I've been having issues with powering on my Minisforum UM773 Mini PC. PC Model
The power adapter's green light is coming on just fine when plugged in, but the blue light on the PC is not. No matter what I try. So far, I have unplugged everything from the PC and held down the power button for about 30-60 seconds, and did the same thing with the little reset button, inserting a safety pin. I suppose this is CMOS reset.
I have also tried different outlets around my house with no luck. So, lastly, I decided to open it up to check for burns, and any other abnormalities to the best of my ability.
I saw another post on here about a blemmish near the DC input. And I checked that as well. There seems to be something different, but my untrained eye cannot pick up very much. Maybe you guys can take a look at the pictures I have included?
I plan to take it in to a repair shop if necessary to get further advice. I'm afraid it's blown, but hopefully I can still retrieve my data, and I have heard that something could possibly be done with the PCB?
You let the magic smoke out. Rule #1 of electronics is to never let the magic smoke out.
Jokes aside, based on your question and comments, it's not something you'd be able to DIY. Bring it to a repair shop and they'll have the tools to work on replacing the SMD components. It's possible that other things got damaged, but the obvious starting point is the burnt out resistor / mosfet (I can't see the label) which they'd easily identify via a microscope or a schematic.
I don't know how old your miniPC is. I had a Minisforum not power anymore after the power brick overvolted it and fried the board. I can't remember if mine was out of warranty, but they did replace my entire miniPC. They responded after I had made a post on this group within 36 hrs. They requested I return the entire PC including box and all parts. I had to remove my NVME but they did sent a new one. So they were good to me even if their parts are questionable. I haven't had any problems with the new one and Ive been editing giant raw photos from my cameras and playing some OC games maxing out the integrated video chip. So I think if anything we're going to be a problem, it would have shown signs since ive had it longer than the original now.
So the NVME is the SSD where all my files and data are stored? is removing it pretty simple?
I guess I will get in touch with Minisforum to see what they will do.
Sorry. It already comes with 1TB storage. I meant I had an extra 2TB NVME I installed after I got it. I had to take it out. It's not hard. Just a screw and tilt like the RAM. But you have to take the bottom off which requires taking off the rubber feet and 4 screws. You won't need to do this since you haven't installed anything inside the PC.
Yes. You'll take it out. You'll need to have some kind of NVME enclosure or something to read it to a good computer and move files over. But put it back in since they will wipe it. Keeping it is not an option since they will (if they send you one) send you a new one in a box and everything.
Amazon has small NVME enclosures for like $20. USBC so you can just hook it up and move files over. It's good to have an enclosure in case of things like this or when you get a larger one and use it for backing up files. NVME and SSD won't break as easily as a hard drive and aren't erased by a magnet near them. So just get an enclosure for future use too.
It's clearly burned. Unfortunately, Chinese products are a pure gamble due to shitty or non-existent QA. You need to send it to China for repair / replace.
Bring it to a local pc repair shop and ask them to replace the burned components on the board. It looks like power management stuff at first glance so they should be able to easily source those parts if they don’t have something on hand already that fits with the pcb
Does it have a power delivery port? you might be able to bypass the DC jack entirely and power it over USB. Check the manual, and get a 65w USB charger.
This may be something I could try. I did a search and the 65w was not recommended for this model. I have some notes from my search results that AI gave me.
"No, a 64W charger is not sufficient or safe to power the Minisforum UM773 Lite.
The original power adapter shipped with the Minisforum UM773 Lite is a massive 120W (19V, 6.32A) power supply with a 5.5 x 2.5 mm barrel jack. [1, 2]
Why 64W Will Cause Failures
Power Deficit under Load: Real-world testing shows the UM773 Lite draws up to 93W peak from the wall under maximum system load (stress tests) and averages around 71W during gaming. [3]
Sudden Crash Risks: Trying to deliver power using a 64W charger will cause the Mini PC to suddenly crash, freeze, or endlessly reboot when the AMD Ryzen 7 7735HS processor boosts its performance. [3, 4]
The Voltage Negotiation Problem: USB-C PD chargers do not natively output 19V. They strictly negotiate fixed profiles at 5V, 9V, 15V, or 20V. While a standard 20V PD trigger can usually be tolerated by a 19V mini PC board tolerance, the wattage must be high enough.
