure this has been!!!!

Insufficient wattage isn't the issue. You can see many build videos or reviews online, including some test benches, testing a 3080 Ti paired with a 12900K-- or a CPU drawing equal wattage-- that operate without issue. Here's just one example with an 800W PSU in the YT video below, in fact. Furthermore, just powering the thing on and booting up will draw very little power. It's only in stress testing that peak draws reach anywhere close to the ~700ish wattage consumption I've quoted to you. You wouldn't be anywhere near that. So it's something else.


Transporting the PC around shouldn't have damaged it. They're quite tough, they're not that delicate.

I'm confounded. It makes no sense to me that the computer turns on, and will provide an image directly from the motherboard, but not with the GPU. The fact this happened a second time makes me wonder if the motherboard is the issue. Obviously the motherboard functions with the onboard GPU, so if it is defective, it would have something to do with the circuitry between the PCIe slot and the CPU that is only called upon when the 3080 Ti is populating the slot. But I assume the PC shop used a multimeter or some other professional device to assess that the first GPU was "dead" because it wouldn't conduct voltage. So to suspect that both the GPU and this circuitry are bad seems a highly improbable coincidence. And I also would have assumed they'd have checked the GPU's functionality in the comp by connecting to one of their own monitors with one of their own cables. So the GPU-to-monitor cable and monitor settings would have also been ruled out.

It's not you. You've proceeded logically in ruling out potential issues. I'll be interested to hear what the Geek Squad concludes.

 

[Neph]

I had used most of the old cables for ease, so took all of those out and put the new connectors, plugged it back in and turned it back on.

This is absolutely a rookie error that I've made only recently myself. I thought there was a problem with power until I swapped to all of the correct cables that came with the PSU - make sure you've changed every single one and not just one or two that are close by and easy to swap, so this includes power supply to the MB itself.

Also pro tip don't put anything into the case until you've turned the whole thing on and it works 100%. Put it flat on the bench where you can access everything instantly so swapping components and cables takes mere seconds. Working inside a case with these issues is a nightmare.

 

[Neph]

What an adventure this has been!!!!

Damn right it sounds fucking infuriating! Please let us know what happens in the end

 

[method115]

This is absolutely a rookie error that I've made only recently myself. I thought there was a problem with power until I swapped to all of the correct cables that came with the PSU - make sure you've changed every single one and not just one or two that are close by and easy to swap, so this includes power supply to the MB itself.

Also pro tip don't put anything into the case until you've turned the whole thing on and it works 100%. Put it flat on the bench where you can access everything instantly so swapping components and cables takes mere seconds. Working inside a case with these issues is a nightmare.

Yea I always getting it all hooked up on the mobo box and test it out first then put it together.

 

[Dinkin_Flicka]

So finally got the gaming rig back from the Geek Squad and everything is running fine. Was a little bummed out when I picked it up that the guy that did the installs wasn't on shift and didn't leave any notes for the next day on what was done. Just some check boxes he installed the new hardware and downloaded the Nvidia drives. The dude at the Geek Sqaud was a little embarassed that he was left with 0 turnover.

They installed all the stuff I had tried on my own, so it must have been an installation issue. It literally went from "Assigned to agent" to "Ready for customer pick up" in just over 2 hours, so guessing it was something simple I gooned up. Super glad it's up and running, but without knowing what I did wrong I won't really know what to look out for.

Best part was when we bought a fridge from BB in the fall, the delivery was going to be like $75 or I could pay for the total tech which was like $80 for a year, and got me free delivery on stuff and Geek Squad support. I went with the Total Tech since it was just a few bucks more, and at the time I was trying to get an XB sereis X for a friend at work and the Total Tech was the entry to even buy them there. Didn't end up snagging the XB, but they did all of the trouble shooting and installs for free. After how much I had dicked around with it, was really happy to be done.

 

[jefferz]

Thanks for the recommendations, really appriciate the help.

Not sure if I'm to big of an ignoramous to put this thing together or having rotten luck with components, but going to drop this thing off at the Best Buy Geek Squad to have them make this bastard work. On Friday I ended up picking up the new GPU and a new PSU (MSI gold series 850w) at BB after work. Installed the GPU, swapped out the PSU, plugged it in and turned it on..... nothing. Tried a few times to cycle the switch, checked the connections, still nothing.

