I can't use my pc, what has happened? | Linus Tech Tips | Page 1

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 5:28 PM

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I have a i5-2310, 8gb of ram and a rx470. My pc was running great around 2 weeks ago, but when I came home from work one day, My pc didn't even show anything. I tried everything, reseated my GPU, RAM, CPU and so on. I tried a GTX670, didn't work aswell! I need someone's help, to figure out what happened. I may have a suspicion, that the PCI-E lane has been busted or something :/

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Additional info: My monitor was trying to show something, but only a black screen, and then showed no signal. Worse thing is, in an effort to get this over with and upgrade my pc, I bought a Ryzen 3 1200 and a A320 motherboard off of marketplace (and got scammed lol)

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(Also, there may have been the fact the solder has somehow unstuck from the gpu, because it's a mining card, that i made into a gaming gpu)

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 5:52 PM

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wsp gang

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what happens when you turn the computer on

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any fans spin any leds anything

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 5:53 PM

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fans spin, no video

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 5:53 PM

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How fast do they spin

supple quest Sep 28, 2023, 5:53 PM

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Did you make sure the monitor was turned on?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 5:53 PM

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well at idle speed

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 5:53 PM

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okay

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 5:53 PM

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yes, many times cycled my monitor's inputs

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 5:54 PM

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so that should mean at least the motherboard boots and can read the cpu temperature and control the fan curves & whatever

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and

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booting requires the cpu to be working

supple quest Sep 28, 2023, 5:54 PM

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dusty prawn yes, many times cycled my monitor's inputs

Are there any debug lights on the motherboard?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 5:55 PM

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no, it's a budget h61 mobo

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 5:57 PM

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if you press caps lock on your keyboard what happens

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 5:58 PM

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when i had my ssd installed, it did light up as far as i remember

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 5:58 PM

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What lit up

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 5:58 PM

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the caps lock light

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 5:58 PM

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Oh yeah exactly

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Do u not have ur ssd installed now

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 5:59 PM

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i gave the gpu to my friend to test it, no signal for him too

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which might be the cause probably

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i'll need to resolder it ig

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:04 PM

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do you have any other gpu to try

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does your friend have one

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:12 PM

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He does, but he already went home :/

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:16 PM

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hmkay then try swapping that into your motherboard

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in the meantime, do you have another x16 slot on the board?

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electrical width doesn't really matter just as long as it physically fits

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:18 PM

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no, unfortunately

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:19 PM

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hmh figures if it's a cheap board

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does the cpu have integrated graphics?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:19 PM

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yes

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but no vga cable

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:20 PM

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grah

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:20 PM

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i'll try to boot my pc with the 670 again

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:21 PM

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does the motherboard only have vga output??

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Oh i guess if it's from that era

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when is that

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second gen core that's gotta be in like 2010

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:21 PM

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2012

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:21 PM

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still

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That's when vga was still pretty ubiquitous

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:22 PM

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yea

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:22 PM

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have you rummaged through your house in case you have an adapter laying about

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:22 PM

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i might take the gpu to my friend, ask if he can redo the solders that i made

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no luck there mate

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:22 PM

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eep

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:22 PM

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went thru everything

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:23 PM

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dusty prawn i might take the gpu to my friend, ask if he can redo the solders that i made

What did you solder???

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:23 PM

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it's a mining card

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i had to activate the hdmi port

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it worked

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:23 PM

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whattahell

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:23 PM

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for a lil bit

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:23 PM

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okay

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Ok so im suspecting the gpu has just died tbh

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like

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it's a ten year old piece of kit that's a good life expectancy

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:24 PM

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i mean

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the rx470 is kinda new

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i bought it 2 weeks ago or so ago

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:24 PM

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Oh i read 670

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yeah polaris is decent

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:25 PM

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the gtx 670 was the main gpu

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:25 PM

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i have a 580 in my couch pc

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:25 PM

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before the rx470

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:25 PM

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oh and that makes more sense i was thinking "there were mining gpus in 2012??"

