Possibility that motherboard fried

[Marth8880]

I may or may not have fried part of my motherboard. My computer powers on, but it seems only the fans spin and the board's LED illuminates. I was testing out this server chassis fan whose power cable I had to sort of attach manually, involving exposed wires near the base of the fan. I accidentally cut my hand on the fan while it was spinning and in shock, I yanked its power cable out of the motherboard. As I did that, I could have sworn I saw a small flash where the 3-pin connects to the motherboard, which leads to the possibility that as I yanked it out, I accidentally caused the exposed wires to come in contact with each other. I can turn the computer on, but I have to unplug it to turn it off. I can't get to POST or anything, nor can I eject my optical drive.

Motherboard is ASUS P5G41T-M LX PLUS.

[Teancum]

More than likely it's unsalvageable. Pull the board and check the traces on both sides around where the accident happened. It's *possible* that if you're a precision solderist you could fix the issue, but mobos are really sensitive, so I'd honestly start watching www.pricewatch.com for a replacement.

[Marth8880]

Luckily, actually, I still have my slightly older MSI motherboard from before this previous Christmas. It's practically identical in features and support, but it only supports DDR2 RAM, whereas this ASUS supports DDR3. I still have the RAM and all to go with it, thank goodness. So for now, I guess I'll just have to stick with dumb RAM.