The Right Way to Power the UM773 Lite via USB-C
If your goal is to shrink your brick down to a portable USB-C setup, you must build a workaround that can handle the full wattage:
Get a 100W or 140W USB-C PD Charger: You need a high-end charger (such as a 100W–140W GaN wall adapter) that explicitly lists a 20V ⎓ 5A (100W) power delivery profile on its spec sheet.
Use a 100W Rated E-Mark Cable: A generic USB-C cable will cap power draw at 60W. You must use a cable explicitly certified to carry 5A/100W. [5]
Buy a 20V USB-C PD to DC 5.5x2.5mm Trigger Cable: Instead of manually bypassing internal circuits, buy a pre-made USB-C PD Decoy/Trigger Cable built with a 20V chip and a 5.5mm x 2.5mm male barrel termination. This safely requests 20V from your high-wattage charger and feeds it straight through the native DC port. [2, 6]
AI is wrong, this model doesn't have Power delivery through USBC so a USB Charger won't work. You are looking for Power Delivery In (PD in). Here is an example of a PC (different model) with PD-in on the advertisement. And this is where this image came from. https://store.minisforum.com/products/minisforum-x1-lite-mini-pc
I'm not sure what the burned component is - actually I noticed the same kind of thing on an xbox one x I just repaired. It's a strange configuration for a fuse, but it being blown definitely points to other problems in the circuit. Pull your SSD and RAM as others said. SSD is the two screws in that plate, then probably one holding it down. Ram is removed by pressing outward <--> on the metal retainer thingies. The ram will tilt towards you and you can pull it out of the socket.
After looking at it more closely, I think the person who said MOSFET is probably right. I had just woken up and thought it looked like an inductor in the xbox.
Thanks for the guide. What things does the ssd have in it? I mean, does my desktop and apps carry over? Or is it my pictures and other data on the C and D drive? Would program files like setup. exe files carry over?
If you put your ssd into a similar PC, there's a good chance it will just work as before. Unfortunately I couldn't tell you where things are saved on your computer. If there were C and D drives, there may be additional drives in the minipc - it could be those were saved on a network drive, or a thumb drive. That's not something we could reasonably guess at.
RAM is basically very fast storage, but it's 'volitile' meaning that if the power is cut, nothing stays stored on it. It's used to hold data like game files, software code, anything that the computer will need to access quickly or repeatedly, but only temporarily. Drives (SSDs now, but disks before that) are 'non-volitile', - it's still retrievable after the power turns off, then on again. So - it's used as the regular storage for software files, user data, the operating system, basically everything 'lives' there until it's actively being used by the computer, then necessary info goes to the ram.
I think I understand. Apart from my SSD, what will happen with the RAM when I put it into another PC? I know that if Minisforum offers to replace the PC, I would just put the RAM in as before. But, if I use another desktop, I'm unsure. My temporary PC is a laptop while I wait to see about the replacement. Is there anything for RAM similar to an enclosure for SSD drives?
No, because RAM needs to be very fast, and to minimize on data error, it's always located very close to the processor - internally. Installing it externally would defeat it's purpose.
As long as it's reasonably close to the same generation (so the parts fit) then you might have to re-activate Windows. It will work, but it will pester you. Different hardware (the physical computer parts) require specific data to run - called Drivers. Drivers tell your Operating System how to use things like the wifi card, graphics processor, sound output devices, et c. Sometimes things won't automatically work when you move your Windows drive to a new machine, and the Drivers will need to be installed. Thankfully recent Operating Systems are a lot better at finding drivers automatically than they used to be.
The part that’s exploded is a MOSFET, part of a buck converter circuit that takes the power from the barrel jack (probably like 20V?) and converts it to a lower voltage. You could swap the part, but first you should try to figure out why it failed. With the barrel jack plugged in, measure the voltage on the center pin and see if it matches what’s printed on the power brick. Then I would locate the controller IC for the buck converter circuit and see if it’s still alive. It has two gate drive output pins, and if it’s alive, the high side gate drive should be high (same as the input voltage).
Honestly I’d be curious if AI was any good at helping you debug this.
I would like to try and measure the voltage, but don't have the tool I need to do so. I know what you're talking about, though. Hopefully, the shop would have one? If it's just the MOSFET that is damaged, would the affected parts on the PCB just need replacement? If You know something about if using AI is possible, how would I go about using it for this kind of thing?
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u/Pulte4janitor 2d ago
Looks like a big burn mark on the resistor to the top right of the DC input jack in the bottom left of the pic.