building a new pc

[juniper]

I always have problems building desktops; for some reason I can never get them to power up.

I plug in the ATX connector, fans, the messy pins for the front panel, making sure I have worked out the polarization.

When I switch on, I always get a green light on the board but nothing else will switch on, the power switch comes on momentarily and then nothing.

I end up having to take them to a store to get them wired up, any suggestions on how I keep making the same mistake is appreciated.

[kalniel]

Did the store tell you what mistake you were making?

[Bonebreaker777]

I can't imagine a different problem but you are "messing" up the messy front panel controls or not plugging everything in?

Try next time to have just a bare run, no case involved (sometimes you can miss something vital in that small dark place).

Don't worry about the front controllers, can active the power button by shorting the right pins with your screwdriver.

[Millennium]

That's not all that rare. Don't let it get you down Bonebreaker was correct, build it on a table first then when you're happy move it into a case, make sure you didn't mess up any fans jumpers or case switches if it didn't boot. You can use a screwdriver to bridge the on/off pins for half a sec to boot on a table.

A speaker can really help with BIOS beep codes, they'll narrow a problem down, there may always be the occasional bios not liking your choice of memory unsolvable problem though that's quite rare now. At least with DDR3 !! (ok that was a guess)

[jamiesthename]

there may always be the occasional bios not liking your choice of memory unsolvable problem though that's quite rare now. At least with DDR3 !! (ok that was a guess)

Still not a problem to completely rule out however unlikely I had an issue with this recently even when using the recommended RAM that was supposed to have been 'supported' by the motherboard.

[PlayerAsleep]

I had this problem, turned out to be an older bios on the board I had and it didnt like the CPU I had. Gave it to a local shop to update and its was fine after that.

[Smudger]

I had this with one of my builds, turned out that some boards have the power plugs all in one row, and some have a second group of 4 plugs elsewhere on the board. Once these were plugged in, away we went!

[Bonebreaker777]

I had this with one of my builds, turned out that some boards have the power plugs all in one row, and some have a second group of 4 plugs elsewhere on the board. Once these were plugged in, away we went!

Wait,you mean the now standard ATX 24pin (20+4 pin) main and 4pin 12V CPU connector by the ATX12V specification or the old 20pin main and 4pin extension by the old ATX standard?

[juniper]

Sorry for dropping out of a discussion I started, I had to go away and do things.

Anyway, I have had another go at getting my pc to work and it still doesn't.

I have the ATX plugged in and the 4 pin, the processor fan, I have turned all the panel connectors around to see if that works but no luck, I can get the HDD light to flicker briefly but that is all. Something looks to be shorting out somewhere around the front panel - the light on the pcb remains lit - all the connectors are polarized, so I'm stuck.

[RobbieRoy]

Have you tried taking everything out, as Bonebreaker suggested, assembling and booting it up on the kitchen table? If no joy, remove one component at a time and reboot. If it won't boot with nothing attached except PSU and monitor then it's likely either the BIOS needs updating its a power issue - make sure all plugs are really connected and well seated. If it boots after one thing is disconnected, say a GPU, then check it was correctly seated and powered.

My recent experience was just like yours and turned out to be a PSU that would fail once the load got above a certain level. It was swiftly RMA-ed by Scan and the system flew once the new one was plugged in (tested on the kitchen table first!).