Motherboard Bypass Power Switch

[Adimar Poynter]

Myold Alienware Aurora R1 (late 2009 I believe) has broken power button, and the power "click" on top I/O board is broken as well. As a result, I cannot power up the machine. I studied the service manual, and there is no direct cable pin on either master I/O or motherboard indicating the "power on" function. I am wondering is there a way to bypass the power button and power on the machine from wall outlet?

I am trying to salvage this machine, as all other components work fine with no problem. Would a replacement of top I/O with power button fix the machine? Alternatively I am considering to get a new case and move all the components to it. But since I could not figure out where the power on connection on the motherboard is, I am afraid I dont know how it is possible to migrate the components to new case.

Try buying a new power supply and powering everything externally using the psu. You can also try finding another triggering mechanism to turn the pc all the way on. You would remove the old button connection on the motherboard and replace it with a new one.

Thank you very much for the assistance. However, I might not have expressed my situation clearly. I have no problems with any other hardware, nor PSU. It is the power button (plastic piece) that is broken for a while ago, and I used a ballpen to stick into the hole to push the trigger mechanism since. And this "brute force" power up operation has recently destroyed the power click button on the front/top I/O board. Now, what I want is a way to power on the PC before I search for replacement parts (and it seems not easy to find now). Like MOGLE222 said, I could "remove the old button connection on the motherboard". But how should I do that?

Thank you mark, but in the attached diagram P17, P18 positions are marked in red. I do not see anything other than flat ribbon cable. Could you please mark the daughter board location you have mentioned?

Thank you Morris, but in the attached diagram P17, P18 positions are marked in red. I do not see anything other than flat ribbon cable. Could you please mark the daughter board location you have mentioned?

No I shorted the pins where the cable connects onto motherboard to simulate power button press. By the way the server was working fine till a shutdown command from the OS. Now all lights are green, but need to press the power button to boot.

I was doing netboot and install of Ubuntu via PXE. Everything went fine till system wanted to reboot instead it just shutdown. I have been able to fix it now by removing the powerbutton board and cleaning up the broken switch to short it directly from board. It worked and system is now powered on. Thank you all for your help

As an IT engineer, I use this method since five years ago when I learn how to assemble a computer on my 1st career. Most people sure curious how to turn on a computer if without power button? This is not difficult, as long you have some technical knowledge over the motherboard and able to identify the power switch location.

Most of the motherboard have a sticker like above. The PC assembler has to stick this sticker behind the CPU casing, you can find this sticker around the CPU casing. This sticker indicates the location of the power switch in my motherboard.

The power button, Reset button, Hard Disk LED, and Power LED on the casing all are connected to this section. Most people found that their power button spoil, or broken, they will have difficulties to turn on their computer.

See the above picture, the power switch (SW), reset switch (SW) and etc, all this are connected to the motherboard from the power button, a reset button over the casing. When you see closer to the switch (SW) you can see it connect into the motherboard, the SW will insert and connect to 2 metal pin in the motherboard.

Well,this method will be helpful only for powering on system at critical situations such as power button failure.

but i want to know whether there is any alternate way of doing it without touching those power pins so that i can use it all the time to boot my system.

The power supply in a desktop PC converts electricity from a power cord into a usable form for the computer. It has a toggle switch that controls the flow of this power. When a power button fails, alternate methods such as using this toggle switch can initiate the startup process.

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Wether you need more power to run extra components, or you're just looking to test some things outside of your case, it's sometimes needed to turn on a power supply without having it connected to your system.

Today, I'll guide you through two different methods of accomplishing this, and believe it or not, both methods are extremely easy. :) Just keep in mind, that you will most likely void your warranty, and OverclockersClub (and especially me) take absolutely no responsibility for damage to your equipment or if you electrocute yourself.

Before you begin, make sure your PSU is powered off and unplugged. Please keep in mind, that capacitors inside your PSU store enough current to kill (or at least make you feel uncomfortable). While we will not be working inside your PSU, keep safety in mind.

