Computer turns off within seconds of turning it on

[Dalton the Grea]

Recently, I've installed a new hard drive, PATA, After my old SATA died out, but now my computer shuts off shortly after I turn it on, I wish I knew my specs but the computer was built by my Brother in Iraq, however I do know the Hard Drive is a 250 GB Western Digital Caviar 7200 RPM

Sorry for not being able to reveal more about my specs

[spoon_]

Can you get to BIOS at least?

[Dalton the Grea]

No, It shuts off too soon, it shuts off in literally four seconds, the screen is also blank

[Champman99]

Without more information my best guess would be the PSU. You've added something in, and now you've got a problem. If the PSU was right on the edge and suddenly has extra draw it could be creating the problems.

That is my best guess. It could be a dodgy power adaptor or something, and it's shutting off for safety. I'm really not sure without more info. Like I said, the PSU would be first on my checklist after what you've described though.

[Giraffe]

No, It shuts off too soon, it shuts off in literally four seconds, the screen is also blank

If it's that soon, it might be the same as I had with a new build this year. Perhaps I've been lucky, but so far the PCs that I've built have fired up first time - that one didn't.
As it went about 4 - 5s (just past POST bleep) and then cut out, there was little chance to do anything. I was thinking that it was hopeless when I realised that keeping the Power button in for ~5s would Power-off the PC.
Checked the Power button and it was sticking in (this is on a new case), so I stripped it out, operated it and it was OK, put it back in and made sure that it wasn't binding on the case and it's been OK ever since - phew!

[narz]

how did you know it was the HDD which died in the first place?

did you touch anything else when you put the replacement HDD in?

Have you gone through a trial and error, i.e bare bones of PC , and plugging things in one by one?

Trial and error is your friend too..

[mikerr]

Have you forgotton to connect the cpu fan, or is the fan stopped?
Heatsink clipped down solid?

I've also seen similar with corrupted bios settings,
try the clear cmos jumper, or remove the motherboard battery.

[watforddude]

Just from what happened to me, i baught a second hand P4, which was broken and every time i turned it on it would shut down within seconds this was it due to the temp of the CPU 90c+ and rising, i only managed to find this out becuase i stuck about 2 tones of thermal paste on it just to see what was up.

might be the same problem.

[Phage]

Just from what happened to me, i baught a second hand P4, which was broken and every time i turned it on it would shut down within seconds this was it due to the temp of the CPU 90c+ and rising, i only managed to find this out becuase i stuck about 2 tones of thermal paste on it just to see what was up.

might be the same problem.

^This^ My first thought also was that the heat sink had come adrift.