After moving, computer makes clicking noise - no output to monitor

Computer Forum General Hardware
1

I moved my computer in its original shipping box & styrofoam. It experienced freezing weather inside a moving truck along with everything else, and then spent a month in climate controlled storage upon arrival (from Florida to Nebraska).

The PC was built by All American Computers just before the company folded. It is a “PureXS.”

I took it out and found the floppy drive was loose inside of it. Naturally, that concerned me. I had completely forgotten that when I installed it I didn’t put screws in, just used the finger-tightness of the bay. It was secure enough to not move as I packed it, but apparently not secure enough for the long haul.

I plugged everything in (dual DVI ports to the two ATI X1900 XT’s, power cable, mouse & keyboard) that it required to boot and powered it on.

The fans all power on, and the 1st videocard fan cools down a bit as it’s supposed to, but immediately there is a light clicking noise, quite rapid. The whole system lights up but the LCD monitor never registers any output - the light stays orange.

The noise appears to be coming from the back of the motherboard near the power supply, which is actually inverted at the bottom of the case (due to the Lian-Li case’s air circulation system). I slowed the back fan and tapped the CPU fan to see if that interrupted the noise at all, and it didn’t. Yes, I know that’s dangerous, but I’ve worked with plenty of computers - I don’t hold the fan down a whole second, just slow it for less than a second - enough time to hear any change in the noise.

While I’m a junior level PC & network technician (by trade I’m a Web Programmer and Graphic Designer - yes I draw freehand), at my old job I had tons of parts (not the caliber that is in this PC) and just swap out what’s broken for what isn’t, and in the worst case, repeat this several times until I find the offending part (usually I can tell). I don’t have that option here.

Any advice is appreciated.

2

clicking noise… sounds a awful lot like a faulty HDD. but if you’re saying - near the PSU… maybe it’s just kinda echoing or something… ?

btw - is any sound coming out of the speakers? ie - is it booting into the OS in the background? that would rule the faulty HDD theory out.

3

unplug the harddrive power cable and see if you get a signal to the monitor, then you will see if the clicking noise occurs. if the click goes when the power to the HDD is unplugged then your hdd is stuffed.

If there’s no difference you could take out the RAM module/s and the video card and then reseat them both and try again - this is the most common way to fix your symptoms. i get this stuff alot and reseasting the ram and video card works much of the time

failing that you would want to unplug all non essentials - such as dvd/cd drives, floppy, harddrive and just leave in the ram and video card.

if you can’t get replacement ram, power supply or video card then you are left with unknowns as to weather any of them are damaged (if the above steps didn’t work). but usually just reseating the ram and the video card does the trick for many of these types of problems.

4

First thing that come to mind of any PC user when they experience a weird clicking noise is a faulty HDD. However I doubt even a faulty HDD could prevent the PC from sending signal to the monitor, as in this case. At the very least, the boot screen would’ve came up. I honestly can’t think of any other devices in a normal PC, apart from the HDD/Floppy and the fans, that is capable of making such noises, especially that close to the PSU.
One problem that I seldom meet when I assemble computers is the PSU wires get into the way of the CPU fan, preventing it from working properly. This could be your problem, as it produces weird noises near the PSU, and an overheating CPU would prevent your PC from booting up. I don’t reckon this might be your problem?