My power goes out often how do I protect my pc

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Ltsmith4

Commendable
Aug 5, 2016
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My house has its power go out often. Recently I left without exiting a game and while I was gone there must have been a brownout or something. My pc was off and when I turned it on it gave me the Windows did not shut down properly screen. I shut everything down for the night but there was an electric sound, like a high pitched noise, coming from my psu. It's no longer doing that but I'm not wanting to risk my pc again. What do I need to get in terms of surge protectors and ups and what not? Also what can I get to check my hardware to make sure temps and everything of psu, GPU, etc are running at? I hope my pc wasn't damaged this time
 
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My power goes out all the time and I don't have a problem. A power outage is not a surge, it's actually quite the opposite. Instead of a large voltage spike you simply lose all AC, so no voltage. Some cheaper power supplies will drop the PWR_OK signal at too low of a voltage. When the power goes out, the power supply still has some energy stored in its capacitors. As that energy is drained, the voltages of the outputs decrease, so the 12V steadily decreases. It is up to the power supply to notify the motherboard "hey, this voltage is getting too low, you better shut me off" and it does so by dropping the PWR_OK signal. Some PSUs will drop the signal too late. But really that shouldn't be much of a problem even if it does happen, nor do I see how that would relate to PSU noise.

Really the only thing that could happen is software corruption from a power outage. So if you run important software you can get a UPS, But if you really don't do anything important there is no need to. Having a decent PSU should be enough. Windows always boots back up and everything seems to be fine usually. But if you're really concerned, get a UPS, but you have to spend a good $200+ to get one that's decent. Others are so cheaply made that I don't even see how they're considered a form of protection for the PC.
 
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for monitoring pc voltages/ temperatures i recommend this little uttility, the HWMonitor.
is simple and in most cases is accurate. if some temperatures are crazy (like a cpu on 120º or a chipset) you may consider visiting your BIOS to see the real temps or check if the hardware manufacturer provides some utilities that covers that sensors you want to check.
for a good UPS you need so to see what is your current amps that you are using from the wall socket, becausé you don't want an ups that can supply like 6A on a pc that requires 10A while gaming
 
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Not for voltages, it's super inaccurate. Any software for voltages is bound to be inaccurate.
 
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The bigger danger is not the outage, but a possible power surge when the power is restored.

You could buy a UPS.. That will let you ride through momentary power fluctuations.
You need perhaps only 5 minutes run time to gracefully shut down.
APC makes good units and they have a free app(POWERCHUTE) that will shut down for you unattended if power is lost.
 
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thats why i said to see the BIOS, on there is more accurate.
he can go ''old school'' like me, i have 1 little panel multmeter for each voltage on my pc case, on this way no more software or BIOS checking, its just there, you can instantly see what is going on :)
 
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true, thats why i have mine directly from the molex connector from each connector (1 for the MB, other for GPU other for CPU and the other things).
the pc front case looks like a power plant panel but all the info is there. my next plan is to use ampmeters for each thing but it might take some time to make that happen
 
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There is a sensor somewhere on the board that reports voltages. Both BIOS and software utilities can usually read this sensor. The problem is noise. Because there is power draw from components between the sensor and the power supply, the voltages to the sensor are no longer representative of PSU output. Turkey explained this to me before and I did some research and found a very informative article on this, but I no longer have the link.

Basically, whether it's BIOS or a software utility, it's not perfectly accurate because it's not a direct connection.
 
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I think this was it http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDFAQs&op=FAQ_Question&ndfaq_id=26
 
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As said above, you could get an Uninterruptible Power Supply which would provide power for a short time after the grid goes down, and it will help to protect against surges when the power comes back on.

https://www.google.com/search?q=uninterruptible+power+supply&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8#tbs=vw:l,mr:1,cat:1348,pdtr0:717116%7C600.0%24900.0&tbm=shop&q=uninterruptible+power+supply&spd=11659116163081061388

As for the high pitched sound... Is it a constant sound or does it only last for a second or so?

I used to have a Rosewill power supply years and years ago... It would make this high pitched sound for a fraction of a second when it ran out of power. I think that's just the sound of the electromagnetic fields collapsing as it runs out of voltage to output.
 
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The high pitched noise went away, however when I start a game, like world of Warcraft, the first 30 seconds to a minute it's runnining, it skips like how a scratched dvd will skip. Is this the GPU? It sounds like something is struggling but after 30 seconds or so it's fine
 
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The sound stopped after I shut everything down and left it for the night. The only problem now is when I start a game it lags and freezes for about 30 seconds then acts fine. It's similar to when a dvd skips. It also sounds louder than normal and im assuming the noise is coming from the GPU, kinda like its really struggling. the only thing else that happened besides the power event was that i downloaded some corsair software for my new keyboard.
 
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How do I check temps? My thinking is my psu might be damaged therefor my graphics cars isn't getting enough power causing the coil whine and lagging when starting a game. Could this be possible? How could I check it?
 
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sorry for the long response, I greatly appreciate the help. My psu did freak out and I ended up getting a new one. now however my pc has restarted once on me while playing a game and I have had to re download a few things. When I clicked the shortcut it wants me to download it even though I never uninstalled it. I am not getting any error messages which is confusing. I ran the test and will post a shot in a minute. Could something be wrong with my HDD?
iM7wHe.png
 
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