Phoenix Posted January 20, 2007 Share Posted January 20, 2007 So my Power supply has been making really wierd noises for a while and it would turn off randomly :( I decided to take it out and have a look. Every thing looked good and the noise was not comming form the fan as I had thought it was. I took the case off of it trying to find where the noise was comming from and I could not tell. So as I am putting the case aback on the side of it hits my comp a I see a bright like, hear a popping sound and smoke starts to come from the power supply :( So I took it completly out. Now I can't even use my comp. and had to make this pose on the old peice that my family uses. I have no way of playing games now :( I am soooo mad. Now I guess I will buy a new one. but I don't know what kind I need or if i should get a bigger one..... (It was a Model : TTX-AS420W 12v) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cooper Posted January 20, 2007 Share Posted January 20, 2007 So you had a no-name piece of shit 420W power supply that died. Rejoice. You've probably saved your machine from a lifetime of electrical agony. I believe power supplies these days are required by law to have a label on the side that explains how many amps it can provide to each rail. Here's a writeout of my Antex TruePower 2.0 550W power supply: +5V => 40A +12V1 => 19A +12V2 => 19A +3.3V => 32A -12V => 1A +5V SB => 2A Note that if you take the above, you wind up with a rating WELL beyond 550 watt. However, below these numbers they state the following: +5V, +12V1, +12V2 and +3.3V max load: 530 W +12V1 & +12V2 max load: 36A I'm mighty interested in what your current, dead PSU's label says. Now, what powersupply you should get as a replacement depends greatly on what you've got in your machine right now, and how often you upgrade (i.e. how long the PSU is supposed to last, as it tends to stick around with upgrades). Brands that have served me very well over the years are Antec and Enermax. The ToughPower range by I think it was Thermaltake seems to be doing allright by me aswell. When I want to go cheap, I tend to go with Huntkey, but then I take a model that has considerably higher rated power than what this machine is expected to require. Power supplies are good investments. Good ones will contain some circuitry that tries to protect your system from power fluctuations. That bit along can extend the life of you system as a long-term result, and provide a significant boost in system stability in the short term. And like I said before, they tend to last quite a while. I have systems that have been gutted several times for upgrades, but the case, PSU and floppy drive haven't changed since day 1. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VaKo Posted January 20, 2007 Share Posted January 20, 2007 Buy a cheap one, then save up for a decent one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobotChild Posted January 20, 2007 Share Posted January 20, 2007 Aspire power supplys are bull fuck. That's Antec, Cooper. I have an Antec TrueBlue (Truepower with blue LED fans) 480W. A general rule when buying a PSU, is to buy a good, name-brand one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cooper Posted January 20, 2007 Share Posted January 20, 2007 Here's another general rule for buying a PSU: weight = quality Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phoenix Posted January 20, 2007 Author Share Posted January 20, 2007 # Intel Pentium 4 support # SATA support # Wire sleeves on all wires # AC Input: 115V/230V~ 10/5A 50-60Hz # DC Output: 18A@+3.3V; 22A@5V; 20A@12V; .3A@-5V; .8A@-12V; 2.0A@+5VSB I got that from here http://www.directron.com/as420w.html that is what i have. Thanks for the input. I guess I am off to look for a new one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rab Posted January 20, 2007 Share Posted January 20, 2007 stay very much clear of NeoHE models. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cooper Posted January 20, 2007 Share Posted January 20, 2007 # DC Output: 18A@+3.3V; 22A@5V; 20A@12V; .3A@-5V; .8A@-12V; 2.0A@+5VSB Get one with multiple +12V rails (i.e. multiple entries for 12V). It's said to provide better voltage stability under load. I'm still quite curious to learn what components you house in your system so we can more or less compute what wattage PSU you need. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phoenix Posted January 20, 2007 Author Share Posted January 20, 2007 Processor: AMD Athlon 64 Processor 3500+, MMX, 3DNow, ~2.2GHz Video Card: RADEON X800 GTO MEMORY: (Req.DDR2 MainBoard)1GB (2x512MB) PC6400 DDR2/800 Dual Channel Memory CASE: X-QPack Aluminum Mini 420Watt Case with 3 See-Thru Windows (Green Color) Optical Drive: (Special Price) 18X DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW DRIVE DUAL LAYER MotherBoard: (Socket AM2) Biostar NVIDIA GeForce 6100 Chipset SATA PCIE 16X w/Video,LAN,USB2.0,&7.1Audio 320GB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 16MB Cache 7200RPM HDD Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobotChild Posted January 20, 2007 Share Posted January 20, 2007 You were using the QPack stock PSU? I thought everyone knew those were garbage. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phoenix Posted January 20, 2007 Author Share Posted January 20, 2007 lol i do now :P I feel so stupid. I took the PS from the other old comp i have to see if it would work and I got it hooked up and turned it on and then realized that it did not have the 4 pin connector thing so the CPU had no power :P I hooked it back up to the other comp and started it. I turned on and was really loud but i thought that one ussually was so i ignored it. Like 5 sec the copm kills and wont turn back on. I think I killed the other PS :@ man am i stupid. My parents are gone and when they get back they are gonna kill me :( Edit: This is amazing. The other comp is working agian :) But i still got to get a new PSU for my good comp :) I opened up the power supply and I noticed that the fuse is blown. Can it be replaced or should i jest get a new PSU? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
