Question Has anyone had any experience with this power supply, and what is the optimal input for it ?

[reaper89971]

I just purchased this power supply but do not have it yet: HDPLEX 500W HiFi DC-ATX.
https://hdplex.com/hdplex-500w-hi-fi-dc-atx-power-supply-12v-48v-wide-range-voltage-input.html

It has a really wide range of input voltage 12v-48v but does not mention amperage,

I am wondering what voltage and amperage would make it run optimally?

I need the power supply to give me at least 400 watts on the 12v rail to power my system comfortably or at least that is what is recommended for my system kinda i can't get an exact power supply calculator to tell me how much power i need.

The system i intend on building
Sleeper PC:
Case number 1 problem: Fat Playstation 2 SCPH 30000
Motherboard Asrock mini industrial IMB-1220-D

(10th gen this board is the newest gen board with the power plug on the left side and that is really important when it comes to fitment also its a lga 1200, the lga 1700 is alot bigger harder to fit in there the heat sink i mean)

CPU intel i9-10900 65watt tdp but goes up to 224 watts when boosted
Graphics card the PNY Nvidia T1000 8gb gddr6 single slot supposidly goes up to 50watts maximum current draw
Ram Vengence DDR4 2933 mhz ram 32gb 2 modules
Hard drive Samsung 870evo 4tb
Power supply: not sure yet
Cooling: still figuring that out. I might do several 35mm fans that will have there own power
Heat sink: ID cooling 30mm

The second problem is Power I found a pico power supply 600 watts but it is from china and is unbranded witch means it could be great or it could be horrible Unbranded is a little risky in my opinion. Or i go with the above power supply witch has a brand and is only 31mm high and should fit in the case.

 

[punkncat]

Are you trying to use this for a camper/car/boat type application?

I may not be understanding the assignment, but it would seem to me to consider your build from a traditional point of view insofar as even using a regular 120VAC power supply in it. Run calculations out of a wall socket with a tool to read draw and then select a DC to AC converter of the proper output.
Most often, the type you are wanting will be drawing directly from the battery itself so Amp draw on that side won't be any concern at all. Typically these will come with a 15A fuse link on the output side, so pretty much like a standard wall plug in a home (United States).

edit- and just as an aside, if this is running directly from a battery be sure to install a proper sized fusible link inline in case of a short or whatnot

 

[reaper89971]

Are you trying to use this for a camper/car/boat type application?

I may not be understanding the assignment, but it would seem to me to consider your build from a traditional point of view insofar as even using a regular 120VAC power supply in it. Run calculations out of a wall socket with a tool to read draw and then select a DC to AC converter of the proper output.
Most often, the type you are wanting will be drawing directly from the battery itself so Amp draw on that side won't be any concern at all. Typically these will come with a 15A fuse link on the output side, so pretty much like a standard wall plug in a home (United States).

edit- and just as an aside, if this is running directly from a battery be sure to install a proper sized fusible link inline in case of a short or whatnot

I was going to run it using some type of power supply not a battery.
Im going to build a computer inside of a playstation 2 case and was going to cram that power supply into the case.

I just don't know what amperage would make the power supply run optimally? I know the voltage input but not the amperage

 

[punkncat]

I was going to run it using some type of power supply not a battery

Ok, so what is being used to supply the power to the power supply?

 

[reaper89971]

Ok, so what is being used to supply the power to the power supply?

15amp 110v from my wall outlet in the united states

 

[reaper89971]

I found a medical AC DC adapter 24v 250 watt by Delta Electronics
MEA-250A24C H-A 24v 10.42amp
Type the name of the power supply above into the website below and then you can download the Data Sheet and Manual
https://www.deltapsu.com/en/product-documents

The MEA-250A24C uses a 6 pin connector but the HDPLEX 500W HiFi DC-ATX has a 8 pin DC input Connector.

Can i use a regular ATX 6pin to 8 pin connector? Or would the current and voltage be 2 strong for a regular adapter cable?

Is there a heavy duty 6pin to 8 pin Connector for medical purposes?

I got the power supply for 25$ when it is normally 240$ so i found a deal on it that is why i wanted to use it. Will this Medical Power supply work?

 

[bill001g]

The largest reason to be concerned about the MEA adapter is not the plug or voltage. It is only rated for 250 watts. That means even though you hook it to a 500 watt power supply you still can only use 250 watts and that assumes you can actually get the 250 watts in the first place.

