DescentBB

A couple of weeks ago my computer crashed. Seemed like either something in the hard drive dropped out or there was a serious virus involved. The drive was an old 3 gig. My IT advisor got is working again but I picked up a 40 gig Maxtor as a replacement and transfered the image. No problem.
Except... While installing the drive I noticed that the rear on-board USB port was not working. Looking a little closer I see that the smoke has escaped from some of the electronics next to the USB port.(K7S5A Elitegroup mother board) The computer sits on a carpeted floor and was nicely filled with dust bunnies inside so it may just have been a short that caused the whole mess. Or was it the joystick plugged into the USB port??
How can I tell if the joystick (Precision 2) is shorted without plugging it into a USB port?? There are two more ports on the front of the computer that are operating just fine. But if I plug in a faulty joystick and let out more smoke many bad things might happen. I use the stick to play Descent!

Waiting and worrying.

Once the magic smoke makes its appearance, it is pretty much over.

yeah you need the magic smoke to be INSIDE the chip.

if yours has escaped, you'll need to get it re-smoked. where they put the smoke back in. i'll work better coz it'll be newer smoke.

Take it down to circuit city and plug it in...

Actually, once the magic smoke appears, it's pretty much all beginning: usually with a run to the fridge for a cold coke and something to nibble on...

That had to be plenty of dust to create a short. Check the pins in the USB port for any shorts. The USB ports on your motherboard are powered so thats 12V running to whatever's plugged into it.

EGG NOG !!!!

You need more E-G-G N-O-G !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

MD-2389 wrote:The USB ports on your motherboard are powered so thats 12V running to whatever's plugged into it.

i thought USB was only using 5V ?

Duper should change his name to Egg Nog. Maybe throw a Pika or two in there.

Well thank you one and all for your ever so useful information.
Actually Will had some good advice.
Since I was on my own on this one I screwed up my courage and plugged the thing in and thankfully only my courage got screwed up.
Got to find a natrual predator for those dust bunnies.

ok.. serious post.

The plug MIGHT have a problem, but it's more likey that the MB had a faulty component on it. From what did the smoke come from specifically? was it an SMT part or a barrel capacitor? (Tallish cylindrical things standing on the board)

About the only time a part smokes after being on a board a good while is a Huge power surge, although that would have blown more than just a UBS port.

A part that had a small flaw that finally died. A part was in backwards, although that would have most likely blown in the factory during testing.

I doubt that a short in a USB circuit caused a HD crash. If it was a 3 gig'er then most likely it wsa just old. I've had HD give up the ghost from old age before... it's never pretty.

I don't think that DUST caused a short. It might have caused something to over heat, but unless there was conductive material in the dust, it's doubtful. WLook and see if there is anything that is lying on the MB. A screw, metal shaving, something like that.

If all things seem fine, Then I recommend taking the stick over to JMeat's house and plug it into his computer. hehe

The other thing is check the connectors: the stick's plug and the USB port for foreign material.

You can try it in another plug, and if it should short out again,you could buy a UBS adapter that plugs into a PCI slot.

AceCombat wrote:

MD-2389 wrote:The USB ports on your motherboard are powered so thats 12V running to whatever's plugged into it.

i thought USB was only using 5V ?

http://www.antec-inc.com/specs/ezusb.html

I stand corrected.

Btw Ford, you might want to head on over to Wally World and nab a cheap USB cable that lights up and plug that in to each connector. If it burns out the light, its your mobo. (In which case, I suggest you replace ASAP before it fries anything else important.) Chances are, the stick is toast as well. Better get that switched out too if it turns out its the board. If you really want to be sure, you could do like what Will said, and take it to a store and have them test it for you.

PWNED-BY-ACE. A whole new level of PWNAGE

STRESSTEST wrote:PWNED-BY-ACE. A whole new level of PWNAGE

That's just not right. The apocalypse is nigh!

Next thing ya know MD'll be fondling cats.