I had used most of the old cables for ease, so took all of those out and put the new connectors, plugged it back in and turned it back on. This time I got some lights on the mother and GPU, but no fans and it doesn't boot up. I thought maybe there is to much of a power draw with the GPU to fire up, so I took that back out along with the cables, tried to start it up again, and again I got some lights, no fans, and still wont boot up. It occuerd to me at this point that I had not powered it up since I got back from the PC shop that told me the old card was dead, and was worried that maybe it got damaged in transporting it around.

Pulled everything back out for the umpteenth time, put the original PSU back in with its original cables and it turned on just fine. Thankfully it's still working, but back to where I started. So now I have an appointment to drop this off tonight with the Geek Squad. I'm at my wits end trying to trouble shoot this thing and just want it to go.

I think what you had said was the culprit all along that an 850w PSU should be sufficient, and I should have jumped to 1000w just to be sure. Now I just don't have the time or patience. Will return the new PSU for a 1000w and have them deal with it.

What an adventure this has been!!!!

For future reference, all PSU power supply cables aren't pinned the same. The connector that goes to your device, like the motherboard and gpu are all the same. But the pinout on the power supply itself can be different.

 

[PEB]

Insufficient wattage isn't the issue. You can see many build videos or reviews online, including some test benches, testing a 3080 Ti paired with a 12900K-- or a CPU drawing equal wattage-- that operate without issue. Here's just one example with an 800W PSU in the YT video below, in fact. Furthermore, just powering the thing on and booting up will draw very little power. It's only in stress testing that peak draws reach anywhere close to the ~700ish wattage consumption I've quoted to you. You wouldn't be anywhere near that. So it's something else.


Transporting the PC around shouldn't have damaged it. They're quite tough, they're not that delicate.

I'm confounded. It makes no sense to me that the computer turns on, and will provide an image directly from the motherboard, but not with the GPU. The fact this happened a second time makes me wonder if the motherboard is the issue. Obviously the motherboard functions with the onboard GPU, so if it is defective, it would have something to do with the circuitry between the PCIe slot and the CPU that is only called upon when the 3080 Ti is populating the slot. But I assume the PC shop used a multimeter or some other professional device to assess that the first GPU was "dead" because it wouldn't conduct voltage. So to suspect that both the GPU and this circuitry are bad seems a highly improbable coincidence. And I also would have assumed they'd have checked the GPU's functionality in the comp by connecting to one of their own monitors with one of their own cables. So the GPU-to-monitor cable and monitor settings would have also been ruled out.

It's not you. You've proceeded logically in ruling out potential issues. I'll be interested to hear what the Geek Squad concludes.

Just asking is there a rumor that the rtx 4070 coming out sooner then anyone expects with a 699 price and will blow the 3090ti out of the water? What I hear Nvidia could simultaneously announce it and release it within a week apart "Start saving my coins" lol? I thought I heard Sept or Oct this year? Just asking if you or anyone heard something similar.

 

[Blayt7hh]

Just asking is there a rumor that the rtx 4070 coming out sooner then anyone expects with a 699 price and will blow the 3090ti out of the water? What I hear Nvidia could simultaneously announce it and release it within a week apart "Start saving my coins" lol? I thought I heard Sept or Oct this year? Just asking if you or anyone heard something similar.

I don’t take any of those rumors seriously. Every generation they make crazy claims leading up to a launch and they never turn out to be true.

 

[Lubaolong]

Thinking about buying a new pc. My old gaming PC circa ~2011ish (gtx 590) has been serving as a living room PC, but it has gotten so slow. It locks up, crashes, and seems like it's on its last leg. I've already limited startup processes, cleaned up disk, scanned for malware crap, cleaned dust out, etc, but it doesn't run like it used to.

I'm trying to decide if I should buy a new mid-level PC to use mostly for media and some net surfing on the couch or if I should move my 2-year-old gaming PC to my living room and build a new monster gaming PC for my bedroom.

Anyone have any thoughts?

