faulty power cable

[jes]

My friend was complaining that his CD drive wasn't working so he sent the computer to me. I couldn't make the CD drive work either so he gave his other computer to me to remove the CD drive from it and put it in the other. That new drive seemed to work perfectly at my house but my friend still had problems with it. He would open it, insert a CD and close it and the tray would slide out again so he sent the PC back to me. I couldn't find anything wrong and it worked perfectly for me so I took it back to him. The problem would occur every time he used the CD drive. I told him to try a different power cable. I said that just to give him something to do so I could think about the problem. He said that the new power cable cleared the problem.
How would a power cable make that difference?

[jlreich]

"Dirty" power can cause many strange problems. Data is nothing more than an electrical current changing the state of a transistor from on to off(or 1's and 0's) or vice-versa. So data can become corrupted if the computer is not getting "clean" or enough power. The data could be an important file being written to the HDD, or the signal to open/close the CD drive tray.

[Whyzman]

"The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them."
- Albert Einstein:D

I definitely had my fist on my chin with a rather perplexed look. jlr's explanation certainly is better than mine..."After all, it's a computer!" :D

[jlreich]

:D

I definitely had my fist on my chin with a rather perplexed look. jlr's explanation certainly is better than mine..."After all, it's a computer!" :D
LOL. :D

Funny how we get wrapped up in the seeming complexity of modern computers that we tend to forget that a computer is nothing more than a series of on and off switches controlled by electrical current. :cool: Yeah, millions of them, but on and off switches none the less. :p

Personally, that's what fascinates me about computers. All this from - on, off, on, off......or 1, 0, 1, 0.... :cool: :cool:

[Paul Komski]

By power cable do you mean data ribbon cable, the powere molex connector or the whole power supply unit?

[jes]

I mean the cable that connects the computer to the wall.

I had forgoten that a computer is just a bunch of on/off switches. I should get a MultiMeter.

[Whyzman]

I mean the cable that connects the computer to the wall.No pun intended, but I don't get the connection...

Fist is back under chin...http://z.about.com/d/philadelphia/1/0/L/b/parkway14.jpg

[saphalline]

I mean the cable that connects the computer to the wall.Hmmm... must have been a faulty power cable. I suggest you tell your friend to throw it out (if he hasn't already) so that you don't get it confused later. ;)

Power cables are not all made the same. Just recently I moved my system and noticed among all the cables that some were slightly different shades of black. Thinking this may be a variable, I decided to examine all my power cables. Lo and behold, they are different lengths and slightly different thicknesses! :eek: And I thought they were all standard... I guess not!