It turned out that it’s not the power supply. I guess I should have known, as the LEDs on the motherboard still light up. At this point it seems most likely that the motherboard is fried. This itself isn’t too bad, as my motherboard and processor are about 2 1/2 years old now and they weren’t exactly cutting edge back then. So I guess it’s time to get a new motherboard and processor. Time to start doing my research on the current generation of motherboards and processors. I don’t tend to keep up with the rapid developments in these fields, and I usually just invest the time to get up to speed when it’s time to buy new hardware.
The problem is that buying a new motherboard often has a cascading effect… The last time I bought a new motherboard, I had to buy new RAM as well. I have 1GB of PC 2100 RAM which I’d rather not replace with the preferred RAM type du jour, but I have a feeling that the new motherboard generation will have updated memory requirements. And I’ve also thought about replacing my case for a while, because it’s not all that great. But at that point it might be more economic to buy an entirely new PC (which I haven’t done in about 8 years), as these often go on sale for much less than the sum of their parts these days. Then again, I really don’t need any of the other peripherals, as I have a good sound card, a decent video card, a DVD-ROM, DVD burner, and several large HDs.
Sigh
Time to hit the following websites:
AnandTech Tom’s Hardware Guide xpBargains
If you have any good suggestions on which motherboard to buy (I am somewhat biased towards Athlon processors but still need to do my research and compare prices), please leave a comment. Up to now, I was very happy with my Gigabyte GA-7VRXP, particularly because of its secondary IDE controller, which came in handy because I have more than 4 IDE devices. I would like to buy another motherboard with this feature, although I suppose I could buy a separate IDE controller card.