[SOLVED] Failing PSU?

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ThunDagaFlare

ThunDagaFlare

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Yesterday my 10 year old cord extension with surge protection made an electric arc sound and straight up turned off with my whole system, turned it back on and it didn't light up, neither did my computer turn on. I took it apart and didn't find anything wrong with it, i changed it to one with no protection and after plugging in the power cable into the PSU it also made the arc sound but i went along thinking it was a one time thing, and it appeared it was. I turned my system on and after about 10 minutes my computer turned off and started to restart. On that very restart it was working as usual. Then i turned computer off, unplugged to see if the cable or the pins were damaged or not and they're not, so i plugged it back in, heard the arc sound again and turned the pc on. The same scenario happened as the first time. Today i turned PC on and nothing of unusual happened, i was thinking if the dying of my surge protected cord extension damaged the PSU. I have anti surge support turned off in the UEFI.
 
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ChevetteSCx

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Yeah....THAT IS NOT A GOOD SOUND, EVER!!
Are you SURE it wasn't your Power Cord (from the Surge Protector to the PSU) or the PSU itself that are arcing, causing the Surge Protector to do it's job (or fail)?

Have you checked BOTH ENDS of the AC Power Cord?
1.) Check the AC Plug End for burning or scorch marks;
2.) Check to see if the C13 End (that plugs into the PSU) is tight and seats firmly into the PSU;
3.) Check the C13 receptacle on the PSU. Do the PSU PINS have burning or scorch marks?

Can you post a picture of JUST the Surge Protector Plugged in?
 
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jonnyguru

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ThunDagaFlare said:
Yesterday my 10 year old cord extension with surge protection made an electric arc sound and straight up turned off with my whole system, turned it back on and it didn't light up, neither did my computer turn on. I took it apart and didn't find anything wrong with it, i changed it to one with no protection and after plugging in the power cable into the PSU it also made the arc sound but i went along thinking it was a one time thing, and it appeared it was. I turned my system on and after about 10 minutes my computer turned off and started to restart. On that very restart it was working as usual. Then i turned computer off, unplugged to see if the cable or the pins were damaged or not and they're not, so i plugged it back in, heard the arc sound again and turned the pc on. The same scenario happened as the first time. Today i turned PC on and nothing of unusual happened, i was thinking if the dying of my surge protected cord extension damaged the PSU. I have anti surge support turned off in the UEFI.
Click to expand...

So, whenever you discontinue power completely to a PC, it takes longer to boot up. That's because otherwise, when the PC is shut down but still has power and is not switched off, it's in "standby".

When you unplug the PSU, the main cap drains eventually because of your PC's need for +5VSB. When you plug back in, there's a surge of power to the PSU called "in rush current" that recharges the PSU's bulk capacitor.

Neither the arc sound or the long POST/boot time should occur if you don't discontinue AC power to the PC.
 
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Karadjgne

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Check the outlet. Many homes built in the last 20 years or so have been built with uber-cheap (33¢ at home depot) stab in outlets. The bad part of that is that the spring steel on the inside makes very little actual contact with the wire and after years of heat-cool from higher extended current through the plug, that contact gets very thin. This creates high amounts of resistance, carbon scorching etc. You plug in a load like the pc and you get a surge as the current has to bully its way through all that resistance. Which creates heat, which speeds up the cycle until eventually the plug deteriorates to the point of fire or falls apart.

So in your panel box, turn off the rooms breaker, and then unscrew the outlet from the wall and see if there's any discoloration or melting of the wire insulation or if the wire pulls right out the back of the outlet. If it does so, that outlet will need to be replaced, and not used until it is.
 
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Karadjgne

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I love that movie...

But yes, in this case electrical company profit margins trump craftsmanship and quality considerations every time.

Prior to the mid 70's, every car on the street was built like a tank. Nowadays you have to go to a 'hot-rod' meet to find anything that doesn't crush like an empty soda-can if you look at it sideways.
 
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ChevetteSCx

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...and that is why I REFUSE TO USE THOSE ''STAB IN'' AC CONNECTIONS!!

People have asked me over the years...''Why does it take you so long to do things?''

ANSWER : ''Because I do it the RIGHT WAY the FIRST TIME, EVERY TIME!! (mostly because I'm too lazy to reschedule and return to do it over!)

