u/Dear_Net_8211

I seem to have accidentally infected my PC. I turned it off, and plan to do a hardware level bios flash and reìnstall of windows from a clean USB.

The motherboard (Gigabyte x870 Tachyon) however has a LED controlling chip on board, which's firmware is updatable os level.

And perhaps more importantly, the case (Fractal design Meshify 3 xl ambience pro) has an internal box to which case LEDs and fans are connected via usb-c, and which itself is then connected to an usb hub on the morherboard, os level it is recognized as a dynamic light device, but sometimes it disconnects during restart for some reason, causing a white underscore on screen during boot and showind as unrecognized usb os level.

I am stressing that because it seems to me both devices could have been infected, and can serve as a vector for the virus to bypass bios and os wipe.

Is this fear justified, and what can be done about it?

Hello, while testing the GPU via OCCT adaptive test, with HWiNFO64 open, even at 100% utilization there was power draw no greater than 550 W, even though max power draw should be 575.

Is that normal, or is there possibly a bottleneck/limit somewhere?

Hello, I was tightening case fan screws in my recently build PC yesterday (because unpleasant hum the fans gave of that I though may be because of vibrations), and I took to wipe the inner bottom with damp cloth - chiefly because I did not want any of the small metal shavings that may have fallen to the bottom to be sucked into the GPU and potentially short it.

While I was at it, I also wiped the face of the CPU pump, that had some fingerprints on it. I was aware of dangers of humidity, so I worked with the open PC being shone on by the sun through windows, so that any moisture from surfaces would evaporate before closing and turning on the PC.

After turning the PC on and going to bios, I however encountered a weird visual glitch - a nearly transparent horizontal grey bar blinking over around 2/3 of the screen - this however appeared only in a single bios menu, and briefly when the monitor logo appeared after turning the monitor on.

There are no visible visual glitches in Windows.

I have turned the PC off, and I am now worried I may have caused some damage to the GPU by exposing it to moisture. What is the best course of action? Should I open the PC again, take the GPU out and "let it dry"? Would blowing through the fan openings with compressed air also help?

Or should I just not risk opening the PC again until dust builds up too much and cleaning is required?