Someone has given me a pc that they say was "struck by lightning" (ie. they live in a rural area, and one night in a thunderstorm the computer went off and wouldn't restart.) When I hit the power on button, nothing happens. Nothing at all. No fans, no lights, nothing. I tried another known - working psu, and got the same result. What I'd like to know is, how bad could it be? If I try replacing the mobo, is the cpu and/or ram going to be dead also? Could it be a write-off?
Can anyone tell me the best case scenario (ie is it likely to be just the mobo), and the worst case (it's totally dead, drives and all).
Any info at all would be appreciated - hmm. if I get it sorted, that could be the wifes' xmas prezzy sorted....

*EDIT* Forgot to mention, there are no marks or discoloration on the board, no dodgy looking tracks, no obvious sign of damage, the onboard fuse on the PSU pcb is still intact, again no signs of anything untoward.

I see about a dozen machines like this a year. At this point the worst cas has been a bad nic, mobo, and processor. It all depends upon how the surge came in. If it came through the power supply it usually is just the power supply and or the motherboard. If it came in through a peripheral, like nic or modem (usually the most common pathway as most individuals do not protect their data line from a surge) tghen it could bee as bad as mobo, nic/modem, procesor and memory, I haven't yet seen a drive killed by a lightning strike, but it is still possible.

Do you have any change of symptoms if you reduce the system to minimum config? mobo, processor, video, minimum memory? At lot of times it if it comes through the modem/nic and shorted it out the system will refuse to boot until the bad card is removed (best case).

Good Luck.

hey 1st buy a ups
2nd you might want to try different parts of the hardware on an other computer just to be sure.
I mostly think its the power supply that got fried and also the motherboard. might cause a data corruption on the hdd.
also how is the monitor? is it alive?

also I remember this: once there was a electric failure in my house.
by then i didn't have a ups. The electricty went off for a sec or up to 10 sec and went back on. everthing was working except my computer.
I was so sad everything blew up. after that I went to watch tv and then I decided to try my comp again and volia it was working:
dunno what happened (I've some ideas but not sure:P )
so I don't know if u've resolved the issue but try it again now
maybe...

Thanks guys, much appreciated. It turned out the modem was fried, and the mobo dead, but everything else was alive and kicking. I think I've learnt more in the past 3 days than I have the past 3 years Muchas gracias, amigos. :beer: