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Post your first FAIL

Norton

Moderator - Returning from the Darkness
Joined
Dec 21, 2011
Messages
14,104 (2.85/day)
Location
Northeast USA
System Name Main PC- Gamer- Main Cruncher/Folder and too many crunching/folding rigs
Processor Ryzen 5900X- Ryzen 5950X- Ryzen 3950X and etc...
Motherboard Asrock X570 Extreme4- MSI X570S Tomahawk MAX WiFi- MSI B450M Bazooka Max and etc...
Cooling Noctua NH-U14S (dual fan)- EK 360 AIO with push/pull fans- Corsair H115i RGB Pro XT and etc...
Memory 2x16GB GSkill FlareX 3200/c14- 4x8GB Corsair Vengeance 3600/c16- 2x16GB Team 3600/c18 and etc..
Video Card(s) MSI Gaming RX 6800- Asus RTX 3070 TUF OC- MSI Ventus GTX 1660Ti and etc...
Storage Main PC (1TB WD SN850- 2TB PNY CS 3040- 2TB Seagate Firecuda) and etc...
Display(s) Main PC (2x24" Dell UltraSharp U2414H)
Case Phanteks P600s- Seasonic Q704- Fractal Meshify C and etc...
Audio Device(s) Logitech Z625 THX 2.1 speakers
Power Supply EVGA 750 G3- SeaSonic DGC 750- EVGA P2 850 and etc...
Mouse G300s
Keyboard Corsair K65
VR HMD N/A
Software Windows 10 Pro or Ubuntu
Benchmark Scores Why sit on the Bench when you can get in the game and Crunch!!!
Most of us have been building our own PC's for a long time and we all know with any success there is a near certain chance for FAIL

Post up your first big FAIL and the lesson learned from it....

Here's mine:

I was running a Socket A system with a 1Ghz Athlon at the time. In the middle of playing a game, Unreal I think it was, I heard a snap inside my PC followed by a rattling noise and a crash.

I was just at the wtf moment when the PC shut down and wouldn't restart??? Pulled the side panel off and realized that the CPU cooler had snapped off the socket and fell off into the bottom of the case.... burned the CPU out in like 10 seconds :wtf:

Lesson learned:
I always ensure my CPU runs as cool as possible and the cooler is mounted securely :p
 
Not that much of a fail though in my case. Forgot to reconnect the PCI-E connectors to the HD 4870. :laugh:
 
Was overclocking an Athlon X2 4400+ to 3.4ghz when my MSI Nforce 570 board caught on fire. I put the fire out reconnected everything and kept on trying. eventually succeeded so i backed it down to 2.8ghz and its run fine for 5+ years
 
Socket + wires = death. No need to say more. LOL
 
Cheapo MSI P45 Motherboard + Q6600 (B3) + 1.45v = FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIREEEEEEEE.

Next board was a DFI P45 which could deal with the heat...heh.
 
Most of us have been building our own PC's for a long time and we all know with any success there is a near certain chance for FAIL

Post up your first big FAIL and the lesson learned from it....

Here's mine:

I was running a Socket A system with a 1Ghz Athlon at the time. In the middle of playing a game, Unreal I think it was, I heard a snap inside my PC followed by a rattling noise and a crash.

I was just at the wtf moment when the PC shut down and wouldn't restart??? Pulled the side panel off and realized that the CPU cooler had snapped off the socket and fell off into the bottom of the case.... burned the CPU out in like 10 seconds :wtf:

Lesson learned:
I always ensure my CPU runs as cool as possible and the cooler is mounted securely :p


Do I happen to have that mobo now lol :laugh:


Mine would be I was updating the bios on a Shuttle AI6 slot A board and forced the wrong bios file and that spelled the end to that bios chip. I actually still have the bios chip but not the board.
 
My professor told me a story about a girl in his class who tried to remove RAM from a computer that was still turned on. :laugh:
 
Shitty PSU + motherboard screwed directly to the case (no spacers) = massive electrical sparks flying out.
 
My professor told me a story about a girl in his class who tried to remove RAM from a computer that was still turned on. :laugh:

What's wrong with that?! :ohwell:
 
My professor told me a story about a girl in his class who tried to remove RAM from a computer that was still turned on. :laugh:

ive done that - it just shuts off.

My first fail was when I was trying to overclock my voodoo banshee and forced too high of a refresh on the monitor... pop.

Then I tried to setup a raid system with old used drives on my emachines rig and a customg gfx (9550 pencil modded) with the stock PSU... also pop. Or that time I forgot to hook up my water pump after rebuilding wc loop on my q6600 almost melted the block's plastic fittings. Or the time one of the tubes popped off after leak testing and drenched both gtx 260's in the system. Or that time that the base of a CPU cooler touched a resistor and litterally burned my board on the back....

man... there was a lot of times. :roll:
 
Alot of years back i rebuild a p3 rig and i connected it wrong, luckely the psu had alot of Security features so only the psu burned:p
 
Installing a faulty PSU into a customers PC while he stands there watching.
I plug in the PSU and noticed I was getting a sharp pain where my forearm was touching the case.
Suspect electric shock.