 

[Blayt7hh]

Thinking about buying a new pc. My old gaming PC circa ~2011ish (gtx 590) has been serving as a living room PC, but it has gotten so slow. It locks up, crashes, and seems like it's on its last leg. I've already limited startup processes, cleaned up disk, scanned for malware crap, cleaned dust out, etc, but it doesn't run like it used to.

I'm trying to decide if I should buy a new mid-level PC to use mostly for media and some net surfing on the couch or if I should move my 2-year-old gaming PC to my living room and build a new monster gaming PC for my bedroom.

Anyone have any thoughts?

… I think you know the answer. Monster PC

 

[GtehMVP]

Thinking about buying a new pc. My old gaming PC circa ~2011ish (gtx 590) has been serving as a living room PC, but it has gotten so slow. It locks up, crashes, and seems like it's on its last leg. I've already limited startup processes, cleaned up disk, scanned for malware crap, cleaned dust out, etc, but it doesn't run like it used to.

I'm trying to decide if I should buy a new mid-level PC to use mostly for media and some net surfing on the couch or if I should move my 2-year-old gaming PC to my living room and build a new monster gaming PC for my bedroom.

Anyone have any thoughts?

I'd probably wait a bit on the new gaming pc. The new cards are coming out, though current GPU prices are dropping quite a bit. Just checking, I can buy a 3080ti for $1350 Cdn right now on best buy ($450 off on "sale") and a 3080 for $999. I paid $1300 for the latter 7 months ago. I spent 6 months or more trying to buy either.

You might as well wait a couple of months and see what the new cards are costing, and what their supplies are like. A 3080 or a 3080ti will carry you for a long time if you decide to buy now though.

If you're only using the living room PC for media, you don't need much to run it. You could just buy a cheaper laptop, at least you can take it with you.

 

[Lubaolong]

I'd probably wait a bit on the new gaming pc. The new cards are coming out, though current GPU prices are dropping quite a bit. Just checking, I can buy a 3080ti for $1350 Cdn right now on best buy ($450 off on "sale") and a 3080 for $999. I paid $1300 for the latter 7 months ago. I spent 6 months or more trying to buy either.

You might as well wait a couple of months and see what the new cards are costing, and what their supplies are like. A 3080 or a 3080ti will carry you for a long time if you decide to buy now though.

If you're only using the living room PC for media, you don't need much to run it. You could just buy a cheaper laptop, at least you can take it with you.

I have a 3080 and 3090 (my and my youngest daughter's gaming pcs). I would probably turn the 3080 into the living room PC. My oldest daughter could game on that maybe when we are all playing online games. Right now, she's limited to PS5/Xbox crossplay. I would build a monster PC around the new flagship nvidia card whenever it drops in a couple months. It's a lot to spend though and not sure if worth it. I guess that's what it boils down to. Do I want to spend extra to get a gaming PC that I don't super need but would be nice to have? Maybe. Maybe I was just hoping someone could say some stuff to convince me and make me not feel so bad about it.

 

[GtehMVP]

I have a 3080 and 3090 (my and my youngest daughter's gaming pcs). I would probably turn the 3080 into the living room PC. My oldest daughter could game on that maybe when we are all playing online games. Right now, she's limited to PS5/Xbox crossplay. I would build a monster PC around the new flagship nvidia card whenever it drops in a couple months. It's a lot to spend though and not sure if worth it. I guess that's what it boils down to. Do I want to spend extra to get a gaming PC that I don't super need but would be nice to have? Maybe. Maybe I was just hoping someone could say some stuff to convince me and make me not feel so bad about it.

Well, what games need pushing beyond a 3090 now, or in the near future?

I'm just trying to think of what's on the radar for bleeding edge graphics to warrant the upgrade.

If you're not gaming on the living room PC, you don't much in there.

I prefer my pc on the couch, That's where my main one is

I guess wait and see what the 4000 series delivers. The rumors are monster performance upgrades. I'm curious of the availability and cost.

What's your monitor like? If you feel like a big upgrade, you could always dump $$ into that if it's not bleeding edge.

My buddy just bought Samsung's 49 inch qled monitor, it's pretty damn awesome.

