My wife’s computer finally died. I mean really died. For about ten minutes I could push the power button and it would just barely turn on and then it would immediately shut down. Then it stopped turning on all together. It is an old Dell Dimension 8400. There are two things that can go wrong with these things. (OK, there are like a million things that can go wrong, but these computers have two that go wrong a lot). The first one is that the power supply goes bad. The second is that the capacitors on the mother board self destruct. If problem number two happens then unless you are really good with a soldering iron you need to recycle your computer and look for some killer deals. If problem number one happens then got to Newegg and find a cheap 350 Watt power supply. Mine cost $13.
We lucked out that the power supply was the problem. I don’t really feel like adding more computers at the moment. I have more computers than children. That isn’t right.
The joy of my tech support adventure came when I found that the power supply had a power switch on the back (why do they do that?). The Dell case does not have a hole for said switch. Being the handy guy that I am I hauled the computer to the garage and enlisted the help of a hacksaw.
The power supply fits just fine now.
It’s a good thing the computer is out of warranty because I am pretty sure these kinds of activities tend to void any claim you might have on official assistance from the manufacturer.