I walk away for a few seconds and the other tech turns on the PC to find the PSU starts smoking infront of the customer.
 
My first AMD build, I forgot to properly push the arm down on the CPU socket. Bent about 10-12 pins on the X2 240 >_< My friend had to straighten them out and has never let me forget about it. lesson learned? Buy Intel and not have to worry about pins as much :D
 
Mine lead to me finding this site. It was a high end system when I built it. I had a 2800+Barton a friend got for me before its official release, a 9700 pro, 512mb of ddr400, a Shuttle mobo I can't remember, and a Hercules cooler. All in a Black Dragon case.

Where did it go wrong? In 2006 the HEC PSU failed and took everything out but the g-card and ram. Those I sold since AGP was a forgotten thing by that point. That is when I found out all psu's are not what they claim or of good quality.
 
Some of my biggest fails, well shit.....hmmm Memory not in, cpu heatsink not on, gpu card not in, cpu power not in, atx power not in and hard drives not it. Never fried anything though. Lucky ey!! :) mmmmmmmm beer! :)
 
Pulling out an AGP video card with the system still running. D'OH!
 
When mounting a Thermalright socket 478 cooler on my first custom build I built entirely myself I put the mounting bracket on the cooler upside down. So when I tightened the mounting screws they bottomed out but didn't actually put enough pressure on the cooler to have it hold down to the CPU.

The machine ran fine for a day when I had it sitting on its side while I was finishing up the cable management, gravity held the cooler down to the CPU. Then I turned the PC upright and the machine turned itself off almost instantly. It took me an hour to figure out why it was turning itself off when standing upright and working fine on its side. Then one time when I was turning it upright, I saw the CPU cooler "pop" off the CPU and instantly knew...
 
forgetting risers and wondering why pc wont say boot up
 
Do I happen to have that mobo now lol :laugh:


Mine would be I was updating the bios on a Shuttle AI6 slot A board and forced the wrong bios file and that spelled the end to that bios chip. I actually still have the bios chip but not the board.

The board you have is either that one or its replacement
- check the the CPU socket... if one of the cooler tabs is broken off then you have the one:laugh:

Luckily an aftermarket cooler's hold downs are different and I was able re-use the board with a different cooler. :cool:

The burnt CPU spent some time sitting on my desk with the blown connecting rod from the first and only engine I bought that I didn't rebuild myself before installing in my ride. Over the years both items seem to have disappeared.... only the memories remain.

Thanks to everyone for the responses and keep them coming:toast:
 
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The only part I have ever broken was an ASUS X800XT that I had hardmods on. The mod was acting really weird, so I cut it off the card...wit hthe system running.(oops). Cutting the mod with metal cutters lead to the mod being bypassed, and the memory fried.

Blown a few fan headers on boards..but they all still worked. Hardware is actually pretty resilient as long as you are not pushing it too hard.
 
The board you have is either that one or its replacement
- check the the CPU socket... if one of the cooler tabs is broken off then you have the one:laugh:

Luckily an aftermarket cooler's hold downs are different and I was able re-use the board with a different cooler. :cool:

The burnt CPU spent some time sitting on my desk with the blown connecting rod from the first and only engine I bought that I didn't rebuild myself before installing in my ride. Over the years both items seem to have disappeared.... only the memories remain.

Thanks to everyone for the responses and keep them coming:toast:

And that will be it. (Norton I will take special care of it since you have memories attached to it and if you need it back let me know) That exact board Norton was referring to is now the foundation for my win 98 build. The board still runs great. :toast:
 
Can't remember my first fail...so long ago, but I sometimes have some FAIL moments.
Just three days ago, I was trying to revive my NF7-S (because of Abit's site going down) and the darn thing wasn't POSTing. Constant long beeping (usually RAM related).
Took me a while before I noticed the floppy cable wasn't properly connected (upside down). :banghead:












Btw, typing this in said machine, via remote desktop on my laptop.
 
And that will be it. (Norton I will take special care of it since you have memories attached to it and if you need it back let me know) That exact board Norton was referring to is now the foundation for my win 98 build. The board still runs great. :toast:

That board found a good home- I get to see it when I check your progress on Project Old School :D
 
I touched my video card to see if it was warm, accidentally shorted something out because of my wedding ring.

Turned off instantly but rebooted just fine.
 
I touched my video card to see if it was warm, accidentally shorted something out because of my wedding ring.

Turned off instantly but rebooted just fine.

Oh hell I done that without the shorting part but I hit the fan and took some skin off. :laugh:
 
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