So power is kinda simple when you talk dc. watts is voltage x current. So 24 volts at 21 amps and 12 volts at 42 amps are both around 500 watts. The key difference is wire size is based on amps. You need smaller wires for 24 volts or you can run with less larger wires than 12 volts. You would really only need a 2 pin connector if the wires were large enough. They use 8 because it is easier to use more small wires than fewer large ones.

 

[reaper89971]

The largest reason to be concerned about the MEA adapter is not the plug or voltage. It is only rated for 250 watts. That means even though you hook it to a 500 watt power supply you still can only use 250 watts and that assumes you can actually get the 250 watts in the first place.

So power is kinda simple when you talk dc. watts is voltage x current. So 24 volts at 21 amps and 12 volts at 42 amps are both around 500 watts. The key difference is wire size is based on amps. You need smaller wires for 24 volts or you can run with less larger wires than 12 volts. You would really only need a 2 pin connector if the wires were large enough. They use 8 because it is easier to use more small wires than fewer large ones.

Thanks for your reply
This brings me back to my first question what voltage and amperage would make that power supply run optimally?

They don't list amperage on there website but give you a wide range of input voltage witch suggest you have to do your own math on power. They don't list a input current max even. Unless i am mistaken.

They reccomend a ACDC adapter that is 19.5v at 330 watts Dell model la330pm160, I will probably just use that to be safe assuming that will give me enough power to get that power supply running optimally.

Problem is there are a bunch of generic and unbranded and fakes of that power supply. Hard to find Dell and it is expensive.

If it does not run optimally i will have problems. I really don't want to short my expensive computer parts.

 

[bill001g]

Very hard to say on what is "optimal". Since the vast majority of the power you are actually going to use is 12 volts you would think that would be the best input. Modern power has gotten much better at converting from one voltage to another. Used to be a lot of that extra voltage would be lost to heat. Likely there is still some but how much is hard to say.

Laptop power I am unsure why they run the voltages they do. The main motherboard mostly runs on 12 volts. I suspect it might be the display that like higher voltages.

Just be aware 330 watts is still less than 500. If the computer where to attempt to pull more than 330 the power supply would have no issue but it could damage the ac adapter. Just be very sure you are not pulling more than 330 watts.

Part of the difficulty is a lot of computer things, video cards in particular, can spike their power draw. A 4090 for example does not draw 450 watts constantly but it will spike to value and higher on models that are overclocked.

 

[reaper89971]

Very hard to say on what is "optimal". Since the vast majority of the power you are actually going to use is 12 volts you would think that would be the best input. Modern power has gotten much better at converting from one voltage to another. Used to be a lot of that extra voltage would be lost to heat. Likely there is still some but how much is hard to say.

Laptop power I am unsure why they run the voltages they do. The main motherboard mostly runs on 12 volts. I suspect it might be the display that like higher voltages.

Just be aware 330 watts is still less than 500. If the computer where to attempt to pull more than 330 the power supply would have no issue but it could damage the ac adapter. Just be very sure you are not pulling more than 330 watts.

Part of the difficulty is a lot of computer things, video cards in particular, can spike their power draw. A 4090 for example does not draw 450 watts constantly but it will spike to value and higher on models that are overclocked.

Thanks for your reply
I did some searching around and then went to the mean well website and found 2 power supplies that would be able to power the HDPLEX 500W HiFi DC-ATX up to 500 watts at whatever voltage it would accept.

EPP-500

LOP-500

I called the maker of the power supply and you get nothing but an answering machine. I left a message not sure were they are located. With the hurricane Milton and Halene maybe they are evacuated. Or maybe they will return my call.

With such a wide voltage range there has to be one that runs better than others. I wouldn't want to give it the max or the least so i was going to just go in the middle at 27volts and hope for the best.

With LOP-500-27 it has a peak wattage of 750 watts not sure if that is a problem. So if the power supply peaks for some reason it will blow the other board up.

Why would a power supply peak? I need the power supply to never peak out for any reason.

 

[bill001g]

...so I started a response and I will call the device like lop-500 "power adapter" and the hdplex device "power supply" even though both are technically power supplies.

That is kinda tricky. It would be better to say the power adapter can PROVIDE 750 watts peak power. It does not randomly just put out power it. It is more the device connected to it that will "request?/draw" the watts. Now I guess if computer somehow requests the power supply give it 750 watts and the power supply then got that much power from the adapter something is going to likely be blown out. That should never happen. Your pc does not seem to need anywhere even close to the 500 watts the power supply can handle and that is even less than the 750 the adapter can provide.

It should be fine having too much capacity is always better than having not enough.