You car comparison reminded me of a Monster Jam I went to years ago. They hauled out all sorts of cars and vans to be crushed, but the one that upset me the most, was the shell of a late 1930s/early 1940s Pontiac rounded roof/rumbleseat. At the end, when EVERYTHING ELSE WAS FLAT from being driven over by 12,000lb trucks...the Pontiac ONLY HAD A DENT IN THE ROOF!!

'nuff said!
 
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Karadjgne

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Nope. Doesn't work like that. The surge arrestor is designed to stop surges from the wall hitting the psu. Conversely, it should stop surges from the psu from affecting stuff downstream, like a TV or monitor that's plugged into the wall.

If the psu caps blow, it'll be upto the protective circuitry inside the psu to stop any potentially dangerous voltage/current levels from hitting anything inside the psu.

The surge arrestor has absolutely nothing to do stopping the psu from hitting anything upstream, only possibly downstream.

It's one of the many reasons it's highly recommended to use quality psus, not junk. Junk simply does not have decent protective circuitry, or has protections set at such high values that damaging voltage/current fails to trip them.

Until that psu is replaced, and a full system diagnostic is done, consider everything inside the pc as suspect.
 
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Juular

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Karadjgne said:
The surge arrestor is designed to stop surges from the wall hitting the psu.
Conversely, it should stop surges from the psu from affecting stuff downstream
The surge arrestor has absolutely nothing to do stopping the psu from hitting anything upstream, only possibly downstream.
Click to expand...

You're kinda contradicting yourself here. Surge protector (if it has a fuse) and breakers have smth to do in this particular situation @ChevetteSCx were talking about, they're stopping a short.
 
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Karadjgne

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Not really. If lightning hits the house, it travels around the circuits, hits the plug on the wall then hits the surge arrestor, stopping the lightning spike from hitting the psu in the first place.

If the cord or plug AT the psu shorts out, the surge arrestor is supposed to trip, because it's still AC voltage.

Once the voltage has entered the psu, it's exactly no different than power at the wall, if it spikes/shorts, it'll send that spike downstream to anything that's plugged into it. It's now DC voltage, so only the psu protective circuitry will stop the damaging voltage/current from hitting the mobo or cpu or gpu etc.

Wall - - > ¦¦ - - > psu
Psu - - > motherboard

The arrestor will protect from the backside of the psu all the way back to your mains circuit panel. There's no protection from the motherboard back to the psu other than what's inside the psu.

It takes a massive amperage strike at 12vDC to trip a 120/240vAC breaker.
 
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Juular

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@Karadjgne Why you're talking about a surge or a lightning if we were talking about capacitor failure. Aside of no mentions from OP of such scenario, this isn't wrong, if capacitor fails with short then it's a short (obviously) which would engage the breakers or a fuse in PSU itself, a cord, surge protector or an outlet. Not to mention that if PSU doesn't have a MOV\GDT and there's no standalone surge protector then nothing else inside a PSU would help in case of a lightning strike, primary side would get completely blown up, possibly permitting unswitched mains voltage to flow to secondary side (i'm not an expert, can't say what would exactly happen there) but secondary side protection would be absolutely useless in this scenario because nothing would work as intended since switching circuit have ran amok.

But we're getting off topic. What's your PSU, OP ?
 
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ThunDagaFlare

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from what i understand it's HC PS-550W? It doesn't say "model:" anywhere, a 200-240Vac 5A Frequency 50/60Hz made in China. It's about 3 years old, my friend that gave me this rig used to keep the PC running 24/7 for at least 2 years.
 
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jonnyguru

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ThunDagaFlare said:
from what i understand it's HC PS-550W? It doesn't say "model:" anywhere, a 200-240Vac 5A Frequency 50/60Hz made in China. It's about 3 years old, my friend that gave me this rig used to keep the PC running 24/7 for at least 2 years.
Click to expand...

He was lucky. I believe that's a garbage PSU.

Take a picture of the spec label and post it. We'll see. But the fact that it's 200-240V and doesn't have a brand and just a model are some serious red warning lights.
 
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ThunDagaFlare

ThunDagaFlare

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King_V said:
See the first link in my sig
Click to expand...
I've read the thread and it appears that the PSU i wanted to get is bad. I was thinking maybe Thermaltake Hamburg W0392RE Intel ATX 12V 2.3 530W with protections: OCP / OVP / OTL / OLP / Short / Full protection, What do you guys think?

rig:
i3 7100 3.90GHz
gtx 550 TI
Gskill Ripjaws DDR4 8GB (don't remember the frequency)
two 7200RPM HDDs
and i don't remember the motherboard

no RGB anywhere
 
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