Aurora R7, power button doesn't light up

Question

First some context, I added 2 sticks of RAM, started the machine up and they worked fine. Then I got 2 SATA SSD drives installed those; plug in the machine and nothing. All of this was done with the machine unplugged on non-carpeted flooring so I don't expect electrical charge to be the culprit here. The light on the power button doesn't come on, nothing. So I replace the PSU, which isn't a huge issue since I was going to upgrade to an 850 to add a SLI GPU in the next few months.

This PSU works fine on its own and upon plugging it all in nothing is different. Tracing the cable that comes from the location of the power button I notice that it appears to go up under the mother board and I also notice that this board doesn't seem to have the small individual power plugs for the case LEDS (eg: power button, HDD disk, etc).

I then notice that on the case itself there are 4 sets of copper connections which connect with the panel you remove and one of the connections is bent. I presume these connections are solely for the LEDs on the panel but I am not sure if they are within the same circuit as the power button.

I honestly can't make heads or tails of this so I've come down to the following 3 possibilities:

Motherboard died somewhere (not sure, but somehow)
Powerbutton got unplugged during the movement of the power cables to plug in the sata drives and I can't find this cable to plug it back in
The case copper connections do connect with power button and my attempt to fix the bent one didn't work

So here are my questions in hopes to debug what the root issue is:

Q1: I'd first like to check on item 2 - doesn't anyone know where the power button is plugged in on the mother board to receive power from the PSU?
Q2: Do the connections from the case to the panel have any impact on the power button receiving power, or is it just for the LEDs?
Q3: Even if it is the motherboard, the fact I don't see the one off ports for the power button makes me think that I'll need a new case and motherboard.
Q4: Before snagging a new motherboard does anyone know of a way to test if the motherboard is receiving power?
Q5: If it is receiving power how can I ensure that the motherboard is ok.

Thanks in advance.

Tesla1856 · Answer

You say it was unplugged, but did you dissipate the flea power each time before messing with motherboard?

The Dell-PS should have a self-test button and LED.

When you replaced the Power-Supply, did you also install the cables that came with it? The existing Dell modular cables will only work with the Dell-OEM PS.

The machine will work with the side panel completely removed. Obviously, those metal contacts can not be mangled or touching each other (shorting-out).

Reinstall original memory in the original slots.

r72019 · Answer

The power button connects to the led con header on the bottom left of the mobo.  On the right side of the case, if you remove the panel behind the motherboard, there is a branch where the RGB for the PC goes in one direction and the wires to the power button goes in another.  If you were pulling on wires it's possible it could have popped out I suppose.

r72019 · Answer

Here's a photo of the Y split I referred to in my earlier post.

Alienware Desktops

Aurora R7, power button doesn't light up

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