I have not looked at the pricing but it almost seems you could get a physically small computer power supply and put it in a external box and accomplish the same thing. Real pc power supplies have all kinds of extra circuits in them to protect the power supply and the computer from damage due to shorts and temporary excessive power draws. If for example you had a very high power video card connected to low watt power supply if the video card would spike the power requirement the protection circuits in the power supply will shut the power supply and the computer down before any damage occurs. Very cheap power supplies have simple fuses but most more main line computer power supplies reset themselves if you unplug them. This is part of the reason a computer supply is rather expensive compared to the type of devices you are looking at.

 

[reaper89971]

Well i had a email conversation with the manufacturer customer support and they told me that the power supply runs more efficient with higher voltages. He reccomended 24 v and 48 v and said keep the amps under 40. 40 amps sounds like alot of power especially at 48 volts. But that is the information i got from them. So 24volts and up make the power supply run more efficiently and i was told to keep the amperage under 40 amps.

The power supply i was going to use is much weaker than 40 amps.

 

[bill001g]

40 amps is what the connectors are likely rated at 12 volts at 40 amps is 480 watts.

Although in theory you could attempt to put 40 amps at 48 volts though the physical connection the other electronics in the power supply is not rated to handle that many watts. The maximum amps the power supply would every try to use at 48 volts is 10.42.

If the company says it works better at higher voltages then I would trust that. You can get ac power adapters that put out 24 or 48 volts.

There are 2 different kinds of efficiency though. Power transmission always likes higher voltages. Those high power lines you see connecting from the power plant to a city are over 100,000 volts to reduce the loss over long distance. The problem is most electronics runs on 12 volts or many times less. There is power wasted converting from a higher voltage and the more the difference the more that is wasted. Hard to say I would not worry about this too much just make sure everything you buy has the proper watt rating. Watts are a much better measure of usable power.

 

[reaper89971]

40 amps is what the connectors are likely rated at 12 volts at 40 amps is 480 watts.

Although in theory you could attempt to put 40 amps at 48 volts though the physical connection the other electronics in the power supply is not rated to handle that many watts. The maximum amps the power supply would every try to use at 48 volts is 10.42.

If the company says it works better at higher voltages then I would trust that. You can get ac power adapters that put out 24 or 48 volts.

There are 2 different kinds of efficiency though. Power transmission always likes higher voltages. Those high power lines you see connecting from the power plant to a city are over 100,000 volts to reduce the loss over long distance. The problem is most electronics runs on 12 volts or many times less. There is power wasted converting from a higher voltage and the more the difference the more that is wasted. Hard to say I would not worry about this too much just make sure everything you buy has the proper watt rating. Watts are a much better measure of usable power.

Thanks for your reply
I just posted another question maybe you could answer it. It is about this same power supply

 

[Misgar]

i had a email conversation with the manufacturer customer support and they told me that the power supply runs more efficient with higher voltages.

This holds true for standard ATX PSUs. They are slightly more efficient at 230V in than at 120V AC.

If I had a choice, I'd run your HDPLEX off 48V DC. That way it will draw the lowest currents and you can get away with smaller gauges of wire.

Don't forget that no PSU is 100% efficient. You can expect roughly 90% out, with the final 10% emitted as waste heat. If you want to pull the full 500W out of your HDPLEX, you'll need to supply it with approx 550W in.

550W divided by 48V equals 11.46A (call it 12A). Choose wire rated at over 12A for the input to the HDPLEX when fed from 48V. But if you run the HDPLEX off 12V it'll pull roughly 46A (assuming 90% efficiency) for 500W out.

Of course whatever PSU you use to generate the DC input for the HDPLEX will have its own nominal 10% power loss, so overall system efficiency will drop to 80%.

 

[reaper89971]

This holds true for standard ATX PSUs. They are slightly more efficient at 230V in than at 120V AC.

If I had a choice, I'd run your HDPLEX off 48V DC. That way it will draw the lowest currents and you can get away with smaller gauges of wire.

Don't forget that no PSU is 100% efficient. You can expect roughly 90% out, with the final 10% emitted as waste heat. If you want to pull the full 500W out of your HDPLEX, you'll need to supply it with approx 550W in.

550W divided by 48V equals 11.46A (call it 12A). Choose wire rated at over 12A for the input to the HDPLEX when fed from 48V. But if you run the HDPLEX off 12V it'll pull roughly 46A (assuming 90% efficiency) for 500W out.

Of course whatever PSU you use to generate the DC input for the HDPLEX will have its own nominal 10% power loss, so overall system efficiency will drop to 80%.

