Rant: fried a $200 motherboard because of a single loose screw

Last Tuesday I was swapping out a power supply in a gaming rig, nothing crazy. Got everything hooked up, hit the power button, and this nasty pop sound came out. Turns out a screw from the old PSU fell behind the board and shorted something out. I spent like 3 hours tracing the damage with a multimeter before I realized what happened. The only salvageable part was the RAM sticks. Has anyone else lost a board to something this dumb?

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leo_mason6mo ago

That nasty pop sound" gives me flashbacks to when I dropped a penny into a computer at a LAN party back in high school. It was wedged between the GPU and the motherboard, and the whole thing just went dark with a little smoke. I felt like such a idiot but at least I learned to always check for loose change before closing the case.

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the_charlie6mo ago

Jump right in with my own dumb mistake story. Oh man @leo_mason, the penny thing is brutal but I bet it taught you a lesson. I did something similar last year with a loose standoff from an old case. I was swapping cases and one of those brass standoffs fell off the tray and landed right under the motherboard. Didn't notice it until I pressed the power button and saw a quick spark near the rear I/O. Fried a perfectly good B550 board that cost me $180. Now I do what you said, I always shake the case out before putting a board in and run a lint free cloth under there. That pop sound is the worst feeling in the world. Did your penny at least leave a cool scorch mark on the board or was it just dead?

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