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My (old) case front panel has a 3-pin power led connector (inc. one empty slot in the middle). My (new) motherboard has a 2-pin power led connector.

How do I connect the two? If I try to connect the panel's connector, one pin hole is left hanging off the side. Obviously, the led does not work.

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  • More info: google.com/search?q=3+pin+power+led+to+2+pin+motherboard
    – Jason C
    Nov 8, 2014 at 4:24
  • @JasonC Thank you for the downvote. Searching the webs is always my first step. I had searched with google like you suggest (I actually did so twice before asking here), but found mostly people with similar problem but I didn't find a definite answer or solution (at least none that I understood so far). I thought the electronics Q&A web site would be a good place to query the collective knowledge of its members.
    – augustin
    Nov 8, 2014 at 7:22
  • Augustin - there is no way to know who downvoted the question. Jason C took the time to post something useful. Downvotes are often flybys who don't take the time to contribute anything useful. It goes with the territory.
    – fixer1234
    Nov 8, 2014 at 7:48
  • Actually, you need some rep to downvote.You generally are expected to have some rep before you can do something as serious as downvoting. I would suspect the downvote might be due to other issues. With a question like this, photos of the parts in question and the case model would be nice.
    – Journeyman Geek ♦
    Nov 8, 2014 at 9:00

3 Answers 3

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Most motherboards have both the 3pin and 2pin power LED header, I'd be surprised if yours actually didn't. Since you didn't supply you motherboard's model number I can't confirm or deny that for you; check your manual.

If it doesn't, just use an X-acto knife with a fine point on it to gently pry the plastic tabs back, while gently pulling/tugging the wire, to release the wire's metal end from the plastic housing.

Then push it into the middle hole and it should click back in (if you were careful enough when removing it :) ).

You now have the two wires right next to each other, suitable for plugging into a 2-pin header. If the now-empty 3rd hole is in the way fro some reason, just trim it off with a pair of side-cutters.

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  • +1 Thank you. The motherboard is a low-end ASUS MB: AM1M-A. I checked again the MB manual, but couldn't find a 3-pin connector. However, with your encouragement, I did do as you suggested and managed to rewire one wire into the middle hole. I had seen it suggested elsewhere but mistakenly thought mine were soldered solidly into place. Thanks.
    – augustin
    Nov 8, 2014 at 7:32
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If the power LED cable has a connector at each end (rather than being soldered to the power LED), and is in a place where the wire routing is readily accessible, you can probably buy a replacement cable that has the right connector for a few dollars.

If not, a simple solution would be to scrounge a cable with the right connector at the end (they are widely available--purchase any cheap cable with the right connector at one end, or you may have one from an old computer, or you could snip the cable off a broken device). Snip the old connector off the end of your power LED cable. Then splice the wires and insulate the splices. Splicing the wires is a lot easier than messing with the connector, itself.

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I ran into this problem with my MSI PRO B760M-P motherboard and the switches in a 2001 case I was re-using, as there is only a 2 pin header on the motherboard and the power LED was laid out for 3 pins. I had already tried @Ƭᴇcʜιᴇ007's solution, but couldn't pull back the cable, no matter what.

So I used the knife I was using to split the connector in half on the unused middle channel. You don't have to clean the rough edges just turn both 90 degrees (one to the left, one to the right) and have the cruft from the cutting stick outside of the jumperblock, in order not to block other connectors.

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