Croaking Noise on PSU?

[Mordz]

Hi, i think I'm having a problem with my PSU. I have a FSP Raider 550W 80+Silver, bought it nearly nine months ago. I know it's not the best PSU in the market, but at that time i think i'm too stupid to think that the only important thing about PSU is its 80+ thingy. Well about one month ago i just realized that, on the contrary to my belief, this PSU is probably the worst according to this thread. So then before i even stumbled upon said thread, i've encountered a problem with my PSU, sometimes i can hear a buzzing noise from it but mysteriously enough, it stopped happening a few months ago. At that time i considered to RMA it but since the buzzing noise is gone i brushed it off.
But then it started behaving again, this time is yet another noise, i think the closest i can describe it that it sounded like a frog's croaking sound. While the buzzing noise appears randomly, this one can be heard when my system is at full load. Not exactly full load but mostly on gaming i can hear it very clearly because it is quite loud and when i close the game the croaking noise gradually disappear. Just about recently, i can't stand it anymore and googled it, but i found nothing, no one has the same sort of problem as mine.
Moving on to the questions then. Do you think my PSU is really the culprit? since no one has the same problem i'm not too sure myself but one thing i know for sure is that i can hear the noise clearest in between the GPU and PSU. If it's really my PSU that causing this noise, is it harmful? can i fix it myself? or should i RMA it immediately?

That's all i have to say, thanks for your help and attention. Also i'm sorry for my bad english

 

[BleedingEdgeTek]

Are you positive it's coming from the power supply, or could it be from the graphics card? Most likely culprit is the power supply, just want to make sure.

And your assumptions on its quality are correct. Their new 80+ silver line is actually much poorer quality than the 80+ bronze it replaced.

Depending on shipping costs and wait times, you might be better off just buying a better unit than replacing a poor one with another poor one, as this issue will probably happen again.

Is there any way you could remove the power supply from the case but still connected to get a better verification it is the power supply?

 

[nukemaster]

I wonder if your fan is making the sound.

Coil buzz/whine is normal because coils can vibrate at the frequencies power supplies use.

Maybe try to slow the fan when running with a qtip or other soft non conductive object. I had a power supply fan randomly make a strange noise. I just replaced the fan

I have had a number of FSP power supplies in the past with minimal issues(still have an SFX one in my media center pc running 24/7 for 4 years so far.). one did have LOTS of coil whine, but it was very underloaded and actually stopped when gaming. Older power supplies did not behave well under low loads.

All 80+ cares about is efficiency(something that is in no way an indicator of max power output and all about how much power it takes to make its output instead), Not that some outright BAD power supplies would make it though the tests. so at least some of the real bad stuff does not make it.

I would see about warranty service if you can. If it cost too much, as the above users say a new power supply may be an option.

Please note that coil whine can be effected by the hardware in the PC as well as the power supply. So in one system it may not do it, while in another it may do it. The croaking noise sounds like something all together different.

 

[Mordz]

Are you positive it's coming from the power supply, or could it be from the graphics card? Most likely culprit is the power supply, just want to make sure.

And your assumptions on its quality are correct. Their new 80+ silver line is actually much poorer quality than the 80+ bronze it replaced.

Depending on shipping costs and wait times, you might be better off just buying a better unit than replacing a poor one with another poor one, as this issue will probably happen again.

Is there any way you could remove the power supply from the case but still connected to get a better verification it is the power supply?

If i were to express it with a percent, i'd say i'm about 80% sure it's the PSU. I've tested the graphics card, tuning the fan speed to 100%, i could tell that the noise is in no way a croaking one. About the shipping costs, i think it would take about 2 weeks for the waiting time, and costs about ~$25(that is almost one third of what the PSU itself costs in here). Well yes i think i could remove the power supply from the case but i think i'll do it tomorrow.

I wonder if your fan is making the sound.

Coil buzz/whine is normal because coils can vibrate at the frequencies power supplies use.

Maybe try to slow the fan when running with a qtip or other soft non conductive object. I had a power supply fan randomly make a strange noise. I just replaced the fan

I have had a number of FSP power supplies in the past with minimal issues(still have an SFX one in my media center pc running 24/7 for 4 years so far.). one did have LOTS of coil whine, but it was very underloaded and actually stopped when gaming. Older power supplies did not behave well under low loads.

All 80+ cares about is efficiency(something that is in no way an indicator of max power output and all about how much power it takes to make its output instead), Not that some outright BAD power supplies would make it though the tests. so at least some of the real bad stuff does not make it.

I would see about warranty service if you can. If it cost too much, as the above users say a new power supply may be an option.

Please note that coil whine can be effected by the hardware in the PC as well as the power supply. So in one system it may not do it, while in another it may do it. The croaking noise sounds like something all together different.