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:25 PM

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haha

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:26 PM

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but polaris/pascal was right around the first big mining boom wasnt it

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:26 PM

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yeah, as far as i know

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:26 PM

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mhm

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:26 PM

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welp

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no cs2 for me haha

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:27 PM

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Okay but try your gpus in your friends motherboard and try your friends gpu in your motherboard

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and get a vga cable to check the motherboard output

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:27 PM

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my 470 didn't work in my and his mobo

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:27 PM

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the 670?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:28 PM

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the 670 worked

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:28 PM

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In his

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:28 PM

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but not anymore

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:28 PM

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But not yours?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:28 PM

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in his yes

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not mine

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:29 PM

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so you first tried the 470 in your machine and then in his and neither worked

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:29 PM

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i tried the 470 in mine, then gave it to him, didn't work aswell

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:29 PM

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and then the 670 in your machine and it didn't work and then in his machine and it worked and then in yours again and it didn't?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 6:29 PM

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yea

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:30 PM

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what gpu does he have

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because I'm wondering if there are drivers missing

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because it sounds like

left jay Sep 28, 2023, 6:31 PM

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if there were no drivers it should at least fall back on windows default drivers

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 6:31 PM

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either both your graphics card AND motherboard are broken

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if a known functioning gpu isn't working

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like you said there could be something wrong with the slot

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or heaven forbid the power delivery

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actually

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If there was a power malfunction for any number of reasons it could have gone through the pcie slot and the gpu at the same time

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which feels more likely than both the gpu and the board frying through separate events

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But if you put the 670 in your machine and it was fine in his i think the motherboard is at least not a danger of frying your other components

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:03 PM

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so in short, motherboard's the issue?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:03 PM

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mellow oar what gpu does he have

gtx 970

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:04 PM

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dusty prawn so in short, motherboard's the issue?

maybe 😭

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i mean evidently the gpu doesn't work either

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:05 PM

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to be honest, at this point im fed up with what's happened

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:05 PM

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Or maybe it does and his windows install just doesn't like it

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:05 PM

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i could do a fresh install of windows

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:05 PM

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if he runs nvdia and it's an amd card i mean

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yeah you could

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:05 PM

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he ddu'd it

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:05 PM

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or well just booting bios would probably be enough

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:06 PM

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dusty prawn he ddu'd it

hm then maybe not

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:06 PM

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by far the worst thing was

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:06 PM

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Ok but try his known working card in your motherboard and see

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:06 PM

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is that i got scammed in the middle of this thing

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which genuinely sucks

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:07 PM

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if it still doesn't work i think we can conclude the gpu itself isn't the only fault

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:07 PM

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dusty prawn which genuinely sucks

It does

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:07 PM

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i've would've had this done by monday

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:07 PM

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what happened?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:07 PM

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so

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i found a ad on marketplace

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:07 PM

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Facebook?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:07 PM

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of a ryzen 3 1200 and a a320 mobo for 40 euro

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yes

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and i thought, hey! great deal! i should buy it!

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so i texted the guy, he said sure, i'll send it out today

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i thought great, i'll have it in saturday or monday

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and monday passes

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sent the dude a message asking where's the package

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he said his friend sent it out on monday, i should have it by (today)

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today came and went

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no mobo in sight

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i did some digging, found he's some kid trying to sell old android phones and tablets

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trying to make a quick buck

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and in hindsight, it was too good to be true

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but eh, we learn from mistakes

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:10 PM

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Ryzen 3 1200 on an A320 mobo frankly isn't worth much more than 40€

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Not that I'm trying to lecture you or anything

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I feel sorry that you got swindled like that

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It could still be that the shipping is just hanging up, but if the kit doesn't show up tell them you're filing a police report next

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:13 PM

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that's what i'm doing next week

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:13 PM

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that usually is enough to spook slow senders, then just file the report if nothing comes from it

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:13 PM

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i'm giving him the benefit of the doubt, i'll see maybe it'll arrive tomorrow

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:14 PM

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formal silo that usually is enough to spook slow senders, then just file the report if nothi...

i found his parents facebook accounts, i could just message them

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:14 PM

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Yeah who knows, like I said could be that the shipping is just hanging up

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:14 PM

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I mean

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usually it takes 3 days max to ship across the country

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:15 PM

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formal silo It could still be that the shipping is just hanging up, but if the kit doesn't s...

Yeah man the post office has gotten awfully ineffective at least over here

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i always try to pick up used stuff myself

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i live pretty centrally though so that might not be an option for everyone

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:16 PM

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Yeah I have no context for what country you live in but it's pretty typical for packages to get hung up every now and then here

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:16 PM

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i mean, my country has not really a post office defiecency

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:16 PM

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Hmh nobody really sends time critical things with mail anymore so they don't really have pressure to be quick

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Which country may i ask?

