Found a weird fix for a boot loop on an old Dell Optiplex

I had this Dell Optiplex 390 sitting in my shop for like two weeks. Customer said it would turn on, fans spin, but then just restart over and over before even hitting the Dell logo. I tried swapping RAM, unplugging the hard drive, reseating the GPU... nothing worked. Then I noticed the front USB ports had a little corrosion in them like somebody spilled soda in there years ago. I unplugged the front panel header from the motherboard and it booted right up first try. Never seen a bad USB header cause a boot loop like that. Has anyone else run into a weird motherboard header issue that was totally unexpected?

3 comments

3 Comments

holly_sanchez7515d agoMost Upvoted

Did you try cleaning the header with alcohol first or just unplug it?

holly_sanchez7515d agoMost Upvoted

You sure it's not just a coincidence?

miles_sanchez15d ago

Coincidence? No way. @holly_sanchez75 I've seen this exact same issue pop up on three different forums now. People swap parts like crazy but skip the simplest fix first. Cleaning the header with alcohol takes five minutes and costs nothing. Unplugging and replugging things can actually damage the pins over time. Sometimes the obvious answer is the right one.