Motherboard Caught on Fire

CCIEWANNABE

Ok, So I'm in the process of building my computer and I hooked everything up, Case, PSU, CPU, Mobo, RAM, Video card and turned on the computer. I heard some snapping sounds and realized that my mobo had caught fire and was smoking like crazy. I pulled the power cord from the PSU and was in shock. WTF? really, did that really just happen? It was like something out of a movie. I mean, who's computer catches on fire? Anyway, this was the second mobo for my computer build, the first wouldn't POST. Now I find myself RMA'ing 2 mobo's and a PSU. I don't even know if the memory or CPU are bad, the fire wasn't around those devices, and I will get them tested. What the hell is going on? This is just crazy! Someone doesn't want me to build this GNS3/Dynamips Server.


To read the old thread on my computer problems last week follow the link below:

http://www.techexams.net/forums/off-topic/47703-help-blank-monitor-new-pc-build.html

mikej412

What brand motherboard(s) are you using?

MSI? I think I needed some cheap video cards once -- and 2 of the 3 MSI video cards had issues. If it's the same MSI then maybe the next one will be the "good one."

I usually go for Intel or ASUS motherboards for my "good systems" at home.

dynamik

Maybe you should put that CCIE on hold and focus on the A+

I kid, I kid...

tiersten

Did you check again that you don't have any extra metal standoff posts? That is usually why a motherboard shorts out and starts letting out the magic smoke.

CompuTron99

Sounds like a rogue metal stand-off under the motherboard.

JDMurray

Something was certainly shorted somewhere. I've seen electrolytic caps pop on audio cards and on mobos. You can smoke the CPU if it's installed incorrectly, or the voltage settings in the BIOS are wrong, and the CPU itself is visibly blackened. A bad PSU supplying over-voltage can just destroy everything.

And don't be surprised the vendor won't RMA electronic components that are obviously damaged. I've had to eat the cost of a couple of CPUs because of a "you break it you bought it" no-return policy.

CCIEWANNABE

there was no metal anything under the board, or on the case as far as I could tell that would have shorted it out. I think it was a bad PSU because I could hear like a pulsing noise coming from it when I plugged in the power cord to the PSU every minute or so. I think it was over supplying power to the mobo and caused it to catch on fire.

As far as the parts, yeah i can RMA everything the first 30 days of having it. So what I'm gonna do is take the cpu and ram to a computer store nearby who does free diagnostics and have them check both.

Silentsoul

dynamik wrote: »

Maybe you should put that CCIE on hold and focus on the A+

I kid, I kid...

I lolz on this.

But on a serious note, I have had capacitors give it up and burn a little spot in the board. But the machine in question had been working for around 5 years and ran almost 24/7.

Sounds like you made a mistake somewhere, chalk it up to a learning tax. It happens, how bad was it? pictures?

Also be ready for that smell to stick around for DAYS!

tiersten

CCIEWANNABE wrote: »

there was no metal anything under the board, or on the case as far as I could tell that would have shorted it out.

Did you check that the standoffs screwed into the motherboard tray actually matched up with the mounting holes on the motherboard though? No random dropped screws or anything?

CCIEWANNABE wrote: »

I think it was a bad PSU because I could hear like a pulsing noise coming from it when I plugged in the power cord to the PSU every minute or so.

The noise is the PSU trying to regulate the voltage whilst its output is shorted. It'll ramp up the voltage because the high current going through the short will pull it down. This will trigger the overcurrent protection if the PSU has it and cause it to shutdown.

CCIEWANNABE wrote: »

I think it was over supplying power to the mobo and caused it to catch on fire.

IMO it is something to do with the motherboard. If the PSU failed and started outputting 12V or whatever on a lower voltage rail then most of the PC parts will have failed with a bang.

CCIEWANNABE wrote: »

As far as the parts, yeah i can RMA everything the first 30 days of having it.

You should look at what terms the return is under. Usually they won't accept items which were damaged by the user.

CCIEWANNABE wrote: »

So what I'm gonna do is take the cpu and ram to a computer store nearby who does free diagnostics and have them check both.

If it really was the PSU outputting the wrong voltage then your CPU and RAM are probably dead.

tiersten

Silentsoul wrote: »

But on a serious note, I have had capacitors give it up and burn a little spot in the board. But the machine in question had been working for around 5 years and ran almost 24/7.

One of the failure modes for an electrolytic capacitor is that drendrites form which then cause it to short out. This usually causes a bang as the internal temperature of the capacitor reaches the boiling point of the electrolyte.

