Oops i think i broke it

ok so heres the problem, i have an asus motherboard that i was testing on the bench and did not have a power switch to use so i used a pair of needlenose pliers as my own switch by shorting the pins. that worked just fine and the board and powersupply worked great, then i went to short it again turning off the motherboard. as i was removing the pliers i hit another pin on accident and created a small spark. now the mobo wont start at all. so my question is, am i to assume the board is a lost cause and toss it in the garbage or is there some way to fix my stupid mistake. any suggestions would be appreciated. thanks!!

well it was a visible spark to another pin in that whole cluster of pins where the power switch connector plugs in. i thought it was dead, but i was reading another thread on the forums and someone had a similar problem to mine. they did not short the mother board but installed a fan controller and the machine would not come on. one of the replies to that forum was to unplug the power supply for a few minutes and let the thing drain of all residual power, then plug it in and start it. i did this thinking i had nothing to lose and it worked! im so happy now that it works i cant even describe it. i know im not going to be poking around one of these things with a pliers anytime soon, i think ill keep an extra switch handy from now. anyways thanks for your reply!

Pliers are a bit big, next time try a SMALL flat head screwdriver. If you have a steady hand, all will work out ok. If you constantly do a Mohammad Ali impression, ask someone else to do it.

Because I breadboard a lot, I made my own breakout box to emulate a computer case out of wiring and LED's scavenged from an old, junked case. Then I tucked the whole thing into an old plastic Dysan floppy disk box:
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/foru [...] _13_0.html