"The Beast", our mighty and custom-built VR-PC went silent. I hit the power button...lifeless. Not a blink. Not a peep. No fan flutters, no LED flash, nothing.
At Brooklyn's Micro-Center, they wanted $40 to look a it, another $40 to look at it right away, and $80 for the labor. I politely declined and went to the back to buy a new Evga Supernova - 850 G3. You might remember from "Build Your own custom PC" this time two years ago, we installed a G2. The difference? Not much - G3 is slightly smaller, and has hydraulic dynamic (opposed to the G2's double ball). Unless you're hardcore with hardware - don't think much of it.
G3 Specs:
Size: 85mm (H) x 150mm (W) x 150mm (L)
efficiency: 90% (115VAC) / 92% (220VAC~240VAC) or Higher Typical
Fan size / bearing: 130mm Hydraulic Dynamic Bearing
Japanese Capacitors 100%
The G2 is under an 8 year warranty - but would take 3 weeks to be replaced, so we bought a new one and will have an extra power supply for our next build.
Bad news is that this didn't solve the problem. We probably fried the motherboard during a power surge, as The Beast was not running through a surge protector in the aftermath of a power outage. The joys of operating from a 19th century warehouse ;).
Now we have to replace the motherboard (Mobo). This is as invasive of a procedure you can perform on your computer (just a few steps away from a re-build). We are running a Gigabyte (brand) ATX (style: larger - 12"x9").
We have an i7 Intel processor, which makes this procedure a challenge, because any new motherboard will not (in all likelihood) have the ports necessary to match the motherboard to the processor. Therefore, our new motherboard ASUS Prime B350-Plus AMD Ryzen AM4 ($84) will run a different processor. We will exercise the warranty of the old Mobo, and keep the i7 Intel for a new VR computer build.
New CPU (processor):
We are taking this opportunity to jump over to a AMD Ryzen 7 1700 Processor which we found on amazon for $200. AND promises to keep their AM4 ports through 2020. In the hardware game, you have to plan to update ever 18 months or so, anyways. It would have been nice to get the threaddripper 64-core, but that would have been an extra $1500.
Well, the parts won't be here for another 10 days, and we've a mad amount to accomplish in the meantime - so look for an update in a couple weeks!