The other main one is the breakdown of the electrolyte caused by high temperature. A few years back, there was a case of industrial espionage where the formula for an electrolyte was stolen from another company. It was put into production but they didn't know that it was missing some key components which stabilised it over long periods of time. This caused a massive recall of many electronic devices including some big name brands.

Silentsoul wrote: »

Also be ready for that smell to stick around for DAYS!

Yeah. The burnt electrolyte smell will stay around for days and your clothes/hair will stink of it if you're in the room when it happens.

arwes

If you want something to test your power supply, I've got one of these at our office and it works fairly well:

FrozenCPU ATX 2.0 Ultimate LCD Power Supply Tester (20/24 pin ATX, SATA, P4, Xeon, PCI-E, Floppy, 4 pin) - FrozenCPU.com

Had a coworker bring his PS in and try it and it said it was working fine, but we replaced it anyway and his computer has been fine ever since (it was randomly rebooting).

Edit: Also, I gotta believe there's something that's in that case touching the bottom of the motherboard. Is the tray removable? If so take that thing out and see if you can see anything touching. That happened to a friend of mine and it was quite the light show with the blue arcing all over the board.

tiersten

arwes wrote: »

If you want something to test your power supply, I've got one of these at our office and it works fairly well:

FrozenCPU ATX 2.0 Ultimate LCD Power Supply Tester (20/24 pin ATX, SATA, P4, Xeon, PCI-E, Floppy, 4 pin) - FrozenCPU.com

Those test units aren't infallible because they can't test the voltages under a realistic load. The tiny unit will only provide a small load that is enough to keep the PSU running. It'd tell you if something is really badly wrong still though.

eMeS

Back in the early 90's we installed a number of large-scale Unix machines produced by a company at the time called "Pyramid".

These were installed in a large data center equipped with halon, etc. On one occasion one of these machines caught fire, causing the halon to release in that specific zone. On another occasion, one of these machines caught fire, but we happened to be in the area and were able to manually hold the halon while someone put out the fire.

Point being, sometimes electrical equipment catches on fire. If I remember correctly weren't some laptop manufacturers having problems a couple of years ago with laptops lighting up? I would much rather have it happen in a controlled data center with proper fire suppression than in my home or on my lap or on a plane.

Reading this post kind of makes me nervous about the 2 or 3 pieces of equipment at home that run 24x7....

MS

abefroman

CCIEWANNABE wrote: »

Ok, So I'm in the process of building my computer and I hooked everything up, Case, PSU, CPU, Mobo, RAM, Video card and turned on the computer. I heard some snapping sounds and realized that my mobo had caught fire and was smoking like crazy. I pulled the power cord from the PSU and was in shock. WTF? really, did that really just happen? It was like something out of a movie. I mean, who's computer catches on fire? Anyway, this was the second mobo for my computer build, the first wouldn't POST. Now I find myself RMA'ing 2 mobo's and a PSU. I don't even know if the memory or CPU are bad, the fire wasn't around those devices, and I will get them tested. What the hell is going on? This is just crazy! Someone doesn't want me to build this GNS3/Dynamips Server.


To read the old thread on my computer problems last week follow the link below:

http://www.techexams.net/forums/off-topic/47703-help-blank-monitor-new-pc-build.html

That happened to me once before, it is most likely the power supply. I build server for a large web hosting company and had a batch of a about 10 power supplies, that would short.

I would plug on it, it would blow the circuit, go to the next one same thing, tried a different MB etc, then finally one of them didn't short and instead caught the mother board on fire.

One my there was a burn mark on the spot where the PSU connects to the MB.

I now buy supermicro cases with the PSU already inside.

RobertKaucher

Back in the day when I worked at the Geek Squad I once had an old lady, 60ish, bring in her eMchines desktop. This was not when eMachines totally sucked, but was only a few years ago when they just plain sucked.

I knew something was wrong when I took it from her and heard a heavy clunk. I though "uh oh." And opened the case to find the heat sink/fan was no longer connected to the board because there was a melted hole where the CPU used to be.

I have seen a lot of stuff in my life, but this is one that tops the list for computers. That and the Mac I had to return to a customer in a biohazard bag. Don't ask!

veritas_libertas

Since I am studying for the Security+ certification the first thing that came to mind when I saw the title of this post was: "Oh look! A class C fire!"

Sorry! I know that was just wrong...

abefroman

veritas_libertas wrote: »

Since I am studying for the Security+ certification the first I thing I thought of when seeing the title of this post was: "Oh look! A class C fire!"

Sorry! I know that was just wrong...

Better fill the room with C02 or FM200.