 

[Lubaolong]

Well, what games need pushing beyond a 3090 now, or in the near future?

I'm just trying to think of what's on the radar for bleeding edge graphics to warrant the upgrade.

If you're not gaming on the living room PC, you don't much in there.

I prefer my pc on the couch, That's where my main one is

I guess wait and see what the 4000 series delivers. The rumors are monster performance upgrades. I'm curious of the availability and cost.

What's your monitor like? If you feel like a big upgrade, you could always dump $$ into that if it's not bleeding edge.

My buddy just bought Samsung's 49 inch qled monitor, it's pretty damn awesome.

I sit pretty close to my monitor in my bedroom and don't think that large would be desirable for me. I'm using a Samsung Q90T 65" in the living room and two vg27aq in my bedroom. Both models were pretty badass a couple years ago and probably don't need upgrades.

No game needs the latest video card. I'm not playing anything that pushes the limits. It's fun to build monster computers, but it's true that it's not a good value at all. Counterpoint is I waste money on way stupider shit than this. But I agree the smartest financial decision would probably be to get a $1-1.2k pc with 3060ti or equivalent radeon card for the living room. That's probably about the sweet spot.

 

[GtehMVP]

I sit pretty close to my monitor in my bedroom and don't think that large would be desirable for me. I'm using a Samsung Q90T 65" in the living room and two vg27aq in my bedroom. Both models were pretty badass a couple years ago and probably don't need upgrades.

No game needs the latest video card. I'm not playing anything that pushes the limits. It's fun to build monster computers, but it's true that it's not a good value at all. Counterpoint is I waste money on way stupider shit than this. But I agree the smartest financial decision would probably be to get a $1-1.2k pc with 3060ti or equivalent radeon card for the living room. That's probably about the sweet spot.

I don't really prefer those 49 inch monitors either, it's too wide. It's a gorgeous panel though, just like our TV's. I have the same one as you. Most games don't support it either. I find 21:9 to be the sweet spot.

I have a 34 inch LG, but I really wanted a 38". I didn't like the panels enough to warrant the big jump in price to 38". Everything fast enough at the time was IPS only (terrible contrast/HDR). My next big purchase will be a 38" ultrawide, once we see better panels. They might already exist.

Anyway, the 21:9 monitors are awesome for 1st person shooters especially. They really suck you in. Plenty of games support that resolution too. A few inches bigger (taller especially the key), and you'll really get sucked.


I have a question for you on our tv's. Game mode always looks like shit. EVerything is washed out, especially if you use HDR.

I have my pc running on the HDMI 2.1 input. I don't need to use gamemode as the 2.1 slot let's me use 120 hrtz refresh rates. I can force filmkaer mode, which gives us excellent colours.

My PS4 and Switch are on the regular HDMI inputs. If I don't use Gamemode, games look great, but everything plays laggy. I really don't want to switch HDMI inputs every time. Do you have any consoles hooked into the regular HDMI ports? What settings do you use? Perhaps I can just get an HDMI 2.1 switcher box now. They didn't exist when I bought my tv.

 

[Lubaolong]

I don't really prefer those 49 inch monitors either, it's too wide. It's a gorgeous panel though, just like our TV's. I have the same one as you. Most games don't support it either. I find 21:9 to be the sweet spot.

I have a 34 inch LG, but I really wanted a 38". I didn't like the panels enough to warrant the big jump in price to 38". Everything fast enough at the time was IPS only (terrible contrast/HDR). My next big purchase will be a 38" ultrawide, once we see better panels. They might already exist.

Anyway, the 21:9 monitors are awesome for 1st person shooters especially. They really suck you in. Plenty of games support that resolution too. A few inches bigger (taller especially the key), and you'll really get sucked.


I have a question for you on our tv's. Game mode always looks like shit. EVerything is washed out, especially if you use HDR.

I have my pc running on the HDMI 2.1 input. I don't need to use gamemode as the 2.1 slot let's me use 120 hrtz refresh rates. I can force filmkaer mode, which gives us excellent colours.

