[Fixed] power surge? lost all my devices

[Cyan]

I used to unplug with a storm, but my computer is on 24h/24 so I didn't do it on the past years.
But there were no storm or rain this week.
I also have everything connected to APC power surge protectors, and onduleur (uninterupted power supply), even internet line pass through it.


I took some screenshot of my mother board, if you want to see, but I don't see anything interesting on it, no bad condensator or fired element.


avout PSVR, the headset wasn't connected, only the CPU splitter box.

 

[Minox]

About two years I had something similar happen to me that ended up frying my monitor & GPU. Unlike you I did not have surge protection and there is no one to blame for it happening but me.

What I believe happened is that during one night where I left the computer on we had a lightning strike somewhere close (not completely unbelievable due to the bad weather that night). Said lightning strike caused a surge that fried my monitor (22" 1680x1050) and fried the GPU (560Ti) that was connected to it. The rest of my computer however seemed just fine and I believe that was all due to my PSU offering sufficient protection against surges (this is why you don't get the cheapest PSU you can find btw). At first I only thought it was the monitor that died so given that it was an older monitor with a not too convenient resolution I ended up taking the plunge and got myself a new fancy 24" 144Hz monitor thinking that was the end of my problems.

However days later I started noticing graphical artifacts on my monitor which at first just were a little bit annoying, but ultimately ended up bluescreening the computer every time the Nvidia driver was loaded (Safe mode still worked fine except you could see lots of artifacts). Not having the money for another upgrade and the old GPU being out of warranty I ended up having to replace it with a still functional, but less than ideal GTS 250 which I then proceeded to use with my new monitor until the time I could again afford a decent GPU. Having had a much stronger GPU before this time period sucked and I barely did any gaming outside of games I knew I could run on semi-high settings without the much older GPU being a chokepoint.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this story, but I feel very sorry that something like this happened to you and that it happened to so many of your devices. I'm hoping that not all parts of your computer are gone and that it could be salvaged with some minor part replacements.

 

[naddel81]

@ cyan: when you have APC power protection check if the fuse broke. if it didnt then it wasn't the power surge.
if it did you still have a 100 000€ insurance on everything that was behind the thing.

 

[Cyan]

all I hope is my HDD are fine so I can backup/rescue my data.
all other things are replaceable parts. costy, but replaceable.
Of course I could always re-get most of my data, but some of them were my own (development, pictures, logs, other personnal stuff that I would better recover)
My own fault for procrastinating instead of backup them up regularly...

How to I check the APC fuse?
I open the box and check inside?

The APC led seems to work fine (green)

 

[Lucifer666]

Oh man, I don't have advice to give, this just sucks.

Hope you get your way with the power company.

 

[Clydefrosch]

usually, such a surge would come from the electricity net, not from one of your machines. have you tried calling your provider and asking for any kind of surges around whenever that happened?

 

[Minox]

all I hope is my HDD are fine so I can backup/rescue my data.
all other things are replaceable parts. costy, but replaceable.
Of course I could always re-get most of my data, but some of them were my own (development, pictures, logs, other personnal stuff that I would better recover)
My own fault for procrastinating instead of backup them up regularly...

What I would do is get a way to connect your HDDs through USB to another computer so that you can check if your data is fine and if it is back it up somewhere else as quickly as you can. Keeping them connected to what could be faulty parts isn't really recommended.

 

[Cyan]

Calling is very very hard to me. I'm social phobic and have really issues calling unknown people.
I would even rather have my data lost


Is there USB HDD readers compatible with RAID?
my hdd are in RAID1 (mirroring)


Also, about clear CMOS, is that the correct place? I suppose, even if it's not "right in front of it"

 

[DarkGabbz]

Calling is very very hard to me. I'm social phobic and have really issues calling unknown people.
I would even rather have my data lost


Is there USB HDD readers compatible with RAID?
my hdd are in RAID1 (mirroring)


Also, about clear CMOS, is that the correct place? I suppose, even if it's not "right in front of it"

Yes its the correct jumper.

 

[Cyan]

CMOS Cleared (with and without the battery).
Still not working. I didn't unplug the RAM yet, do you think it could be the RAM? the bios would bip if the ram was defective.

I will have to buy a new mother board (or send it back, but I bought the computer fully assembled by internet, I would probably have to send it back assembled too, that's very big and I didn't keep the box.)

I'll email the company I bought it from and explain what I did/tested.
I'll see if they ask to send the full pc or if they will send me a new MB only.

Their work is nice, all is well attached.
I don't know how the CPU is attached to the mother board, it seems hard to remove.

 

[DarkGabbz]

CMOS Cleared (with and without the battery).
Still not working. I didn't unplug the RAM yet, do you think it could be the RAM? the bios would bip if the ram was defective.

I will have to buy a new mother board (or send it back, but I bought the computer fully assembled by internet, I would probably have to send it back assembled too, that's very big and I didn't keep the box.)

I'll email the company I bought it from and explain what I did/tested.
I'll see if they ask to send the full pc or if they will send me a new MB only.

Their work is nice, all is well attached.
I don't know how the CPU is attached to the mother board, it seems hard to remove.

The CPU is very easy to remove.

