motherboard fried?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Randy
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Randy

I came home the other day and the mouse and keyboard on the PS/2 ports were
no longer working. I was told by my son that he had 'accidently' put a
letter opener in a rear USB port, which caused the PC to reboot. He said
that when it started up again, the mouse and keyboard were not working. The
USB ports still function.
It appears he shorted something. Can I reset my board somehow to get PS/2
DIN's to function again or are they toast? Any fuses?
MB ECS Elitegroup P4M800Pro - M478

Thanks,
Randy
 
Randy said:
I came home the other day and the mouse and keyboard on the PS/2 ports were
no longer working. I was told by my son that he had 'accidently' put a
letter opener in a rear USB port, which caused the PC to reboot. He said
that when it started up again, the mouse and keyboard were not working. The
USB ports still function.
It appears he shorted something. Can I reset my board somehow to get PS/2
DIN's to function again or are they toast? Any fuses?
MB ECS Elitegroup P4M800Pro - M478

Thanks,
Randy
Click to expand...

You can try resetting the CMOS. But i don't think it'll work. If the
only thing he managed to kill was the PS2, count your blessings and get
a usb keyboard and mouse.
 
There are no fuses on a motherboard. I'm afraid it's fried.
Click to expand...


Actually most boards do have fuses for PS2 and USB, but
PCChips/ECS, are among the most common to leave off those
fuses and use jumper wire instead to save fractions of a
cent in parts cost.
 
kony said:
Actually most boards do have fuses for PS2 and USB, but
PCChips/ECS, are among the most common to leave off those
fuses and use jumper wire instead to save fractions of a
cent in parts cost.
Click to expand...

I downloaded the manual, and there are two Polyfuses near
USB3/USB4. So there is hope for ECS yet :-)

What I cannot see in the picture in the manual, is if there
is a Polyfuse next to the PS/2 connector.

If a USB mouse on the ECS boards remains lit when the computer
is sleeping or stopped, then it could be that the USB port
is powered by +5VSB. Inserting a letter opener in the slot
in that case, would run the risk of shorting +5VSB to something.
Grounding +5VSB would cause the power supply to restart (as
soon as the letter opener is removed, and whatever protects
+5VSB inside the power supply, has had time to recover).
The power supply would react almost instantly to the insult,
while the Polyfuse would take a bit longer.

I don't know why the PS/2 ports would go. It is tradition to
protect them with their own fuse. And certainly if the USB
port is working, then the Polyfuse on the USB is not being
shared with the PS/2.

As for Polyfuses, they are self-resetting fuses. Polyfuses
recover when they cool off. You can turn off the computer,
unplug it, and check the Polyfuses with a multimeter set
to ohms. In the manual, in the lower right hand corner of
the motherboard picture, you can see two greenish parts with
"dimples" on the top and the bottom. There are probably a
few more scattered around the motherboard.

Paul
 
I came home the other day and the mouse and keyboard on the PS/2 ports were
no longer working. I was told by my son that he had 'accidently' put a
letter opener in a rear USB port, which caused the PC to reboot. He said
that when it started up again, the mouse and keyboard were not working. The
USB ports still function.
It appears he shorted something. Can I reset my board somehow to get PS/2
DIN's to function again or are they toast? Any fuses?
MB ECS Elitegroup P4M800Pro - M478

Thanks,
Randy
Click to expand...


It's doubtful there's anything you can do at this point
(unless you feel up to taking a multimeter to the
motherboard to test continuity on any available fuses, IF
these were fused). The curious part is that the USB was
shorted, but that it still works while PS2 doesn't. Is it
possible you have only tried using different pairs of USB
ports rather than the one the letter opener was jammed in?
I'm wondering if possibly there was a shared fuse for the
supply to the PS2 and one set of USB ports, and that
particular USB port pair might not work too... in which case
you might just need to find the fuse with a multimeter (it
is soldered on, not in a holder).

You might try unplugging the system from AC for a few
minutes then restarting it, but it's a long shot. Maybe
more questions should be posed to your son, what else
might've happened coinciding with the knife attack.
 
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