My PS4 and Switch are on the regular HDMI inputs. If I don't use Gamemode, games look great, but everything plays laggy. I really don't want to switch HDMI inputs every time. Do you have any consoles hooked into the regular HDMI ports? What settings do you use? Perhaps I can just get an HDMI 2.1 switcher box now. They didn't exist when I bought my tv.

I just have a PS5 plugged into the HDMI with the controller picture. The Xbox is plugged into another TV just a couple feet away. I have a Switch but haven't played in over 2 years now and don't recall which TV it's hooked up to. I usually don't play console games except for the big exclusives. Oldest daughter and wife have been using the consoles mostly to play Dead by Daylight with me and youngest daughter on pc. Don't have 4 gaming pcs. Yeah, so I can't offer much advice.

 

[Blayt7hh]

I sit pretty close to my monitor in my bedroom and don't think that large would be desirable for me. I'm using a Samsung Q90T 65" in the living room and two vg27aq in my bedroom. Both models were pretty badass a couple years ago and probably don't need upgrades.

No game needs the latest video card. I'm not playing anything that pushes the limits. It's fun to build monster computers, but it's true that it's not a good value at all. Counterpoint is I waste money on way stupider shit than this. But I agree the smartest financial decision would probably be to get a $1-1.2k pc with 3060ti or equivalent radeon card for the living room. That's probably about the sweet spot.

Actually, for your desktop monitor I highly suggest looking into an ultrawide- something like a predator x38. Ignore the specs list. Even downgrading resolution it’s a much better experience over a 27in display and you would notice the difference a lot more that a graphics card upgrade

I’ve been on ultrawide for 5 years now and would never go back. Easily the best upgrade I’ve ever made to my setup

 

[Law Talkin’ Guy]

So with demand on GPUs etc going down allegedly would there be any hope of some good deals for gaming laptops in the near future? Or not really since gaming laptops would be largely unaffected by the crypto crash?

 

[Madmick]

Thinking about buying a new pc. My old gaming PC circa ~2011ish (gtx 590) has been serving as a living room PC, but it has gotten so slow. It locks up, crashes, and seems like it's on its last leg. I've already limited startup processes, cleaned up disk, scanned for malware crap, cleaned dust out, etc, but it doesn't run like it used to.

I'm trying to decide if I should buy a new mid-level PC to use mostly for media and some net surfing on the couch or if I should move my 2-year-old gaming PC to my living room and build a new monster gaming PC for my bedroom.

Anyone have any thoughts?

In favor of the monster PC is the value argument. While as isolated components more middling CPUs and GPUs win the value assessment, whether you define this abstractly as benchmark processing power divided by cost, or more practically as average FPS across a suite of games divided by cost, that is only valid for someone buying solely this one part to upgrade. Once you factor in the cost of a whole build that shifts to favor the more expensive CPUs and GPUs. Not the most expensive ones, but the best ones before the pricing gets stupid, and skyrockets. For the CPU, I'm talking about the 5800X or 12600K/12700F; for the GPU, I'm talking about AMD 6800 XT or the NVIDIA 3080 12GB.

That's if you build yourself. Things are a bit different if you consider weird prebuilds for a cheaper HTPC that don't conform to the universal form factor, and aren't as amenable to upgrades. For example, this HP on Amazon is the top seller right now of this ilk. And with this one, it would be ideal to find out exactly what RAM stick is in there once you get it, and buy a matching one to get those dual channel speeds:
($650) HP Pavilion (10400F, GTX 1650, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD)
Or you could try to catch one of the sales that usually flies around on a universal form factor, but with the drawback they usually have terrible, weird cases with poor airflow. Example today for Costco members on Slickdeals:
($550) ASUS ROG Desktop (R5-3600X, GTX 1660 Ti, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD)

Because if you build yourself you're going to be up around this range for all of the non-GPU components, $650, at a minimum, before you decide on a GPU. More likely in the $750-$1000 range. That's why the difference of three or four hundred dollars on the GPU becomes less meaningful, and the value for the more expensive ones superior. That pressures you to favor spending more, and this of course begs you to ask yourself, "Wait, why in the hell am I spending $1500+ on a half measure? Why don't I just go whole hog? I already have a build this good, anyway. I'll just move it out into the living room."