Plantwiz

You stated your CPU wasn't harmed, but your post reminded me of a customer who insisted on buiding his own machine. Bought all his parts and went home to assemble. Returned to the store about 2 hours later, purchased a new CPU.......ok...returned a hour later with his whole box and both CPUs wondering what he did wrong.

I started to check in his box for service but with him at the counter and telling me the story we started to look through things there on the spot...start disassembling the cables and things, pulled the ram, and for grins I pulled the CPU...there on the bottom of the HS was two freshly stamped/melting in CPU SN# because he never took the plastic cover off the HS. Surprisingly he was really P1$$ at the store for NOT telling him he'd need to remove the cover :scatch: we offered a build service, or customers were free to purchase their own...the sales rep who was on when he was first in, asked him if he'd need our help to build and he said, "No, I have a friend..." Famous line. So, he really could only blame himself...pretty risky way to blow $1500+ dollars to save a few bucks on not buying an assembled system or one that was custom for him.

So, he didn't pay for the repair service (which I dropped anyway) and he never collected his items, he just left.

Just curious, and without any photos and such to see what you've got going on (and nothing beats being onsite to see it all first-hand) are you 100% certain there aren't any metal items creating a short?
-Did you have the chassis plugged directly into the wall? A surge protector? or a UPS?
-Is it possible there may have been something 'caught'/pinched between one of the connections that caused the fire?
-When you tested the board outside the box? How did you set that up? Was the board resting on anything (what type of surface)?

http://www.techexams.net/forums/newreply.php?do=newreply&noquote=1&p=355247

I thought I read you were going to have a friend or a tech place take a look at your setup and give you some tips, I'm missing it or thinking of a different post (but) do you have someone nearby to look at this stuff? Or maybe post some images of the specifics?

It does unfortnately sound like a screw or standoff was in a bad place. Sorry to hear it, but it happens. I had one kid I was trying to train where we had to do a shake test when he completed assembling because we'd find typically 2-3 screws with each of his builds. (after a few weeks, we was left to sorting the various screws out for the rest of us, because going back over someone's work EVERYTIME It's more productive to do it myself).

So, it may not be what you want to hear, but it does happen.

Some .jpgs may help though!

miller811

this thread reminds me why I do not have the time or patience to build a machine.

Hyper-Me

miller811 wrote: »

this thread reminds me why I do not have the time or patience to build a machine.

Don't be fooled. Putting together a workstation is easy peasy, lemon squeezy.

nevolved

You don't happen to have it plugged into a circuit that runs through a dimmer rheostat do you?

veritas_libertas

miller811 wrote: »

this thread reminds me why I do not have the time or patience to build a machine.

+1 It changes to rapidly for my taste. I would rather be playing Servers, Switches, and Routers

arwes

Let me preface this by saying I've built around 5 or 6 PC's from scratch in my life, starting around 1997. Each one has gotten progressively easier. The one constant gripe I've got? Those stupid case wires. Standardize that crap. Actually I guess that falls on the board manufacturers as well.

The most difficult thing I had on this last build was lapping the base of the cooler. I've got a Tuniq Tower and those things sometimes ship with an uneven base it seems. Wet sanded that for awhile (and was nervous, that cooler was almost as much as my CPU ), and temps decreased dramatically. It was idling in the 40C range, and after lapping I got it down to the high 20's. Everything else was ridiculously simple. Just be smart when buying your parts that you get what you need (especially for high end video cards).

mikedisd2

RobertKaucher wrote: »

That and the Mac I had to return to a customer in a biohazard bag. Don't ask!

Man, I wanna hear about that one.

Plantwiz

So where's our friend who started the post? He/she hasn't responded for quite some time What have you found out with the diagnosis at that store near you?

How's it going CCIEWANNABE?

Silentsoul

Plantwiz wrote: »

So where's our friend who started the post? He/she hasn't responded for quite some time What have you found out with the diagnosis at that store near you?

How's it going CCIEWANNABE?

Hopefully he hasn't suffered a more catastrophic failure on his second attempt.

dynamik

Silentsoul wrote: »

Hopefully he hasn't suffered a more catastrophic failure on his second attempt.

Maybe he set himself on fire this time...

arwes

dynamik wrote: »

Maybe he set himself on fire this time...

Either that or he opened the power supply.

veritas_libertas

arwes wrote: »

Either that or he opened the power supply.

I was thinking maybe his usual PC got fried?

Silentsoul

dynamik wrote: »

Maybe he set himself on fire this time...

That's what I was trying to say. Just didn't want any negative reputation. I don't think I would want to be a CCIE associated with burning my house down building a computer, i think i would be looking to get this post removed.

mrmcmint

hehehehehe
This post makes me laugh