velessa: (Lion King - Scar - OMFG)
velessa ([personal profile] velessa) wrote2009-11-10 10:44 pm
Entry tags:

ARGH

Sometime today the power went out, and when I got home from class what do I find but a computer that won't boot up. It wasn't even turned on today! I definitely turned it off last night. Stupid fricking thing. I'm now on my laptop which I pulled out for the first time in oh probably three years at least.

Also, this morning when I left there were at least 8 police cars in the parking lot next to me...I didn't see them until I was driving away, but I wondered what was going on to require so many. I figured it's Sunnyvale and they probably have nothing better to do, maybe a domestic dispute or something. But lo, I get home tonight with a notice on my door that there's been a "tragic death" in our apartment complex that is under investigation! So now I'm wondering just what the hell happened...there were never any sirens or anything, which is why I didn't even know the police were here until I actually saw them. O_o

[identity profile] fullburn.livejournal.com 2009-11-11 08:18 pm (UTC)(link)
If the outage was preceded by a power surge, which they often are, it can damage your system even if it's turned off. If you had a surge protector on it, and you've verified that is still ok (most just blow their fuse at the first major surge and are then useless) then you might be able to get it to come back up with just a cmos reset, if there's no permanent damage. This is a simple procedure, but finding the right jumper can be difficult if you don't know what you're looking for. Search around, if you can find a motherboard manual or specific instructions online I'd give that a go.

Since moving to Seattle I've lost a graphics card and two power supplies to dirty power... invested in an uninterruptable power supply (UPS) and haven't had a problem since.