# Dell Dim E510 Blinking Amber Light No boot up



## tgirard (Dec 3, 2010)

My Dell Dim E510 was working fine until out of the blue it shut down and I now have the dreaded flashing amber light and no boot up. I have read all the posts here about the amber light problem and tried a few things to no avail. I installed a new i/o panel assembly and tried to reset the cmos by moving the pin. Same thing. Do have a solid green on the mother board. Any ideas would be a great help and appreciated. Thanks.


----------



## makinu1der2 (Jan 1, 2008)

Perform the following steps:
-Remove the power from the system and open the case
-Remove the graphics card from the PC (if equipped)
-Clear the CMOS settings (removing the battery from the motherboard for a few minutes will suffice)
-Attempt to boot the PC using the integrated graphics

If unsuccessful continue:
-Remove all RAM and test with one stick at a time
-Remove any PCI card installed (modem,nic,sound,etc)
-Disconnect drives (storage and optical)
-Inspect motherboard for damaged capacitors
-Test with another PSU


----------



## Rich-M (May 2, 2007)

Do the fans and lights in the tower work?


----------



## tgirard (Dec 3, 2010)

Yes the fan spins, there is also a little fan in the motor that I can also see spin. I disconnected the hard drive, the cd, and the fan so that I only had the new i/o panel and the power supply hooked up. Same flashing light. Also, tried to reset the cmos by removing the battery and reinstalling, and also tried by moving the pin settings next to the battery. No luck. The motherboard has the green light on and appears to have no damage. There are no other indicator lights other than just one flashing amber light on the i/o panel board itself. No other lights attached to the i/o panel light up. I have in the past heard the fan spin wildly and then calm down, but the machine never stopped working because of it. I thought it could be the fan, but disconnected it all together and still got the flashing amber light so this leads me to believe that it's the power supply. I have seen where others replaced the power supply and it worked and others that had no luck in replacing it. Thanks for replying.


----------



## tgirard (Dec 3, 2010)

when i said motor, i meant power supply. there is a little fan in there as well that appears to be working.


----------



## Tyree (May 10, 2009)

Your problem points to a failed PSU.
Do you have or can you borrow a known working PSU to try?


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

Blinking Amber on a Dell is either the Power Supply or motherboard > Documentation

Are the 4 Diagnostic lights on the front panel lighting up at all? 
Documentation


----------



## tgirard (Dec 3, 2010)

Pulled the PSU and was going to order a new one today. Will best buy have these in stock? I saw them online. Any good brand to look for? Don't have any to borrow. Should have saved my old dell for parts. The diagnostic lights on the front panel are not lit up. Actually, right now I have the i/o unit hooked up but outside of the machine. It has 6 light bulbs on the front for the error lights, none of them light up. There is just a tiny amber light (not light bulb, like the others) on the i/o computer board that is blinking.


----------



## Wrench97 (May 10, 2008)

Corsair, Seasonic, XFX are decent brands BB tends to push their low quality brands for the same price as you can get a decent one else where. Newegg on line, Microcenter if there is one near you or Compusa(tigerdirect(stay away from their Ultra brand)) to name a few.


----------



## tgirard (Dec 3, 2010)

Thank you! I'll order one and let you know how it turns out. Cross your fingers. From other posts I've seen about 50/50 percent chance of this working, but I'm game.


----------

