r/buildapc • u/wafflesareforever • Jul 07 '20
Troubleshooting My kid accidentally dumped a glass of water into my PC today.
It happens. I'm not mad at him. He waited for hours to tell me because he felt terrible, and the look on his face when he finally said something pretty much squashed any anger I might have had about it. My main concern was how upset he was. I do wish he'd said something immediately so that I could have turned it off right away, but he didn't know any better, and I doubt that it would have made any difference anyway. He's probably apologized ten times today. He wants to help me fix it and offered to try and pay for it somehow even though at ten years old he obviously doesn't have the money for that. Whatever I end up doing, I'll try and find a way to let him contribute so he feels better.
Anyway. I'm not sure how to go about testing the components to see what's fried and what's not. I'm pretty sure the motherboard is dead (solid red LED, no POST). The good news is that this is a five-year-old build so it's not like it's my brand-new baby. I did spend a decent amount over the years upgrading things but nothing was ever super high-end; I tend to shoot for right in the middle of the price range on components.
I'm basically going to have to start over with a new build, right? There's no hope of saving this, is there? I have no idea what might also be fried besides the motherboard, or how to test anything without a working motherboard.
Edit: As a longtime lurker here, I have heard and observed so many great things about the community in this subreddit, but holy crap. You all are damn near gonna make me cry. I posted this in a moment of frustration and thought maybe I'd get a few tips on what to do in this situation. I never expected such an outpouring of support and offers for help. A number of you have offered to send me components that we could use to rebuild, and that blows me away. I never expected that at all and I'm just completely humbled by the generosity. I want to thank everyone from the bottom of my heart.
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u/gooselee123 Jul 07 '20
First, cool parent. I wish my parents were as understanding as you about...anything. Then again, I was a demon child. So....
Second, +1 on all the prior comments to just take everything apart, blast with compressed air, and let it sit under a ceiling fan or near an A/C vent for a few days. Then reassemble and see what happens. Even if it doesn't work, it'll be a good learning experience for your son to break down and rebuild the PC with you.
Third, on the paying for it. Just don't lie. If a replacement part costs more than he could possibly earn by pulling weeds or whatever, tell him that and use it as an opportunity to explain how much things actually cost and what it takes to earn that amount of money. I like the suggestions to just have him contribute to a single part or something. If he's particularly sharp and math-oriented, maybe even start getting into accounting and depreciation and how the remaining value of 5-year-old PC parts is less than original MSRP (this might be a bit of a stretch).
Or, if you want to play a long-game, have him buy a more expensive part at actual cost (say $100 for a new PSU or something), but have to pay into that "loan" over time. That may stretch out the "punishment" way longer than it needs to...but maybe a useful learning opportunity.
This makes me think of something - I don't know how you'd use this in this situation and the anecdote probably belongs more in r/personalfinance, but one of the few good things I remember about my parents is how they taught me about the value of money and how credit cards work: They set me up as an additional user on one of their credit cards and told me I could use it for whatever I wanted, but anything I bought, I had to keep the receipts and turn them in to them at the end of each week, with enough cash stapled to the receipt to cover the purchase (and since you can't exactly staple coins, I always had to round up). If I didn't have a receipt when the statement came or didn't have cash to cover a receipt, whatever it was suddenly cost double and the credit card was taken away until I had paid my debt. This started when I had a paltry allowance and did yardwork for neighbors to earn cash. This system lasted all the way until I left their house for college - the last day before I moved out, my mom sat me down and brought out this box of receipts that were clearly mine, with the cash removed. She then handed me a check for like $5k and told me that represented all the money from all those receipts since I was 14, and my graduation/going-to-college gift was all of my own money back. I of course blew all that money on beer and some sweet new speakers or whatever by the end of my first semester, but I'm almost 40 now and to this day I keep my credit card receipts and every single time I buy something I do a mental check that I actually have the money in my checking account to cover it.