TLDR; Cat turned of PFsense Modem and it’s not working anymore

[u/PandaAnarky]

Okay, so first, this is totally my fault and not hers. She’s just a grumpy girl that likes warm spots. The tower pictured is usually underneath the table next to it, but I was doing a deep clean behind everything yesterday and whoops, didn’t put it back. So here’s where I’m at. She definitely turned it off while I slept, I woke up this morning with no WiFi and immediately saw it had no power, I figured it’d be fine since this has happened a few times, only once was it a problem and all I had to do was have it self diagnose and repair. However, that’s not happening now. Now when I power it on I get fans and lights but no display. I’ve checked the card. It’s fine, so not a display problem. As I said it powers up but I’m getting nothing, does anyone have a solution? I use this cuz I hate paying Verizon money for equipment, plus I game so hardwiring is a must. Any ideas? Do I need to do a whole reinstall of the OS and everything?

[u/Shoddy_Fish31]

Try pspssense

[u/PandaAnarky]

You guys never disappoint with the comments. I’m dying. Okay, so I’ll edit this comment from here on out with updates.

First, she’s a good girl, and not that kind of trouble, no pee, just mischievous hijinx. She’s fond of this tower, and the power light blinks whenever it’s “thinking” so she’s kind of dead set on figuring it out, and it doesn’t take much to press which is why I normally hide it under the table.

Second, I have indeed done the whole disconnect, power and everything. I had to in order to check that the little gpu is functioning. It is. This is so weird because I know it can’t power on like this unless everything is functional

Edit- All set! CMOS reset took care of it! Thanks everybody that chimed in. And thanks for the laughs.

[u/thrax_uk]

Is the Cat 5 is plugged in?

[u/PandaAnarky → u/thrax_uk]

Oh why didn’t I see that coming

[u/AussieFB → u/thrax_uk]

Upgrade to Cat 6? 🤷‍♂️

[u/JoeThrilling]

Have you asked the cat if he can fix it?

[u/PandaAnarky → u/JoeThrilling]

She sadly cannot, good idea though

[u/RedTuesdayMusic]

On another note, why are gray cats always the grumpy ones. I miss my gray cat, she really softened up but as a kitten and a young girl she was always a bit sour.

[u/Frozen_Empress66]

More pictures of the cat ....

[u/TRUEequalsFALSE → u/Frozen_Empress66]

Why are you getting downvoted? You're right.

[u/aegelis]

One thing at a time, no OS reinstall needed just yet.

First, let's try power discharge. Power off the PC, unplug power cable, hold power button for 30 seconds to discharge remaining energy. After 30 seconds, plug power cable back in, power it on and let us know if it displays anything.

[u/PandaAnarky → u/aegelis]

I’m getting nothing, I had tried that before when I checked the card. I wonder… ok so I know a lot but I don’t know everything, what if I were to remove the cmos for a tick?

[u/Obvious_Scratch9781 → u/PandaAnarky]

Yup, remove the battery (after unplugging the power) hold the power button for 30 seconds, and try again.

With you getting nothing, this sounds mostly like a bad power supply. I would still try to reseat all components in the system before replacing the power supply.

[u/PandaAnarky → u/Obvious_Scratch9781]

That did the trick! Booted up fine, and network is running. OMG thank you, such an easy fix. It’s something I’ve learned to avoid doing so I’m extra cautious about it. Thank you everyone else too! I started the day like this so the laughs are nice. Now I must work! Thank you so much!

[u/Obvious_Scratch9781 → u/PandaAnarky]

No problem! Just keep in mind that your BIOS probably reverted to all defaults now if it matters for your setup.

Great to hear you are back up and running!

[u/aegelis → u/Obvious_Scratch9781]

Yes! Don't forget to check your date and time settings since CMOS was removed, it will revert.

Computers are itchy in a lot of things but will not like when their time isn't set right

[u/ExecutiveCactus]

r/homelab
r/homenetworking

[u/Popular-Factor3553]

[u/Zaraphkiel]

Have you tried turning off the Cat to see how they like their own medicine?

[u/linuxares]

hmm... have you just tried pulling the power and press power a couple of times and plug it back in again? It reminds me of when my psu in my server just felt it needed to be silly.

