So, as discussed over on the "Whine like a baby" thread, I discovered last night that my 8.5 year old eMachine had been plugged in and running for 3 or 4 years, even though it didn't have a connection to anything except the power. No keyboard, no mouse, no monitor, nothing. At one point in time it was our print server, but the printer died over a year ago. When we turned the computer off, the silence was deafening. It was like someone had just switched off a jet engine.
Original specs of the computer (this was touted as an Awesome Gaming Experience PC when I bought it):
- eMachineT6212
- WinXP Home Edition pre-installed, I think I upgraded it to 64bit Vista at some point in time.
- AMD Athlon 64, 3200 processor (2.0GHz)
- 512 MB DDR 400 RAM. That's right... DDR. Not DDR2, or DDR3; DDR. Upgraded to 1.5GB DDR 400 RAM.
- 160GB HDD. Added second 160GB HDD at some point.
- ATI Radeon X200, eventually upgraded to ATI Radeon 1300X with 256MB of video RAM.
- 56K Modem
And here are the pics.
So, yeah. It was technically "on" but I shudder to think what would have happened if I'd attempted to actually play a game, or open a large spreadsheet.
Original specs of the computer (this was touted as an Awesome Gaming Experience PC when I bought it):
- eMachineT6212
- WinXP Home Edition pre-installed, I think I upgraded it to 64bit Vista at some point in time.
- AMD Athlon 64, 3200 processor (2.0GHz)
- 512 MB DDR 400 RAM. That's right... DDR. Not DDR2, or DDR3; DDR. Upgraded to 1.5GB DDR 400 RAM.
- 160GB HDD. Added second 160GB HDD at some point.
- ATI Radeon X200, eventually upgraded to ATI Radeon 1300X with 256MB of video RAM.
- 56K Modem
And here are the pics.
Getting started, here's the outside of the case. Note the case sticker proclaiming Awesome Gaming Experience... from eMachines.
The outside of the case, from the side with the fan port. Cooling was just as important in the good ol' days as it is now.
The back of the case. Notice that there's an empty slot with no back plate... this is probably not a good sign of things to come.
The side panel of the case by itself. Mmm... furry...
The back of the power supply. Not so bad, maybe this won't be as terrifying as it could be.
The front of the power supply. On the inside of the case. Might've spoken too soon.
Yep. Definitely too soon.
This is what the motherboard looked like when I got the CPU unstuck.
And this is what the heat sink looked like. It's a little hard to see, but suffice to say that the darker line along the upper curve of the heat sink shouldn't be there.
So, yeah. It was technically "on" but I shudder to think what would have happened if I'd attempted to actually play a game, or open a large spreadsheet.