I live in an apartment where there is some faulty wiring or I believe something is wrong with the meter outside. The problem started a few months ago, I shut down my computer one day and then when trying to turn it back on there was no lights or anything powering on with the computer. Now I thought maybe the power supply just went bad on the pc but that was not the case, as I hooked up 2 other computers in the same room and one of the pc’s power supplies died the other one (this one) now has an electrical problem, I believe it has something to do with the voltage because the pc’s bios boots some times and says “Warning system battery voltage is low.” this problem never happened with these pc’s before. The landlord wired this building himself and because this is a problem with the landlord’s wiring do you believe that the landlord should be responsible to buy me a replacement computer and also fix the wiring? Also where is the problem exactly? What is causing the power supplies to fail? All the computers that were here were working normally before this happened, and there’s no noticeable problem like dim lights or anything with the power as of now but the power supplies continue to fail. So what could it be? Also is there any other forum where I can ask this question?
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Yeah but 3 power supplies could have not just failed out of coincidence, there has to be an electrical problem somewhere because it was on 3 different computers all with different hardware.
I guess that’s what I was trying to ask for help here maybe to help the landlord identify what is causing the power supplies to fail before he looks at it. And I already mentioned something to him about the circuit not working right. The strange thing is that it seems like nothing is wrong with the circuit at all. And I know him, he won’t spend a penny on an electrician, he’d rather do it himself.
About the battery in the pc: I mentioned the battery in one of the pc’s because that was one of the problems that came up AFTER this problem had started, there was nothing wrong with the battery BEFORE this happened. I thought maybe the low voltage in the battery was an indication of some kind of voltage problem because there was no problem with voltage with this battery before this.
Also when I power on the pc it turns AMBER it’s a dell, (old backup pc), when I looked it up it said there’s an internal electrical problem. Something has to be causing the electrical problems within the pc’s.
There’s no blue screens of death or anything either. When the pc powers on it has it fans spinning (low rpm) then no video comes up.
I don’t want to do anything like sue the landlord, they are a friend of my dad’s and not to mention i still live here, I just want to get a new computer and the electricity working then right way again.
This has to be an electrical problem because the person in the apartment next door (power is on the same breaker panel) has had his pc stop working too he also had a power supply problem with his machine and now he has another computer plugged into another circuit seems like works. So i know it’s not just me having problems. I was just trying to identify what it could be.
Of course it is always possible to have bad power but mostly for this to cause hardware damage on a computer it has to switch on and off rapidly enough to notice it on other appliances too.
The failure of more than one computer is just as likely to be down to pure coincidence and you will always have one heck of a job to blame the electricity supplier, with compensation being almost unheard of.
THX 1138 is right; your warning has nothing to do with the wall power.
You could hire a professional electrician to run a few checks. The hourly rate will depend on where you live, of course. It’d also be non-reimbursable, but useful if you decide to sue the landlord. (Don’t do this unless it’s your ex-landlord.)
You could also just buy a line conditioner, a line-interactive UPS, or an online UPS. The latter two would also keep your computer up in a blackout/brownout.
https://computing.net/answers/ha…
The system battery is what powers the CMOS chip that keeps your time and settings, it has nothing to do with bad wiring, it means the battery is dying. You can replace the battery yourself, it’s a CR2032 and is about the size of a quarter. You will find it on the motherboard. You should be able to purchase them at just about any grocery store, drug store, electronics store or computer store.
If you suspect bad wiring, put a voltmeter on the line and watch what voltages you get. You might also get one of those testers you plug in the wall socket to detect if the hot and neutral wires are reversed. Other than that, if everything checks out, you might call the power company, they can put monitors on the line to measure anomalies.
I would be careful to get as much info as possible before blaming the landlord or asking him to replace your power supplies.
Depending of where you live, to replace the wiring in a building you need to be properly licensed to do such work and need permits as well. If he isn’t properly licensed or obtained the permits to rewire the building, you may have a valid lawsuit.