Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Most Common Ways to Kill a PC

Posted by Zonk on from the don't-let-out-the-magic-smoke dept.

Sparky the Service Center Dude writes "PCstats covers the most common ways to kill a PC in this "what not to do" guide. Everything from exploding capacitors, to cat hair, to dodgy components and overclocking account for users killing their own PC's. The most common PC killer? The Power Supply."

7 of 593 comments (clear)

  1. Most common problems by larry2k · · Score: 5, Informative
    Most Common Problems:

    26% PSU and power issues
    23% Bad gear and user negligence
    13% Heatsink related
    15% Assembly and moving
    10% Lightning strike and static
    3% Computer cruelty
    6% USB related
    2% Overclocking

    --

    The package said "Windows XP or better. Pentium Class Processor or better"... So I got a Mac with OS X

  2. Mirrordot copy by Phil246 · · Score: 5, Informative

    heres the Mirrordot copy incase the thing totally dies: http://mirrordot.org/stories/4ec4acbeb790ac0270a10 94afdd09d56/index.html

    1. Re:Mirrordot copy by Piquan · · Score: 3, Informative

      If only it had more than the first page.

  3. Re:Interesting by PedanticSpellingTrol · · Score: 5, Informative
    Obviously you've never worked on a heavy smoker's computer if ANY amount of fluffy gray dust can still bother you...

    Once you've seen the gooey orange stuff, you'll be thankful for mere hairballs.

  4. PSU, Heart of the system by Man+in+Spandex · · Score: 4, Informative

    I'm not surprised that PSU related problems is on top seeing how it's the most important component of the computer but the one that people seem to pay the least attention.

    What people must understand is that they need a PSU that have the most stable rails (such as the +5 & +12 rails) and that isn't made by Mr. Bingo Bongo. Sure you can save around $20-30 going with a cheaper PSU but that action is a gamble. Are you a gambler? My friend sure was. Bought some power supply made by some unknown manufacturer and he's still surprised that it was the cause of his exploding CD-Rom.

    People in general should take power supply reviews more seriously and consider to spend the extra bucks to hafve something that will work for years as you want it to.

    1. Re:PSU, Heart of the system by Ogerman · · Score: 3, Informative

      I'm not surprised that PSU related problems is on top seeing how it's the most important component of the computer but the one that people seem to pay the least attention.

      At one of my jobs, a client had a lab full of fairly new computers with cheapo supplies. I kid you not: within 1 year, 25 out of 40 supplies failed and in three cases the motherboard and CPU were destroyed in the process. When I came onboard, I made it a policy that any machine found to crash at random would immediately have its supply yanked and replaced with a quality one. (indication of pending failure..) User complaints dropped rapidly as reliability instantly went up.

      What people must understand is that they need a PSU that have the most stable rails (such as the +5 & +12 rails) and that isn't made by Mr. Bingo Bongo. Sure you can save around $20-30 going with a cheaper PSU but that action is a gamble.

      It's not even just stable rails. (although this is one indication of quality..) I've found by examination of fried supplies that the cheapo varieties don't have much in the way of protection circuitry. All power supplies die at some point. That's a given. The quality ones just die gracefully and don't take the rest of your hardware with them.

      As for price, the amazing thing is that there's not always that much difference between a quality budget supply and a total garbage one. I've found 300W Fortron (FSP-300) supplies in the $25-30 range. They're not top of the line, but I've yet to have a problem either.

  5. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 3, Informative

    Comment removed based on user account deletion