Some time ago, I bought a motherboard (ASUS AT3IONT-i) and a large disk for a project I had in mind. It was the first SATA disk I ever bought, so I was curious as to how that worked.
Plugged it all, and the disk did not work...never got recognised. Strange.
After a lot of investigation, and blaming it on the disk, I remembered I had a CF to SATA adapter lying around bought in a trip to Taipei's electronics area, so decided to give that a try, to rule out the disk.
As I plugged it in, smoke! from one of the regulators. Very strange. Upon some quick investigation, I found out that the 5V and the 12V lines on the power cable were switched, the one that came with the Motherboard. I was upset and thinking of how would they look at me in the shop if I show up with such an argument, that the lines in the cable are switched.
But it was late at night, and I wanted to get it done, so I just disassembled the cable and reassembled it properly. Unfortunately, no pictures of that. All was well afterwards! Except for the adapter that was burned.
So last time I ordered something from Conrad, I remembered that, and ordered some regulators of the same kind. Tonight I did the switch! exciting, as they are SMD components, but it went much easier than expected! Here are some photos:
Burned regulator, AMS1117-3.3
Regulator removed
New regulator in place!
Now the adapter will go into the black hole of computer components, never to be used again! but at least it is fixed!