 

[Cyan]

yeah, not the CPU, it seems it's the FAN on the CPU which is well attached to the mother board. there's a "X" like metalic bar on the other side.
I haven't test to removed it yet, maybe it's easy.

 

[DinohScene]

Time to invest in some surge protectors after reading this.

Shiet Cyan, I feel sorry for the losses :c

 

[naddel81]

all I hope is my HDD are fine so I can backup/rescue my data.
all other things are replaceable parts. costy, but replaceable.
Of course I could always re-get most of my data, but some of them were my own (development, pictures, logs, other personnal stuff that I would better recover)
My own fault for procrastinating instead of backup them up regularly...

How to I check the APC fuse?
I open the box and check inside?

The APC led seems to work fine (green)

you apc back-ups has a switch at the back side. if it came out then the fuse jumped out. you'd have to reset it. if the power LED is green and the switch cannot be pushed (=is already pushed in) then the surge did not come from outside the device. but it still should have protected all the connected devices, shouldn't it?

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

Time to invest in some surge protectors after reading this.

Shiet Cyan, I feel sorry for the losses :c

he says he has a power protection that did not work!

 

[sarkwalvein]

The electric company is required to pay for this kind of thing. But it may take several months because fucking bureaucracy.
It is so in Argentina, and I believe it may be the same in France.
That is ofc if somebody makes the claim.

 

[Cyan]

other devices are not really dead.
only the hdmi signal is dead.

The TV doesnt display any connected hdmi devices, but the TV itself still work (I can watch broadcasts, use the remote, etc.)
the PS4 it's the same, I can power it, synch the controller and move it (I can hear the sound effect of controller movement when plugging headphones to the controller) and I can put it to tandby or shutdown the console with the controller, but I can't see any picture.
I tried on 3 tvs.
I tried the recovery mode, but it didn't display anything.
it's like there's no video signal going through the PS4 (and no signal read on my TV)
That's why I thought only my graphic card was fried (the hdmi port) but it seems the bios/mother board is affected. I don't know about my graphic card then.



Edit :
A Friends says the mother board is maybe not dead, as I don't have to stay pressed on power button to shut it down.
I can press it shortly only.
not sure how reliable it is. He says it might be like the PS4, still working but something is wrong elsewere.


I removed the RAM, still no bip.
But I had to keep power pressed this time!
he sais that's normal without RAM.

HE also said if my keyboard works, then it means the CPU works, and mother board seems to work too.
"maybe" the buzzer is dead, and I don't hear any bip.
My monitor is maybe dead too ??

I tried to open a menu to change any monitor settings, but it doesn't work so maybe my monitor settings only work if there is a picture displayed.

I will go take a VGA cable at my parent's house and test VGA instead of DVI. and test VGA on another monitor, to check if my monitor is dead too.


Maybe my monitor is dead, and not my PC or mother board or graphic card.... Maybe my PC never bipped? (I thought it did but I rarely reboot it)
thought, the HDD made some strange noise so there's still something not normal happening there.

 

[Jack Daniels]

@Cyan could it be the surge protection of your mainboard is the burn out model? in that case there's varistors that collapsed (might look like a capasitor), or a fuse blown somewhere (might look like a resistor). both cut the power when there's something wrong either with the supplied power, or with a short circuit.

 

[Quantumcat]

A couple of weeks ago my parents' house was hit by lightning (mum described it as a flash of intense white light and someone clapping their hands hard right next to your ear). Surge protectors can't do anything about that sort of thing. Their computer and router were destroyed, also the electric dog fence around the property and the pump on the water tank. The home and contents insurance covered most of it though. I hope your insurance will cover your stuff too!

About the not wanting to call people, I understand that, when I was a kid/teenager I was really afraid of talking on the phone, because I'm partially deaf and was always afraid I wouldn't be able to understand the other person and it would be awkward or I'd accidentally say something wrong or embarrassing. So I always avoided the phone at all costs. But I'm not anymore, I think thanks to going on exchange for a year to a country where I hardly spoke a word of the language (which was super scary and traumatising) and then later living on campus at university. Unless you are diagnosed with an actual medical mental illness (in which case pills should be helping) you can eventually lose the fear by continually doing something just a little bit scary, until that thing isn't scary anymore, then doing a new thing that's a little bit scary (that used to be a lot scary), etc. Until so few things are scary you can do all the same things that other people can do without fear. If you don't ever venture into unknown territory then you'll never grow. You'll be afraid of the same things in 20 years that you're afraid of now. Anyway that's just some thoughts.

 

[Daggot]

This is why I have almost everything in my house plugged into a high quality surge protectors that come with insurance. We have alot of outages and surges around here and nothing ever happens but if my shit breaks while using their device they'll pay for it. It happened to a TV once and I don't plan on being caught with my pants down again.

 

[Quantumcat]

This is why I have almost everything in my house plugged into a high quality surge protectors that come with insurance. We have alot of outages and surges around here and nothing ever happens but if my shit breaks while using their device they'll pay for it. It happened to a TV once and I don't plan on being caught with my pants down again.

I don't think they'd cover lightning strikes, and they'd probably try to argue anything else isn't within the scope of what they are meant to protect from. You really need home and contents insurance.