The other day I posted that the whole damn thing was down. I got home and even thought it was terribly late I fired up that computer… it all appeared to be working but shut down again in the middle of the night? So this morning I started some diagnostic tests to see what was giving out… it would start but would run for a shorter and shorter time span… I had feared it was the HD but that seemed to be working and it would come up and run like it was supposed to so it had to be something else… ?
My biggest discovery was putting my hand on the power supply and finding out that it was hot, like almost too hot to touch and the fan had quit… so it was the deduction that it was getting hot and shutting itself down… I restarted it several times and started a backup test that would use more power and sure enough it would shut down in just a few minutes… the answer, get a new power supply…
So when I went to lunch I went by Staples and picked up a power supply. Their unit was about 100 watts bigger than the one I had but it also weighted about twice as much… HUM… I guess that cheap one I bought 2 years ago really was cheap?
Anyway I got it put in…
Note the very large fan on the bottom of the power supply and it came with multiple cables that are much nicer than the multiple hanging ones from the old supply…
Although it was much heavier and nicer to hook up it was also a lot more expensive… about twice the old unit, but if I don’t have anymore problems with it I will be happy…
I also , after getting everything running, hooked up the second drive and this time it all works with out causing the monitors to all go default and not be able to find themselves? Maybe it was the power supply even back then when I was trying everything to get the second drive put in this computer? You never know how things all link up at times..
Anyway, the weather station is now fully functional again… www.ishmaels.net/wx/usa.htm
The APRS node, digi, internet link and what ever is functional again… http://aprs.fi/#!mt=roadmap&z=11&call=a%2FWD0AJG&timerange=3600
The video cameras that give me pictures of the house, and ground 24/7 are back on line as well…
I sure hope that this was the fix and it turns out to be this simple to fix…
Now for a few words of wisdom to end this post…
WD0AJG