Dell XPS 8700 No Power

Removed the CMOS battery, same lack of results.

If what Ron posted above does not work, you may have a bad motherboard. If the PC is under warranty I recommend contacting Dell support and having them create an onsite repair for the desktop, that way you can get up and running as quick as possible. If it is not under warranty, Dell might sell (refurb) motherboards for your desktop and  you can purchase one from them, or look on websites like Amazon, Newegg.com, or eBay. eBay and Amazon you have to be careful on, Newegg.com has recently just started carrying a bunch of OEM stuff through third party sellers on their site, and most third parties appear to be actual online stores.

-Brandon

Unfortunately seems like a new motherboard is in order.  Purchased a new power supply to no avail.  Called Dell, none available.  The only place that I can find one is eBay.  Not sure I want to pay $180 on a used mobo.  Although would be less then purchasing a new computer.  Problem is, I want to keep running Win7 as I have no desire to go to 8.

Before rushing out to buy a new motherboard or PC, you should check all USB ports to make sure none of them is bent or otherwise shorted. 

Power off, unplug and press/hold power button before for ~15 sec. Use a flashlight to examine all ports. If any of them is bent, use a non-metallic item (eg, toothpick) to gently bend the contacts so they're no longer touching each other. Then see if it boots now.

If not, power off and press/hold power button for ~15 sec. Strip the system down to bare essentials by disconnecting all drives except boot hard drive, remove all PCI-e cards except video, all RAM modules except the one in slot 1. Then remove motherboard battery and press/hold power button for ~30 sec. Reinstall battery and see if it boots now with only mouse, monitor and keyboard connected.

If still not, remove remaining RAM module. If you don't get any beeps when you boot, the motherboard is toast. If it beeps, there might still be life in the motherboard. So then disconnect the hard drive and video card and see if it powers on...

Thanks for the additional suggestions Ron, unfortunately once the new power supply was installed only had the P1 and the 12v powerconn1 connected, all RAM out except stick 1, HDD unplugged, Video Card removed and still DOA. No beeps, no lights, nothing. Did check the USB ports, per your suggestion, and they all look good.

Thanks everyone for the help, much appreciated.

The part that I don't understand is that if it's the mobo, then why when I press the "reset" button on the power supply the chipset cooling fan and video card fan operate?  You would think if the mobo was bad those wouldn't operate.  Is it possible that the mobo is fine and that the chipset is bad??

You don't need the motherboard to do anything more than conduct power from the PSU to fans when you press that reset button. It's odd the new PSU (assuming it's good) shuts off too. That typically means there's a short circuit somewhere.

Can I assume the CPU power cable is correctly connected to motherboard?

I guess it's possible there's a fault in the front panel. Either in the switch module or the connector to the motherboard. You may want to check that the connector cable is correctly attached at both ends.

Don't know how much more time and $$ you want to put into troubleshooting...

I had a similar issue with my XPS420.  Yellow power light on inside and pressing the reset on the power supply caused the fans to come on. But, if I held the reset on the power supply and pressed the power button it would boot.

My wife broke the USB port and one of the pins (probably the 5 volt pin) shorted to the connector case.

Once I removed the pin the computer booted fine.

Hope that helps.

This worked for me- I came home from work and my machine wouldn't power up.  Amber light on the mobo, the power button wouldn't illuminate.  I had followed the troubleshooting  steps on the Dell website and had reseated  and rotated my RAM, reseated my video card, eliminated all peripherals, no joy.  Pulling the  battery for 15 sec and reinstalling it powered it right up.

In retrospect, the very next step that I did NOT try from  the website was to clear the  CMOS settings using the jumper... I think this method was probably easier, anyway.  ;)

Thanks, bro!

Mike H.

After spending the last 2 days researching this 'no power' issue on the XPS 8700, i finally got through to Dell and they are saying i have a bad motherboard.  What is infuriating is that my warranty is out by 1 month and Dell won't admit that this seems to be a wide-spread issue with this unit.  I have tried all of the suggestions i could find, and now i am faced with the prospect of either buying a new system (bet you can guess it's not going to be a Dell) or buying a new motherboard.  People wonder why Americans are so fed up with companies that produce faulty products and try and cheat the consumer.  It's like their business model is planned obsolescence! 

I have this same issue on a Dell XPS 8700, which randomly comes up and I have no explanation why. FYI, the computer is powered via UPS. The first time this happened, I cleaned and reseated the RAM, which fixed the problem. This was about 3 months ago after the computer had been turned off for a couple months and left in a humid environment (I thought that was the reason). Since I fixed it in August, it has been running perfectly. I keep it running and just periodically reboot it.

But, a few days ago the problem randomly happened again, so I retried the RAM thing and nothing...

After reading this I reseated the CMOS battery. After powering up again, the computer still won't fully power on, but the power button is now white instead of orange. It stays lit up white for about 30s to a min, and then turns off for a second, turns back on again... this cycle repeats endlessly but the computer doesn't ever power up all the way. BTW, I also checked if their were any short circuits in the USB ports, and there are not.  

Any ideas? I'm not computer savvy, and this whole thing is holding up a major project I am working on :(.

Did you try removing the UPS from the setup and connect the PC directly to the wall outlet?

If you press F2 immediately after powering on, can you get into BIOS setup? In BIOS setup, try disabling Secure Boot, if it's enabled...

YES, thank you. Worked for me! Dell XPS 8700.