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[MJP46356]

Was wondering if ayone could help me out. I have a 23 month old Dell E310. Just before Christmas, it decided not to power up. I was getting the dreaded blinking amber light. I took it to a local repair shop and they told me the same thing my manual did, a power supply or system/motherboard problem. We needed a computer fast, so I purchased my wife a new laptop to replace this desktop. I thought that I would try and replace the parts (since that's allthe local repair shop does...replace parts) myself. Last week I bought a new power supply. Installed it. No luck. Same issue. Blinking Amber Light. The fan in the power supply does turn momentarily though, one step better than the old power supply. By the way, the cooling fan starts to turn then stops, same as before I replaced the power supply. Next thing I did was got on the phone with Dell and ordered a refurbished motherboard (minus the processor). Got that yesterday, took out the old one, installed the processor, RAM, etc. Still a flashing amber light. Can anyone help. I have thought all along that there may be some sort of fail safe that when the cooling fan doesn't turn the machine will not powre up? Any ideas? By the way, when the trouble began, there was a good size djust bunny in front of the cooling fan. Alright...a LARGE dust bunny. Any help would be greately appreciated.

MJP46356

[H-kon]

Hi MJP46356

Those problems could be anything, but at least you have some parts to test things with.

Is it an all integrated motherboard (vga, audio, lan)?  I would remove anything but vga and see if it powered on. From there, add one piece until it doesn't boot.  Does anything happen if you press and hold the Delete button or the Insert button while powering the system on?

If you have a spare VGA PCI adapter, i'd install that and remove anything but it. Get a can of air too and clean the case out. You may have a short if a dust bunny touches a few pins it shouldn't.

[MJP46356]

I've tried unplugging everything and re-plugging devises one at a time. Like I said. New Power Supply, new mother board with the original processor. Do you think that if the cooling fan failed that there could be a fail safe of some sort? I also read that some people with the same situation are finding shorts in their front panel USB connections. Shorts...etc. Do you think a bad processor could cause a machine to not power up?

[MJP46356]

Oh. Everything does seem to be integrated...video card, network etc....only a modem card is seperate.

[H-kon]

Sorry about the late reply, i was sleeping

If your cpu fan was all clogged up, you could have fried the CPU, but to be honest, i haven't seen a fried CPU since the early AMD Athlon days in 2001. I am not sure its possible to fry an Intel processor without upping the voltage.

Do you see a pattern in the blinking amber light?

I am not sure if you have seen this one, but i found an explanation to the blinking lights for your E310

. The pattern of the blinking will tell you what is wrong:


http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/dim3100/en/sm/adtshoot.htm#wp1130520

It also has the beep codes

I'll check some more once i get to work

[MJP46356]

No real pattern to the blink. It is just the yellow, and it blinks every second or so. I have seen that documentation, it really shows nothing for a single blinking yellow/amber light, just a power supply or system board faqilure has occured. As far as I can tell there are noi beeps. Doesn't seem to be gettting that far. I took a good look at the USB connectors on the front panel last night to see if those were damaged. I read a few post on the net saying that a bent or shorted USB can cause a power issue and give a blinking light. No luck. I took out the cooling can so I can get to the circuit board that houses the front panel switches, USB's etc and examined it for a fried cap or a short etc but found nothing. Again, I have replaced the motherboard (minus the processor and memory sticks) and power supply. There really isn't too much left. The cooling fan was quite dirty. I cleaned it. I wish I could findout somewhere if the cooling fan MUST run to power up the computer. There are four wires coming from the fan to the motherboard. Those two extra wires have to be doing something. (2 for power the other 2 for who knows what, unless it doesn't run all the time.) The cooling fan (CPU) does start and makes a few rotations then stops. I appreciate all of your help in this matter. As far as the CPU, could I throw another CPU from a Dell machine in just to test? Would this cause any problems?

Thanks,
MJP46356

[MJP46356]

I'm not sure if it matters, but the green lights do flash momentarily before the yellow starts flashing. I am not at home (work). I will have to try and see if there is anything consistant in the flashing pattern. It is very quick though.

MJP46356

[H-kon]

Just to be checking, but do you ahave the 4-pin power plug connected on the motherboard? I know that newer systems wont power on unless that one is connected. I am not sure if your motherboard has a 20 pin or a 24 pin Power socket, but there should be another 4 pin plug next to the cpu somewhere which is there to feed it extra power.

I bought a new mobo and cpu the other day and found out after i had ripped everything apart that i needed to go and buy a new power supply unit since it didn't have the extra connector (old model PSU)

The two extra pins i think is for the auto-fan function in the BIOS where the fan spin up a bit if it gets too hot in there.

There shouldn't be a problem i think trying to swap CPU's, but i am not sure if a Prescott (the last generation of P4's) will be supported in it or if it's "Williamette". Nothing bad will happen if you swap it though.

I will be assembling 3 computer when i get home today so i'll be around to help you while i assemble them

[H-kon]

I'm not sure if it matters, but the green lights do flash momentarily before the yellow starts flashing. I am not at home (work). I will have to try and see if there is anything consistant in the flashing pattern. It is very quick though.

MJP46356

Hmm. I know that the P4's get very hot, check the heatsink/fan seating.

Do you have any spare parts other than what you have replaced?

[MJP46356]

The 4 pin connector is plugged in. As far as extra part...sort of, but not really. I have a machine here at work (company property) that I may be able to borrow a few things from. It is a dell optiplex gx 270. One other thing. The power supply that discount electronics sent me has an extra connector on it. (one extra more than my old power supply had) It is a 6 conductor with five wires in it (i think, again I am going from memory here, I am at work and the machine is at home). They claim that this is the proper power supply for a E310.

[H-kon]

I will be up another 8 hours at least (4 PM here now)

If i were you, i would try to borrow that other computer and test things using it's parts. Mainly the Power supply (again) It isn't "Antec" by the way? and the processor.

It could also be a short if there is a motherboard hole for tightening it to the case that does not have solder around it. Check if you got those and see if it helps to unscrew it a bit so that it doesnt touch the solder.

Also beware of rogue dust bunnies.

Resetting the CMOS might help as well. Just unplug the power cable from the PSU, remove the battery and let it sit for a minute before you plug it back in and start it.

The last option i can think of is to find a piece of cardboard and lay the entire motherbord/cpu/ram there and start the computer with a jumper.

[MJP46356]

I will try a few of these things. Thanks for all of your help. As far as the "Antec" question. Are you refering to the new power supply or the one in the machine from work? Is there an issue with "Antec"? And...how can I tell if it is "Antec"? Here is the power supply that I bought. http://www.discountelectronics.com/index.php?l=product_detail&p=2148