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:16 PM

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Finland

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:17 PM

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Latvia

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:17 PM

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And yeah usually packages arrive within 2-4 businessdays here

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but sometimes they get hung up and then you're waiting more along the lines of 5-10 businessdays

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:18 PM

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Same!

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:18 PM

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I imagine our shipment logistics are probably fairly similar since we're so close geologically

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:18 PM

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I mean, I called the post office and asked if there's any like problems with shipping times

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but they said no

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:19 PM

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Hmm... Yeah that's kinda suspicious

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:20 PM

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dusty prawn I mean, I called the post office and asked if there's any like problems with shi...

If you're mailing anything actually valuable u should always get a tracked package tbh

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:20 PM

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Yeah I know, he didn't even send me one

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Which makes it much more suspicious

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:21 PM

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You didn't get a tracking number?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:21 PM

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Nope

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:21 PM

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Damn

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:21 PM

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okay not to blame the victim here but for future reference
Get the seller to take like a picture of the package and a confirmation that it's been shipped somehow

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:21 PM

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Yeah

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:21 PM

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did you say he was a kid?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:21 PM

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Yep

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As far as my research goes

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:22 PM

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This post was originally about a PC that won't turn on

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Could you bring me up to speed real quick about it? I would like to take a crack at diagnosing it.

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:24 PM

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Went home from work, turned on my pc, boots, but no video

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tried with different gpu, mobo and so on

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nothing

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and

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i'll try resoldeering the rx470 i have

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(because it's a mining card)

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:26 PM

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What remedies have you done so far?

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Or... Tried.

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:27 PM

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Reseated ram, cpu, gpu, tried different mobo, 1 stick of ram, no ram, different gpu's and even a different pc

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:29 PM

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You mentioned that you think the PCI-E slot is busted.

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:29 PM

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yes

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:29 PM

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You could honestly do a very simple set up to test this theory.

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Take the motherboard completely out of the system, set it up to run on bare minimum. Nothing else except the CPU, single stick of RAM and a PSU

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The CPU has integrated graphics, so you should be able to get a display out from the motherboard.

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:30 PM

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i'll try to find a vga cable

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:32 PM

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alright

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:32 PM

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I can't find any

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:(

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:32 PM

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Well that would've been one way to test that theory...

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I think the answer might be a bit simpler though

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The motherboard is an old one from a prebuilt right?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:33 PM

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like, from an optiplex?

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:33 PM

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A vga cable costs like five dollars

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that's an easy troubleshooting step

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:33 PM

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i'll go to a store to buy one

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:33 PM

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Yeah... Look for an electronics store at this hour that sells VGA

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:34 PM

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no-one's open

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:34 PM

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are we in some kind of hurry?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:34 PM

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i'll get it tomorrow

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:34 PM

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dusty prawn no-one's open

Exactly

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:34 PM

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not really

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:34 PM

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Not at all

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:34 PM

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omg ur obsessed with foxes

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that's so real

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:34 PM

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Oh dear...

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:34 PM

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i love foxes

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can you tell

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:35 PM

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Yeah

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:35 PM

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Heh

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they're cute!

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and cool

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Anyway back on topic

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:35 PM

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dusty prawn like, from an optiplex?

Anyway as I was saying

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Yeah, like from an optiplex or basically any prebuilt system for that matter?

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:35 PM

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no, it's an asrock h61m-vs

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:36 PM

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It's always good to see LGA1155 still kicking around

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What I was saying is that, the motherboard is very old at this point

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And that generation of mobos reaaaaally didn't like it if the CMOS battery ran out

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So it's possible that you just need to replace it

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:37 PM

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I have a spare one from a different h61 mobo

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(which has it's pins bent lol)

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:37 PM

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Ideally you would buy a brand new battery

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If it's from a different H61 mobo, it's just as old

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:38 PM

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True, I'll go to a pc store tomorrow

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:38 PM

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Maybe tomorrow when you're buying that VGA cable you could also buy a CR2032 battery?

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:38 PM

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dusty prawn True, I'll go to a pc store tomorrow

Excellent.

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:39 PM

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formal silo Maybe tomorrow when you're buying that VGA cable you could also buy a CR2032 bat...

Alright

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I'll keep this up, I'll ping y'all tomorrow if there's a improvement on the situation

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:40 PM

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Sounds like a plan

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:40 PM

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Yes king

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:40 PM

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Alright, see y'all later!

