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How To Check The Performance Of My PC

Testing A Desktop Power Supply

These days several computer problems are related to power supply. Whenever the power supply fails, computer stops working. Furthermore, other issues such as booting problems, unexpected restart, and lockups could be because of the problem in the power supply. If you want to examine the power supply then you must have a multimeter. The multimeter is an instrument, which is used to measure the current voltage supply. The power supply also includes a converter for converting 115 AC volts to DC supply, which a computer needs to run.

To check the current supply you need to follow a few steps. These steps are particularly developed for testing the power supply. However you can also use them to test the laptop connections.

Testing With Multimeter

  • Initial step is to inspect the connections of the power supply. You need to shut down the computer and check the voltage selector and then verify whether the fan is spinning or not. If it is spinning then there is nothing wrong with the power supply, the problem is with the power source.
  • The next thing is to try to deal with the issue by checking the electric outlet. For this, you can use the electric multimeter. Set the unit to AC Volt a bit above 115 to test the outlet.
  • At this moment, the multimeter is set to a continuity check. Initially, we have to join the positive terminal of the multimeter with red outlet, and negative terminal has to join with the black wire.
  • If the mulitmeter needle moves to the right side then there is nothing wrong with the power outlet.
  • After this check the motherboard connections. Before checking this plug out the power and make sure that P9 and P8 connectors are correctly connected.

Testing a New Power Supply

Buy a new power supply from the market. Take out the old power supply from the cabinet, for this you must have to detach the cables of the power supply from the motherboard, HDD drives and CD writer. After taking it out, connect new power supply with the motherboard and all their drives and start your computer. If your system boots up then your previous power supply was damaged.

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My Monitor Doesn’t Work Or Turn On / PC Does Not Boot – How Can I Solve This Issue ?

You come home and switch on your system, and the system decides to shock you! This post is part of a series what I call ‘Boot-up Troubleshooter’, with the aid of which, you’ll find solution to the most common boot up problems.

You may face one of the two basic problems while booting up your system :

1> The PC appears dead, ie. the monitor is blank, nothing shows up in your monitor,

2> The PC refuses to boot up completely, i.e. it starts the boot up process, but stops half way through before completion

If you are facing any of the problems, read further. Lets take it case by case, to start with

PC appears dead / monitor is blank / nothing shows up in the monitor when computer is swiched on

May be it sounds silly, but the first thing you need to check is whether all the power cables are connected properly. At times, everything will be right and a loose connection in the network of wires can be creating problem. Check if there is power available to your PC. This should be the first check, not only in case of your computers, but any other electronic or electrical appliances.

There are LED’s and something called a ‘power supply fan’. Check if the LEDs are working and the power supply fan is blowing. When you switch on your PC, the lights on the keyboard should light up, check if you can see that working fine. If they are working fine, then the power supply is pretty much fine.

If your answer was a no, then check one of the following:

> Is there power at the wall socket? The easiest way to check this is to plugin another electronic appliance and see if that works fine.

> Are you using any surge suppressor or any other similar device? If you are using anything like that, try removing them and see if the PC works fine after that.

> Check PC’s power cable and also most modern PC’s have an on/off switch at the rare of the CPU case. Make sure it’s ON.

If none of the above is causing a problem, then you need to get a technician and check if the PC’s power unit is defective and may need a replacement for it. The other possibilities are that you may be facing any  one of the three potential problem, that is either the monitor, graphics system or the motherboard is faulty, which needs replacement or repair.