That's also what i've been thinking all this time! To verify it i think i'll remove the power supply from the case and see if it's really the source of the noise, specifically the fan. But as i said earlier i'll do it tomorrow and will report later on. Thanks for the advice also. I'll see what i can do if the fan really is the cause.
For the warranty service i still could get a full replacement but the shipping cost seems to be the problem though. I already had my eye on Antec TP750, but if you could give another recommendation on the same price range you are very welcome.
So the buzzing problem isn't really the big deal at all? well for my system it seems to occur randomly, sometimes it could be heard when the system is on full load, but sometimes i can hear it too when the pc is turned off

 

[nukemaster]

Switching power supply rapidly switch on and off to get your voltage. by controlling the on to off time ratio you can get good regulation. The unit monitors and adjusts to the loads. This is VERY efficient way to regulate voltage.

Older linear power regulation worked by shedding extra power needed to drop voltage as heat.

Now a side effect of this switching is noise and ripple in the output power. Capacitors and coils work together to filter this noisy power into a much cleaner smoother power your system can use. Both the caps and coils are energy storage devices and the coils happen to vibrate with this constant switching power(think of them as acting kind of like a speaker). Now if you can have a high enough switching speed you should be able to reduce the noise(because it would happen outside of human hearing range).

My monitor has buzzed for about 6 years straight(lucky for me it can only be heard from behind the unit) without issues.

I have had many boards and video cards that had coil whine from the VRM sections as well without any problems.

In my personal experience coil whine does not mean something will be damaged and because it is an interaction in many cases, swapping a power supply or video card/motherboard may not always fix it.

 

[Mordz]

Switching power supply rapidly switch on and off to get your voltage. by controlling the on to off time ratio you can get good regulation. The unit monitors and adjusts to the loads. This is VERY efficient way to regulate voltage.

Older linear power regulation worked by shedding extra power needed to drop voltage as heat.

Now a side effect of this switching is noise and ripple in the output power. Capacitors and coils work together to filter this noisy power into a much cleaner smoother power your system can use. Both the caps and coils are energy storage devices and the coils happen to vibrate with this constant switching power(think of them as acting kind of like a speaker). Now if you can have a high enough switching speed you should be able to reduce the noise(because it would happen outside of human hearing range).

My monitor has buzzed for about 6 years straight(lucky for me it can only be heard from behind the unit) without issues.

I have had many boards and video cards that had coil whine from the VRM sections as well without any problems.

In my personal experience coil whine does not mean something will be damaged and because it is an interaction in many cases, swapping a power supply or video card/motherboard may not always fix it.

Thanks for the tips! I guess i don't have to worry about the buzzing anymore then
About the croaking noise, i think the fan indeed is the cause. Today i tried to remove the PSU from the case, trying to make sure if it's the cause, but i can't hear nothing at all! it's perfectly normal, no croaking noise whatsoever. But i found something interesting, whenever the PSU is shaken, it will produce the croaking sound. But that's not all, this is also true for my case fans and the CPU cooler fan (CM XtraFlo and CM Hyper 212X's fan. Both are the same kind of fan, coincidentally). Weirdly enough, when i put the PSU back to the case, with the case fans removed, there's still no croaking noise at all. When i put back the case fans, which means my system is back to its original state when the croaking noise occurred, i can hear the croaking noise but this time it's very minimal, almost inaudible. During a 1-hour gaming, it remained the same, it didn't get louder. But i know for sure that it's originated from the PSU, which means it's very likely that the PSU fan is the culprit. The only thing i don't get here is why did this time the croaking noise is reduced to almost inaudible, but that's a good news wasn't it?

 

[nukemaster]

I could see fan bearings making a noise, but I have never heard it sound like that.

Strange that the case fans are doing it to. I would look into try to stop each fan and see if it changes or not.

Second last fan I had make noise almost sounded like it was vibrating or rattling(it slowly got louder and louder.). Actual last one vibrated so hard it made the case vibrate(and it would happen for a while then stop then do it again.).

 

[Mordz]

I could see fan bearings making a noise, but I have never heard it sound like that.

Strange that the case fans are doing it to. I would look into try to stop each fan and see if it changes or not.

Second last fan I had make noise almost sounded like it was vibrating or rattling(it slowly got louder and louder.). Actual last one vibrated so hard it made the case vibrate(and it would happen for a while then stop then do it again.).

sorry for the late reply, i already tried each fan and well i think i'm certainly sure now that it really is the PSU fan that is making the noise so don't worry about the case fans. What should i do now?

 

[nukemaster]

You may try to slow the power supply fan with a soft object. If the sound goes away. Try to get it replaced.

I will not recommend swapping the fan unless you are upto the task.

 

[Mordz]

You may try to slow the power supply fan with a soft object. If the sound goes away. Try to get it replaced.

I will not recommend swapping the fan unless you are upto the task.

Well i guess that's it, i'll try to slow the fan first and then i might replace it if it doesn't work. Anyway, thanks for all of your help! I think the case is closed for now

 

[nukemaster]

the fan slowing is a temporary measure to see if it is making the noise. Slowing a power supply fan long term can cause it to overheat.