Hi!
All of a sudden this morning my computer did not wake from sleep, well it actually woke but there was no video. I tried the graphics card in another computer, same thing. No fan spin no video.
Ok, so I removed the heatsink from the graphics card and found a small black dot on the heat pad just over the vrms. Looks like something got hot.
I took my usb microscope out and saw this:
That capacitor (named C178) looks a bit sad, like something may have sparked here. I tried cleaning it up and re-flow it but the problem still remains.
The problem area is located here (red Arrow):
SO MY QUESTION: If the fan does not spin, I guess it is not getting power, but does the fact that the fan does not spin help me in troubleshooting, and if so in what way? - And, do we know where in the circuit that capacitor is. Are there schematics for these boards?
MY NEXT PLAN is to remove the heatsink and read the voltages coming out of the different rails in the VRM section to try to find the problem. A problem is I don't know what the voltages should be.
Any help really appreciated as graphics card prices are through the roof right now, and my bank account is not
Cheers!