Thank you for your reply
Im going to run it at 27volts 18.50 amps 499.5 watts right below the limit of 500 watts. I am using a Mean Well LOP- 500-27. It comes in different voltages ranging from 12-54volts all at 500 watts roughly.

I decided to just go in the middle of the voltage range and stay below 500 watts to be safe with this power supply

Its a Medical Power supply so it should be very efficient and not shut off for much of any reason. I think it has 90-94 % efficiency.

I don't know how it works though because it runs at 320watts without a fan but then can run at 500 watts with a fan. But doesn't say anything about how to adjust that on the power supply. I am guessing that when you plug fan it then it will operate at the higher wattage or something. Or maybe there is a switch on the board.

Anyone know how to switch the wattage on the power supply of the Mean Well LOP-500-27. I want to switch from 320 to 500 I might post this again some where else or as new post

 

[Misgar]

right below the limit of 500 watts

Forget such concepts as "limits". Most good (and I stress good) power supplies will be able to supply 5% to 10% more current than their stated output. In fact the OCP (over current protection) might not kick in until 130% of rated output (30% overload), i.e. no tripping on a 500W PSU until 650W out.

If a power supply has a nominal 500W output rating, that means it should be capable of supplying 500W 24/7, provided the ambient temperature in the room remains below the maximum specified by the PSU manufacturer.

27volts 18.50 amps 499.5 watts

For a start, you've forgotten the probable 90% efficiency rating of your 500W PSU. To generate 500W at the output, it will draw approximately 550W at the input. 550/27=20.37A, not 18.5A.

If a device connected to your PSU demands more power above 500W, the PSU will merrily provide this additional overload power, until the Over Current Protection kicks in or something goes bang.

Assuming a typical 10% overload capability, your 500W PSU will be able to provide 550W on demand.

Again we have to factor in the 90% efficiency, but to keep things simple, let's say it needs 600W in for 550W out. We now have 600/27=22.22A, not 18.50A.

Of course, the PSU used to provide the 27V DC supply may not be able to supply 22.22A, but it might do.

I decided to just go in the middle of the voltage range

Arbitrarily picking 27V is not based on any sound electrical engineering reason. The PSU supplier has already told you efficiency increases at higher input voltages. You won't do any damage to the PSU running it at 48V (or 12V). They're both acceptable input voltages. It will be slightly more efficient (and run cooler) at 48V DC in.

I think it has 90-94 % efficiency.

The range 90 to 94% is just a measure of the peak efficiency at one (undefined?) output power, typically half maximum power (250W in your case).

With 12V DC in (lowest permissible input), it's probably 90% efficiency at 250W out.
With 48V DC in (highest permissible input), it's probably 94% efficiency at 250W out.
At your chosen 27V DC in, you could expect 92% efficiency at 250W out.

Below we have a typical efficiency graph for a 550W ATX PSU. Admittedly this is a mains input PSU, not a DC input, but the performance will be similar. The important thing to note is that efficiency drops off rapidly when the load is less than 100W. If your computer draws 50W when idle, efficiency drops to 84%, not 90 to 94%. Note also that efficiency also drops off above the mid point of 250W heading up to 500W+.

I don't know how it works though because it runs at 320watts without a fan

More accuractely, the PSU is capable of supplying up to 320W without a cooling fan, provided room ambient temperature does not exceed the PSU's specification.

but then can run at 500 watts with a fan

For power ouputs between 320W and 500W, a cooling fan is mandatory.

Its a Medical Power supply so it should be very efficient and not shut off for much of any reason.

Being a Medical PSU makes no difference to efficiency or protection features. It simply means the PSU complies with the relevant Medical RFI/EMC and Safety regulations.

I can think of many reasons why the PSU might shut down.

See this page about output PSU overload protection.
https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/how-we-test-psu,4042-11.html

I want to switch from 320 to 500

You don't "switch" from 320W maximum output (uncooled) to 500W maximum (cooled), unless you are thinking of introducing a thermal switch in the cooling fan circuit (too difficult). If you ever need more than 320W at any time, fit a fan.

Stop thinking about fixed power levels. Your computer device will draw whatever power it needs at any instant in time. It's dynamic in nature, not a fixed (static). Similarly, your 500W PSU will draw whatever current it needs at any time from the 27V supply. Its power demands are variable too.

At one instant your computing device might need 63W, at another time 122W, or 85W, or 265W, depending on how much processing power is required by the CPU.

Sorry, but life's complicated.