multimeter

[Whizzard9992]

Unfortunately we have not educated the young Wizard or whatever his name is.

I'm not the one trying to set someone's house on fire. I am the one trying to expose the person suggesting it as incompetent so no innocent reader decides to try your little trick.

I'm no EE, but I never claimed to be one either. I know enough to get by, and I know shorting out your PSU with resistors is probably at the top of th "How to set myself on fire" list.

It's funny how you call me a young idiot and a troll (mind you, I'm not the one name-calling), yet your suggestion looks strangely JUST like mine. This is after your first suggestion, which was not only impractical, but dangerous.

If you pushed the PSU to the max, you'd prolly just blow a fuse. You don't want to do that. Just test the rails with a DMM while running 3dmark. There's no better way to do it without some expensive equipment or some (real) EE knowledge.

5 Minutes later we see...

If you are only concerned with current draw in you system, forget about directly measuring current. Just measure you rails while under max load.

Let's not forget your original reply....

If you want to measure a PSU's current output on a given rail, jump start it (outside of a system) and place a power resistor on that rail to ground

But hey, I guess when you're an EET, you don't have to admit when you're wrong. You can just call the other person an idiot, and then give the same advice he just did. Makes sense to me! :roll:

 

[Whizzard9992]

Pengwin,

You're an avid poster and I respect you. I'm sure you've seen this:

http://www.tomshardware.com/2005/07/11/stress_test/index.html

Otherwise, there's not much you can do without similar equipment. Just stick with the DMM and you'll wonder how you ever OC'ed without it.

 

[techgeek]

Pengwin wrote this and this was the post I responded to.

work for testing PSU's. IE i wanna see if my Antec Pulls the advertised 17 amps.

The only way to do this is to use my method.

techgeek wrote:
techgeek wrote:
If you want to measure a PSU's current output on a given rail, jump start it (outside of a system) and place a power resistor on that rail to ground

This quote that you quoted me in, I meant the maximum current draw and that was my response to the quote above of Pengwin's. How else would you propose to test a power supply at it's maximum rated current output? It's a little misleading to use that single line from my original post, when all through the rest of it I am talking about maximum current output. It was just a typing oversight that I didn't include the word 'maximum' in that line of my post.

 

[pengwin]

Thank you Batspoon for coming in and backing me up. Unfortunately we have not educated the young Wizard or whatever his name is. Nice touch with the schematic, what did you use? I have experience with Orcad (when I was still going to school), but I couldn't tell what you used from the schematic you provided.

Edit: I just went back over your posts Pengwin, and I may have misunderstood you, and you may have a misconception of how your PSU works. You said that you wanted to see if it was putting out the max rated 17A while in your system. The only way this would happen is if the load required it, it doesn't put the max rated current out all the time, only when you system needs it to. If in fact it ever does reach this limit, your PSU is definitely underpowered for your system.

well i thought multimeters could force the PSU to go under load..etc.

anyways i think i'll go with the 20 dollar one from Cable organiser.

 

[techgeek]

Thank you Batspoon for coming in and backing me up. Unfortunately we have not educated the young Wizard or whatever his name is. Nice touch with the schematic, what did you use? I have experience with Orcad (when I was still going to school), but I couldn't tell what you used from the schematic you provided.

Edit: I just went back over your posts Pengwin, and I may have misunderstood you, and you may have a misconception of how your PSU works. You said that you wanted to see if it was putting out the max rated 17A while in your system. The only way this would happen is if the load required it, it doesn't put the max rated current out all the time, only when you system needs it to. If in fact it ever does reach this limit, your PSU is definitely underpowered for your system.

well i thought multimeters could force the PSU to go under load..etc.

anyways i think i'll go with the 20 dollar one from Cable organiser.


Sadly no, at least not any I have worked with. You have to provide the load. You could provide a very brief load by measuring current directly from the rail to ground (don't flame me Wizard it's a joke). Of course if your meter has a fuse, it will blow, if it doesn't it will wreck you meter. Just to re-iterate that last suggestion was a JOKE. Good luck with your project, however you wish to proceed.

Wizard I restrained myself as long as I could, especially after the comment about "Electronics Engineering Technologist" sounding gay. Which by the way makes you the first to cast derogatory remarks. There are plenty of Technologists (not just in the field of Electronics) that would have found the comment demeaning. The money spent earning that degree and then earning the respect of the people you work with only to have someone call into question your abilities and integrity (a person whom with their very posts shows that they don't have any idea what they are talking about) can be really irksome. One can only fly in the face of ignorance for so long without losing ones cool.

I must go to bed it's 10:00PM here and I likely have to fly to Abu Dhabi (via Sanaa, via Dubia hopefully not through Bahrain) in the morning (if my exit and re-entry visa is in place in time). There's nothing like working in the Middle East when your company doesn't have enough tech's to cover all it's operations.

 

[Whizzard9992]

How else would you propose to test a power supply at it's maximum rated current output?

http://www.tomshardware.com/2005/07/11/stress_test/index.html

^^^^^^^^^^

That's how you test a PSU.



Listen, I'm not trying to flame anyone. There are too many people passing off fallacies as advice, and in this case the suggestion was dangerous. There are too many people out there who instantly have a PH.D from the wiki-google university, pawning half-truths for respect from people who don't know any better.

People come here for advice from experts, or at least from people who might have some experience with what they're talking about. You can't (safely) test the load of a PSU without the proper equipment. Enthusiasts looking to test their PSU use multi-meters.

Q) work for testing PSU's. IE i wanna see if my Antec Pulls the advertised 17 amps.

A) If you want to measure a PSU's current output on a given rail, jump start it (outside of a system) and place a power resistor on that rail to ground.

That's bad advice, no matter how you spin it, especially for someone who's not comfortable with a multi-meter.

As for being an EET, I work heavily in R&D with all types of engineers. No one appends "Technologist" to the end anymore, unless they're trying to make themselves sound special (and that's usually people who aren't EE's at all). Mix that in with a suggestion that's inaccurate/incorrect, and the BS radar goes off.

The only way to do this is to use my method.

THG must have forged the above stated article then, because I didn't see them shorting anything and they got some good readings. But hey, you're the expert, right? Maybe you should write them a letter and complain. Or maybe it's DeVry that needs to receive a complaint...

 

[pengwin]

please. lets not argue. 3 EE's arguing wont be fun. At all. Big words. No cursing. = Boring Flames.