Hello, can you help me debug my computer problem. The symptom is as follow: I press the power button, it flashes the amber light, the fan spins for like a second or so and everything stops...computer won't boot :-(
To debug the problem, I have unplugged all parts, the only connection is the psu to the motherboard. It's a dell xps 420 computer. I even bought new motherboard and new fan, but same symptom. any help would be greatly appreciated.
thanks in advance.

Hi to PCHF Sounds like it could be a power supply issue do you have a spare you could try?

Thanks for the reply.
No go. I got a new psu connecting only to the new motherboard and still the same problem. That's the bare minimum that it should at least do something...what could be the problem?

you get no beeping sounds at all, and you have new PSU and mainboard and CPU fan all hooked up now?

as far as I can tell, cpu, fan, mainboard, and psu is the only that is hooked up. now i wonder if i have a bad cpu. would a bad cpu or fan behave like this?

A Bad CPU fan could do this but it would normally beep a beep code at you.

You said you have installed new PSU, CPU fan, Mainboard is that correct?

actually, I bought a new motherboard and a new psu thinking one of that gotta be culprit (money unnecessary wasted :-( ) . still have the old cpu though. What else can i try to debug this problem.