harshbarj Posted January 22, 2007 Share Posted January 22, 2007 I have nearly the same system. I have a thermaltake 470w and it's not enough. It ran ok for 2 years but now when I fire up bf2 or simcity 4 I can hear high pitched noises coming from the psu. I have monitored the rails with a multimeter and have seen the 5v rail move by as much as 8% (the 12v seem solid at only ~3% movement). I have also had it bluescreen a few times in 3d games (looking to build a new system in ~30 days so I don't care if it cooks). Either my system needs more than 470w or coopers idea of "weight = quality" is wrong . System Athlon 64 3500+ msi motherboard ATI x1900gt pci-e 1x raptor 74gb 1x wd 120gb 7200rpm 8mb cache ide 16x dvd-rw 1.5gb ddr thermaltake atx psu (only 1 12v rail :cry: ) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VaKo Posted January 22, 2007 Share Posted January 22, 2007 Doesn't anyone think that needing over 500watts of power just to play games is excessive? Nvidia/Ati-AMD really need to start fixing there broken graphics chips. Needed watercooling just to run a screensaver strikes me as somewhat of a pisstake. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phoenix Posted January 22, 2007 Author Share Posted January 22, 2007 I am going to replace thefuse and see if it works as a short term fix. That high pich noise is soooo anoying and mine started it after about half a year i think. It really gets bad when you play games and such. I don't have enough money to buy a good PSU right now unless you guys have any ideas for <$50 :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cooper Posted January 22, 2007 Share Posted January 22, 2007 Either my system needs more than 470w or coopers idea of "weight = quality" is wrong . Okay, let's see what the figures say: Athlon 64 3500+ This sucks. That CPU can be either the 67W version or the 89W version. msi motherboard Wow, that narrows the field. NForce chipsets, which tent to adorn gaming rigs, are (or, well, used to be) powerhungry beasts... ATI x1900gt pci-e According to an XBitLabs review on the PowerColor card this one eats 75W at peak. 1x raptor 74gb WD says this one takes about 10W which is decent. I'm sure it'll take WAY more than that on boot as it tries to spin the sucker up, but that wouldn't account for problems while playing games, UNLESS the drive is set to power down when you're not using it, and the game allows this to happen. Doesn't sound likely though, not in the least because as the drive spins up, other processes will be starved for IO and thus slow the machine down, saving power. Let's stick with 10W. 1x wd 120gb 7200rpm 8mb cache ide Given the cache size this is a Caviar SE (don't even DREAM of using this drive in a RAID setup) which takes 8W. 16x dvd-rw New? Old? Being specific would've helped, but I've found a 16x sony that does about 18W and an AOpen that does 16W. Those numbers however reflect power drain at their most active hours, and I don't know if this is when they spin up the disc, or when they're operating the laser on it. I'm going to say getting a disc to spin takes more power, but since you're playing a game I don't believe the disc will have completely stopped spinning. Let's say that at any given time during gameplay the drive is drawing 9W. 1.5gb ddr This takes half a Watt per stick. I'm going to assume 3 sticks. thermaltake atx psu (only 1 12v rail :cry: ) Well, it should supply the rated amount of watts to the system. Do realise that due to inefficiencies in the power conversion done by the PSU the actual power drain at the wall socket may be more than the rated 470W. Total power usage of this system comes in at 89+75+10+8+9+1.5 = 192.5W plus whatever the MoBo does, which really can't be more than 50W unless you've got some really enormous MoBo or it has more heatsinks and fans on it than I can imagine. So, as far as rated power goes, that 470W PSU is overkill for your system. The rails dipping are still a likely culprit for system instability though. The high-pitched noise is probably just the heat-controlled PSU fan kicking into high gear to meet the increased demand. So, back to the original supposition that is under discussion by this challenge. How much did that sucker weigh? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
W4RP3D Posted January 23, 2007 Share Posted January 23, 2007 there's a tool to work out the recommend wattage of a PSU for your setup its quite handy. http://www.pimprig.com/downloads/download.php?file=19 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phoenix Posted January 25, 2007 Author Share Posted January 25, 2007 So I finnaly got some fuses and put one in. I pluged the PSU into the wall and flipped the switch on the PSU and zap bright light and another fuse blown :( I am gonna freak Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paralys Posted January 28, 2007 Share Posted January 28, 2007 Buy a cheap one, then save up for a decent one. Yeah, that's what I was planning on doing with my new build... though I only paid like 20 bucks for this power supply (Odd though, had it for a couple months now and its doing wonderfully.) Maybe not the best one in some peoples opinions, but it gets the job done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phoenix Posted January 31, 2007 Author Share Posted January 31, 2007 So I pulled out my papers I got with my com the other day and realized I have a 3 year warranty. So I emailed them and am waiting for a response. Mabey I can get a replace ment and save up to get a "good" one :P Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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