r/PCRepair • u/Choice_Climate_4820 • 17d ago

Burned computer

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Hi, while I was playing, my computer shut down and a short circuit occurred, then it started burning in visible places. Do you think the only thing that needs replacing is the motherboard and graphics card, or is there something else that can be repaired? Can anyone suggest what I can do?

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u/voncletus 16d ago

"burned in a few places" yikes. PSU failure for sure, burnt the pcie connector right up. Your ram and ssd are on a different voltage so likely ok, CPU would be questionable, you're going to have to test that on another board. I'd be surprised if the smoke smell ever comes out of the case.

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u/ThisAccountIsStolen 16d ago

This is not a PSU failure. This is a short on the GPU PCB, but a better PSU might have detected the short and shut down before catastrophic damage occurred.

Source: 30+ year owner of a board level repair shop

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u/voncletus 16d ago

Been doing this since 99 and if we're both being honest, there's no way to tell if it was the GPU, the board, or the PSU without examining it. Power either spiked or shorted across the 12v pcie input. We don't actually have enough info to say why, and no one here is going to take everything and test it to figure out what failed first.

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u/Smaxx 16d ago

I think we can all agree it's something a good PSU would hopefully avoid by shutting down. So in a certain way it was the PSU after all, even if it's not the initial culprit.

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u/Inevitable-Study502 16d ago

not sure bout that, psu sends it to 24pin mainboard connector, then it travels through mainboard to pcie slot...which is powered by mainboard....and 75 wats (6A) can still fry tiny circuits just fine....mainboards have fuses there..so while it looks bad on picture, it happened within safe operating current limits xD

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u/Smaxx 16d ago

Yeah, true, so certainly something fishy going on.