Question Power Supply Generic Question. Plug into Wall or a Power Bar

jasonp12

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Sep 8, 2010
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Silly question as ive been iut of the game awhile. My okd rig had a XFX 750w Silver+ PSU that i plugged directly into the wall because it had its own surge protection.

My new build is as follows:
PSU: Corsair Gold TX650w
Cpu: Ryzen 5 3600
GPU: Gigabyte OC RTX 2070
Ram: Corsair LPX 2x8gb DDR4 3000mhz CL15

I have my monitor and other perfierals need power plugged into a power bar?(surge protector) should i plus my PSU into it or directly into the wall?
 

Kvlt Doom

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Feb 8, 2011
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Not a silly question at all. Like my high school Chemistry teacher said, "The only silly (or stupid) questions are the ones that you don't ask." At the very minimum, you should plug your PSU into a surge protector. The way to know if what you are plugging into is actually a surge protector: look for a second, separate light on the unit, either around the switch or on the top of the strip; this light will be in addition to the light which illuminates when the strip is switched on, if there is such a light. The "surge" light is usually marked & sometimes a different color might be used to easily identify that there is indeed protection from surges.

Without the presence of that additional light, it's likely that what you are plugging into is simply a "power strip" or "power bar" which does nothing more than give you more receptacles to plug into. It won't provide any protection should there be a power surge, voltage spike, ripple, etc. If there is only a single light on the strip (and especially if that light is inside the "On" switch) please go to your nearest electronics store, or any number of online retailers, & buy a surge protector! One with adequate (read: at least 1,000 Joules) protection.

Better yet, spend the extra cash & get an Uninterruptible Power Supply & be sure you are protecting your rig. Like every other 80+ Rated PSU out there, your Corsair has what's called Active PFC or Active Power Factor Correction, something that helps the unit be more efficient. It also means that if you do decide to buy an UPS you will need one which uses a Pure Sine Wave, NOT a "Simulated Sine Wave" or "Stepped Approximation To A Sine Wave" as they are called by two big name UPS manufacturers. What that basically means to you is a slightly more expensive UPS, looking at $20-30 more or so.

Myself, I bought a CyberPower CP850PFCLCD about a year ago from Newegg: best move I ever made for my system. It's protected me from no less than 11 "events" that could potentially damage my systems. There are some technical articles which explain the difference between Pure Sine Wave & the other, but I'll save us both some research: I originally bought an UPS that didn't have Pure Sine Wave but used "Simulated Sine Wave" from my local Fry's Electronics. This was for my last build which had a 4th Gen Intel Proc & a Corsair CS550M PSU (the TX line replaced the discontinued CS line). I took it home, plugged my system into it, switched on the UPS, flipped the switch on my PSU, hit the power button, and.... Nothing happened. System wouldn't turn on.
Which turns out is a good thing, because that's one of the two things most likely to happen. The other is your system starts up fine & seems to work, only when the time comes & you lose power or maybe there is a lighting strike nearby: your system becomes toast. Not the kind of toast you wanna eat, either. No, it's the black as a charcoal briquette, setting off the smoke alarms & making the house smell funny, toast. The kind which makes you cry, because now you have to start from scratch & build a whole new system. Oh, you can bet your ass it's ALL gonna come out of your pocket, since the warranty doesn't cover damage that occurs should the UPS be used with a non-compatible Power Supply Unit, which an Active PFC PSU is well documented to be not compatable.

Fortunately, I simply boxed the non-compatible UPS back up & returned it to Fry's Electronics the next day. Because I had the CP850PFCLCD on a price watch at Newegg, it was less than two weeks later that I purchased my UPS new at a huge discount because it was on a 48-hour sale & I had a Promo Code that knocked $30.45 off, had 2-day free shipping to boot. So instead of $130, I scored it for $99.50, around the same price as the Simulated Sine Wave unit that didn't work! It's still in service protecting my new build, which is powered by a SeaSonic Focus+ Platinum 550 PSU.