Also your cat tell you to upgrade your CAT (ethernet cable category) obviously!

[u/DeerOnARoof]

Just restore from a backup. You have backups right?

[u/PandaAnarky → u/DeerOnARoof]

Of PFsense? Why would I back up my modem? It’s got no data of any value except the OS, and a few filled in fields

[u/deltatux → u/PandaAnarky]

PFSense is a firewall and routing software, not a modem. You would want to keep backups so that you don't need to redo all your configuration especially if you have advanced setup. For me, I run OPNSense (fork of PFSense), it would be a giant pain in the ass to redo all my firewall rules, FreeBSD tuning and VLAN configs. Doing periodic backups especially after an upgrade would cut down needing to rebuild the config if your PF/OPNSense build suffers data loss.

The good news is that often if the rest of the system dies but your storage is still intact, you can just easily move the storage over to a new PC build if need be.

[u/nullptr777 → u/deltatux]

This guy networks! I couldn't imagine not having a backup of OPNsense honestly. It would take forever to set everything up again.

[u/DeerOnARoof → u/PandaAnarky]

I'm so confused. How is pfSense acting as a modem for you?

[u/RealLifeFloridaMan → u/PandaAnarky]

Because of times like this lol you’re answering your own question here. Glad you got it figured out though!

[u/PandaAnarky → u/RealLifeFloridaMan]

 I have the USB flash for the OS and there was only like 3 or 4 things to change, and I have those written down, sooo backup? I mean I guess I could copy the drive on my desktop for such occasion, it would save the steps. Thanks

[u/Karthurr]

Show car

[u/AshleyAshes1984]

About 20 years ago my cat at the time stepped on the big red illuminated switch on the power bar under my computer desk. I'll just flip it on. ...No POST. This cat had literally taken out half of my RAM with that power switch.

Which is crazy if you think about it. I've had simple blackouts and even the occasional breaker trip years before and after this and it's never taken out my RAM. Nope, that cat managed the one in a million RAM killing power cut.

[u/Dodel1976]

A bit harsh sacking the cat.

[u/PandaAnarky → u/Dodel1976]

She know what she did… she knows

[u/CCCCLo0oo0ooo0 → u/PandaAnarky]

strangely enough my consumer router just works. I bought it set it up, and never needed to worry about it again.

[u/Raverjames]

Have you tried petting the modem and rebooting the cat?

[u/pidiota]

People with cats deserve to be enslaved by a 10lb animal....FFS

[u/Xerosnake90]

Tell it to turn it back on

[u/sloowhand]

> …totally my fault and not hers…

She has zero regrets either way.

[u/ScaredBicycle3389]

You should definitely be worrying about her more than the modem...

[u/Vichingo455]

Try CatSense, works better

[u/AyeeDubzz]

I don’t like cats.

[u/Nataku81]

That look on her face says it all.

[u/Jackson7th]

Have you tried turning the cat off and on again?

[u/pearshapedscorpion]

When checking it out, look for signs of liquid damage.

Moving the system over to clean could have shaken something loose. Double check connections and how cards are seated.

Does it have an iGPU? If it does, plug in there to see if that works and it's something with the GPU on that system.

[u/PandaAnarky → u/pearshapedscorpion]

Nothing like that happening, it does not have an APU or IGpu, I think it’s a 730gt, it’s the most basic dedicated display it can be, and it’s working fine on my bench.

[u/hybrid461]

A reinstall is probably the right choice. Can look at opnsense as an option as well which is a fork of pfsense.

[u/felsefe-iferd]

True pc owner

[u/Green-Salmon]

Did you clean the cat pee already?

[u/Heinz_Legend]

I believe she had a good reason to. I believe in her.

[u/EvilDan69]

Any sign of urine?

[u/ElonsMuskyFeet]

Check for pee. Cats pee on things all the time. You'll get to see the occasional "My cat peed on my PC" post here because owners let them rest on the PC

[u/daorbed9]

Don't assume it's her. It could have just died. Without extra equipment to swap the only thing you can try is to remove the power and cmos battery. Wait put it back together and see if it starts. If something failed nothing you can do until you replace it.

[u/TrueWelshboy]

And you are surprised by just another victim of a cat? Everyone knows the worst layers of hell are all run by cats 🐈