As with Method #1, make sure your PSU is powered off and unplugged. Please keep in mind, that capacitors inside your PSU store enough current to kill (or at least make you feel uncomfortable). While we will not be working inside your PSU, keep safety in mind.

The first thing to do is to cut two pieces of wire to the length you need. Depending on how you will be situating this PSU and switch, your wire may only be a few inches or a few feet long. - For this project, I've actually used two different colored pieces of wire.

Now we need to connect the switch to the PSU. Simply plug one wire from the switch into the PSU's green connector and the other wire into any of the black connectors. It doesn't matter which one of the black connectors you use, and it doesn't matter which end of switch is connected to which wire. All that matters is that one wire is connected to green, and one is connected to black.

There you go, two simple methods to turning on your ATX power supply without having it connected to a motherboard. Being able to do this has been extremely helpful to me as a reviewer, however it also comes in handy if you run a high power Thermoelectric Cooler (aka TEC or pelt) that requires the use of a 2nd PSU.

My system starts without pressing power button after power supply switch on, after that it goes to bios. but there is no problem for restart or shutdown (i always should put power switch button on)

what is the problem?

is there any jumper on motherboard for fix that?

my motherboard is too old and there is no floppy drive for update it's bios(Asus P4XP-X)

what is the best way for fix this issue?

AC PWR Loss Restart [Disabled]This allows you to set whether or not to reboot the system after powerinterruptions. [Disabled] leaves your system off while [Enabled] reboots thesystem. [Previous State] sets the system back to the state it was before the powerinterruption. Configuration options: [Disabled] [Enabled] [Previous State]

Automatic Power Up [Disabled]This allows an unattended or automatic system power up. You may configure yoursystem to power up at a certain time of the day by selecting [Everyday] or at acertain time and day by selecting [By Date]. Configuration options: [Disabled][Everyday] [By Date]

Check that the RAM is fully seated. Check that the CPU_FAN is attached and functioning. Make sure that a monitor is attached to the system. Make sure that both the ATX 24-pin and the 8-pin CPU power connector are attached and solid.

I would suggest trying to boot with the bare minimum as well ... no LEDs (if you have any on the LED headers), no hard drive, no dGPU ... just RAM, CPU and power. Plug the monitor into the back of the case. If that works, work your way up from there.

When I turn the PSU power switch on the Motherboard LEDs flash once then nothing. If I hit the Power button on the Front Panel nothing happens. No Status LEDs on the Motherboard, no Fans start to spin, No Beeps, and No Audio.

The 24-pin ATX connections supplies +5V StandBy Power ... that's what you are seeing when the LEDs come on. And you cannot power on - at all - without the 24-pin ATX connection; not sure why you tried that.

Hope that totally fixed the issue. A buddy of mine is having almost the same issue with RGB. We'll take a look at it right after we finished installing the new brake pads and truck shocks he ordered from 4WheelOnline for his RAM project. We'll take close at the connectors, especially the ATX.

Hey guys. Been trying to figure this out. Today I hacked an LED arcade button to power up my Dell 790 Optiplex SFF. Success. The button acts just as a power button would do. Press it to boot computer, press to go into hibernate and hold down to power off.

The Dell front power button had 5 wires. BLK, R, Y, B and O. I noticed on the MOBO which colors sat across from each other. The microswitch has BLK on the bottom and Y in the middle. The LED has R and B hooked up to it, leaving O free from anything.

The computer boots up. The Dell POST screen splashes. And then I'm hit with the "Alert!" message.

How do I get around this? Can I skip the cable test in ePSA? Should I reset CMOS battery? Reset BIOS? Update BIOS? Any ideas would be greatly appreciated. Once this is done, the Hyperspin cabinet is 100% complete!!!!

I have a Dell optiplex too in my cabinet and I have to hook up a switch button to finish my cabinet as well. I could not figure how to reach that front power switch on the dell without destroying the casing.

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