Tom's Hardware: Topic [Solved] Gigabyte GA-SME-S2 AM2 +Athlon 7750 BE Issues
Tom's Hardware > Forum > Motherboards & Memory > Gigabyte > [Solved] Gigabyte GA-SME-S2 AM2 +Athlon 7750 BE Issues
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Hello everyone, I have an old GA-SME-S2 AM2 Motherboard & just recently It started smoking I could only tell because of the smell.
After finding this out I quickly turned the pc of checked every stand alone part (GPU,CPU, Audio Card, Ram ect.) and nothing I looked over the motherboard
and nothing stood out. so I tried restarting the pc to see if the Psu had gone & no problem booting up, it even booted up completely to windows and worked without a hitch but when I bumped the pc while on by accident the entire pc just shut down and restarted itself! I didnt understand what the case was, after allowing it to reboot itself I bumped it once more to see if it were me or the pc had done that in reaction to me bumping it and sure enough it rebooted again.
I then turned the pc off and left it off for the day for the day.
The following day my girlfriend wanted to use my pc not knowing the issue I was having with it she turned it on and all the fans turned on everything was stable but nothing but the blue screen!
I had her try booting to more times after checking over the components and still nothing so I unplugged everything cleared and removed the mobo for further inspection & I found that My CPU had lines around the outer paramater of the chip casing & a dark residue around the pin holes nothing on or around the pins themsleves & lastly a small Capacitor that when inspected on the underbelly of the mobo had a greenish residue I have photos to further indicate what I am talking about here.
Id just like to know what had happened here, I could give further detail about what I was doing with My PC if that may help in responses.
Thank You for Your time and Intrest
Normally besides the smell, you can tell if your system's been smoking if it has red eyes and gets the munchies! 
OK... The smell was likely caused by a short. Might be the same short that rebooted the system when you bumped it, maybe not. The bumping caused some component to come into contact with something it shouldn't, most often a 'hot' item being grounded. Could be a bad post holding the motherboard, or a loose wire, or a bit of solder coming loose. The things you saw on the motherboard may not be clues, it's not uncommon to find things like that on any old board, even when it works. I once had a whole line of pots blacken on a motherboard and it kept working for years - no idea what they did other than smell bad.
Sounds like you already re-built the system without the case? If you haven't then do that. Test and see if it'll start. If not, remove all the unneeded connections. Pull all wires from the drives, remove any other cards than video. If no joy, try removing all but one RAM module. Try clearing the CMOS settings. BTW, you can turn on your system with no front panel switches by very carefully shorting the power switch pins on the motherboard with a tiny screwdriver then releasing. Or hook up the switch.
Be sure to point out to your girlfriend that despite the problems you had earlier, she likely broke it! This will make you feel better and might get you extra care. Of course, it might back-fire too.
The best way to test things is if you have some extra parts - like your girlfriend's computer! The most likely part that's dead is the motherboard but it could be the power supply or other things.
If you decide to replace the motherboard, remember that your money may be better spent by upgrading MB, cpu and RAM at the same time. And consider a bigger PSU if needed.
Let us know how it goes with the testing.
OK... The smell was likely caused by a short. Might be the same short that rebooted the system when you bumped it, maybe not. The bumping caused some component to come into contact with something it shouldn't, most often a 'hot' item being grounded. Could be a bad post holding the motherboard, or a loose wire, or a bit of solder coming loose. The things you saw on the motherboard may not be clues, it's not uncommon to find things like that on any old board, even when it works. I once had a whole line of pots blacken on a motherboard and it kept working for years - no idea what they did other than smell bad.
Sounds like you already re-built the system without the case? If you haven't then do that. Test and see if it'll start. If not, remove all the unneeded connections. Pull all wires from the drives, remove any other cards than video. If no joy, try removing all but one RAM module. Try clearing the CMOS settings. BTW, you can turn on your system with no front panel switches by very carefully shorting the power switch pins on the motherboard with a tiny screwdriver then releasing. Or hook up the switch.
Be sure to point out to your girlfriend that despite the problems you had earlier, she likely broke it! This will make you feel better and might get you extra care. Of course, it might back-fire too.
The best way to test things is if you have some extra parts - like your girlfriend's computer! The most likely part that's dead is the motherboard but it could be the power supply or other things.
If you decide to replace the motherboard, remember that your money may be better spent by upgrading MB, cpu and RAM at the same time. And consider a bigger PSU if needed.
Let us know how it goes with the testing.
Best answer
------------------------------
Gigabyte MA785GM-US2H, AMD Phenom II x2 550 BE (4 cores@3.6GHz), G.Skill 2x2GB DDR2 1066 (820@CL4), Scythe Katana3, Hec 585W, Samsung 2232BW+, WD Caviar Black 1TB SATA, Sea 500GB USB, 12 IDE HDs w/Masscool IDE-SATA Convertors, Ugly Old Case, Win XP 32bit
Normally besides the smell, you can tell if your system's been smoking if it has red eyes and gets the munchies!
OK... The smell was likely caused by a short. Might be the same short that rebooted the system when you bumped it, maybe not. The bumping caused some component to come into contact with something it shouldn't, most often a 'hot' item being grounded. Could be a bad post holding the motherboard, or a loose wire, or a bit of solder coming loose. The things you saw on the motherboard may not be clues, it's not uncommon to find things like that on any old board, even when it works. I once had a whole line of pots blacken on a motherboard and it kept working for years - no idea what they did other than smell bad.
Sounds like you already re-built the system without the case? If you haven't then do that. Test and see if it'll start. If not, remove all the unneeded connections. Pull all wires from the drives, remove any other cards than video. If no joy, try removing all but one RAM module. Try clearing the CMOS settings. BTW, you can turn on your system with no front panel switches by very carefully shorting the power switch pins on the motherboard with a tiny screwdriver then releasing. Or hook up the switch.
Be sure to point out to your girlfriend that despite the problems you had earlier, she likely broke it! This will make you feel better and might get you extra care. Of course, it might back-fire too.
The best way to test things is if you have some extra parts - like your girlfriend's computer! The most likely part that's dead is the motherboard but it could be the power supply or other things.
If you decide to replace the motherboard, remember that your money may be better spent by upgrading MB, cpu and RAM at the same time. And consider a bigger PSU if needed.
Let us know how it goes with the testing.
Reply to mongox
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