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:40 PM

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we're all in the same time zone aren't we

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Yeah it's good night tbqh

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:40 PM

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gmt+2?

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:40 PM

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uh

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idk

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sweden

dusty prawn Sep 28, 2023, 7:40 PM

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yeah, then we're in the same one

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Alright, goodnight y'all!

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:42 PM

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nightynight sleep tight

formal silo Sep 28, 2023, 7:44 PM

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Except for me, I'm an hour ahead

mellow oar Sep 28, 2023, 7:49 PM

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cannot lie i do not know enough geography for this

dusty prawn Sep 30, 2023, 4:57 AM

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No luck, they were closed yesterday

formal silo Sep 30, 2023, 7:29 AM

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Maybe next week then

dusty prawn Oct 3, 2023, 12:49 PM

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I ordered a Ryzen 5 3600 and a A520 mobo, just to sneak in an upgrade ;)

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But now my main question is

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What do I do about my RX470?

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Because it might be a problem, that it might have no vbios

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Or, it still has a mining bios on it

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Because on first boot it showed an image

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Or maybe i have a faulty memory haha

formal silo Oct 3, 2023, 12:57 PM

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Honestly you could try it in another system to confirm but I won't be willing to bet on it being broken until we can confirm that the LGA1155 mobo is in fact completely dead.

dusty prawn Oct 3, 2023, 1:03 PM

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Well, I could retry with my GTX670

formal silo Oct 3, 2023, 1:07 PM

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It's worth a shot

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I know you said you think the PCI-E slot was broken.

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Did you ever get around to replacing the CMOS battery and trying to see if you can get picture directly from the mobo with VGA?

dusty prawn Oct 3, 2023, 1:15 PM

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I did not, didn't find any time to get those

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But, I'll just replace the CPU and motherboard, since I needed an upgrade

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And for now, I'll use my 670

formal silo Oct 3, 2023, 1:15 PM

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Fair enough

dusty prawn Oct 3, 2023, 1:17 PM

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Lemme try and boot up the system with the 670 real quick

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No luck :/

formal silo Oct 3, 2023, 1:25 PM

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Just to confirm

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You did try clearing CMOS as well?

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Sorry can't remember the exact troubleshoot steps you've taken, it's been a while.

dusty prawn Oct 3, 2023, 1:25 PM

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Yeah, many times

formal silo Oct 3, 2023, 1:26 PM

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Yeaaah... It's either the mobo or the CPU then.

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If it's mobo, it will be a nightmare to track down a replacement.

dusty prawn Oct 3, 2023, 1:26 PM

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Replacements are easy

formal silo Oct 3, 2023, 1:26 PM

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CPUs are pretty cheap for LGA1155 but they're kinda bad by today's standards.

dusty prawn Oct 3, 2023, 1:27 PM

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I have some old pc's in my city's youth centre

formal silo Oct 3, 2023, 1:27 PM

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Bro has a literal gold mine to dig through.

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You have any idea how hard it is to track down a fully functional LGA1155 mobo?

dusty prawn Oct 3, 2023, 1:27 PM

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Very easy here

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for around 15 euro or so

formal silo Oct 3, 2023, 1:28 PM

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It's the biggest issue for Intel, their mobos just die. The CPUs themselves are easy to find but the moment you need a mobo it's going to be a nightmare.

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You're pretty much stuck with prebuilt PC motherboards which are not ideal because of how locked down they are.

dusty prawn Oct 3, 2023, 1:30 PM

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formal silo It's the biggest issue for Intel, their mobos just die. The CPUs themselves are ...

Good thing is, I have 3 LGA1155 mobo's in the youth centre

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Just waiting for the service time for the PC's to end

formal silo Oct 3, 2023, 2:04 PM

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I guess there's not much else to it. Once you have your system setup with the new components, it should work again as usual.

dusty prawn Oct 4, 2023, 4:56 AM

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I hope so haha

dusty prawn Oct 13, 2023, 3:34 PM

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Update: It is the mobo, the 470 is fine, 670 is fine, ordering a ryzen 3 2200g and a b450 mobo, as a replacement :)

formal silo Oct 13, 2023, 3:37 PM

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Why are you buying a 2200g chip?

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Ah well... Then again you are still running a 470

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ig it'll be fine.

#I can't use my pc, what has happened?