Cap trick wont work to power up atx PS

[lordtodd75]

Hello all. I have recently tried Peale's cap trick to power up my tower and I can't seem to get it working. I used a 10 mf, 50 v electrolytic cap. I came off the "power up" jumper pins and nothing. Next I tried a 22 mf, 50 v electrolytic cap. Still nothing. My mobo is an ASUS A7N8X-X I think. If I touch the wiring(which is about 12 inches in length) together I have coming off of the jumper pins, my tower powers up. So I know I have the right pins. The only thing I could think is to try a lower mf rated cap, but I wanted to consult the pros(that is you guys ) before I made another trip to radio shack.

BTW My setup is as follows. Wall outlet to tv power to toggle switch to surge protector where everything else plugged into. My tv is hard wired "on" through the control PCB. I can get everything else to come on except the stinking tower. I have been observing this board since I started my cab a year ago. I just wanted to let everyone here know how informative and helpful this site has been to me. You guys are awesome! I appreciate any help u can give. Thank you all and happy thanksgiving!!!

[RayB]

Are you sure the + and - are the right way?

[lordtodd75]

I know you are not supposed to, but I actually tried it both ways.

[Jess--]

silly suggestion time.....

have you tried just leaving the wires connected to each other?

some machines will power up and stay powered like that.

also have a nose in the bios of the machine and look for power settings, quite a lot of machines around now have an option of what to do after power failure (or when the machine is first given mains) the board in my cab is set to turn itself on after mains failure.

another thing to look at in the bios is whether you can power the machine from any key on the keyboard, then you could power it up by pressing any key on your control panel or moving your joystick

[RandyT]

Have you tried just shorting the "power good" line and ground at the ATX MB power connector?

It should be the green wire.  What I have successfully done in the past was, without cutting through the wires, strip about 1/2" of insulation from the green wire and an adjacent black wire, solder or twist them together, and tape them up well.

The result is a computer that you basically can't turn off....ever.  Not sure if it works on all systems, but it has worked well where I have needed it.

RandyT

[Jess--]

beware of jamming the power good line... if the board tries to turn off the psu (shutdown computer) it can damage the board.... never seen it happen but it is possible.

[lordtodd75]

Seems silly question time worked. Thought i already nosed around the bios. Apparently my mobo has the ability to power on after power loss, as well as power on hitting any key. I am going to use the power on after power failure. My wiring is complete!!! Thanks again everyone.

[RayB]

I'm using the power failure method too, but what I need to still look into is what happens if I go into Windows to do some "maintenance" and then I shutdown. Will the computer come on the next time I power up? I have a feeling I will still need a ATX power button wired up for those rare occasions.

[lordtodd75]

Whether the machine was on or off when you lost power, When the machine is plugged back in, it will power up. You dont need to lose power while in windows for this feature to work.

[wrench]

I'm not sure if I'm understanding what you want to do,but if you are trying to simplify your cabinets power up here's what I did.My cab powers everything (computer, monitor, speakers, lights) with one single button.I spliced into the computer power switch and extended it to a button on the outside of the cab.The computer power cord plugs into a device called a mini power minder

http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/electronic/6ee4/

the other outlet on the power minder has a surge strip with all my other power users pluged into it.One problem I had with the power minder(it senses voltage on the usb cable to turn on the secondary outlet) and my motherboard usb ports were powered all the time.It's basically just looking for a 5v trigger,so instead of pluging it into a usb port on the computer I cut that end off and just hooked the red and black wires to an extra molex connector from the computers power supply.I'm also using a seperate atx power supply for all the cab lights instead of the computers power supply.It's been hacked to stay on.Now when I hit the button the computer starts,the powerminder powers all the rest up and during shut down,after the computer shuts off the powerminder kills power to the rest.Works very well

[SirPeale]

Hello all. I have recently tried Peale's cap trick to power up my tower and I can't seem to get it working...

Odd.  Was it a new cap?

[RandyT]

beware of jamming the power good line... if the board tries to turn off the psu (shutdown computer) it can damage the board.... never seen it happen but it is possible.

I've done this quite a few times and have seen the method recommended by a dozen others.  My arcade cabinet has been running like this for over a year without a twitch.

But if you are concerned about that possibility, just turn off the power management stuff so it won't try to shut the system off.

RandyT