PSU 8pin connector heat up and melted

[SanjithXtremer]

Hello there..
I have a Asus M5A97 EVO R2.0 motherboard with iball marathon 500W PSU...recently i notice my pc getting froze while im working and nothing could be inputted..i pressed reset button and then it wont turn on and the red light of cpu turned on...after a no of tries i found the problem....i saw the the 8pin connector was heating up..when i checked it was slightly melted....the pc was running fine for past 2nhalf years...and suddenly this happened..so here is my question...
..is this the problem of PSU or the MB?
..i recently overclocked from 3.5ghz to 3.7ghz and there was no problem for abt 3weeks..does this have to do anything with this..in doubt...i resetted my clock speed to 3.5 and still heats up.
My pc config:
Asus M5A97 EVO R2.0 mb
AMD FX8320
Deepcool iceedge cooler
4gb 1600
Iball marathon 500w psu
ASUS NVIDIA GTX 650TI
Seagate 1tb

 

[William Henrickson]

OMG crap PSU, sounds like a bad ground to me as well.

 

[Archaic59]

iball PSU? You're lucky your house didn't burn down. Please get a real power supply. Hopefully you didn't fry the motherboard. Use this list as a guide and select from tier 1 or 2 but no lower than tier3.

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-2547993/psu-tier-list.html

 

[SanjithXtremer]

After cleaning the connector i put it back in and checked....mobo turn on and works like charm...but the connector heats up drastically and i turned off the mains..so do u think its the psu causing the problem?should i go on replacing it?

 

[maxalge]

After cleaning the connector i put it back in and checked....mobo turn on and works like charm...but the connector heats up drastically and i turned off the mains..so do u think its the psu causing the problem?should i go on replacing it?

either the psu or the adapter itself

 

[Shaun o]

Basically this is what happened.

When you overclock your cpu two things happen.
Where the eight pin plugs into the motherboard four of them are used for an extra power phase to drive the cpu via voltage regulator modules.
The amount of watts and amps needed to keep the cpu stable when you decided to overclock it cause more power demand.

Wire is made by lots of strands of copper.
How many strands used in a wire relate to how much voltage, or amps the wire can carry.
Any copper wire is made on the AWG gauge, where the numbered value on the wire relates to how many separate strands are used and the thickness of the overall copper wire.

If you try to pass a high voltage, or amp rating, or wattage down a thin cable.
The electrons traveling down the wire bunch up, or bottle neck due to the thinness of the wire.
Where as if the the diameter,or the amount of separate copper strands used in the wire are more it allows more current, high voltage to flow much more easy at a faster rate and the electrons do not bunch together.

When the electrons are packed tightly together they have nowhere to go and bump into each other, rather than flowing in the same direction intended around a circuit from positive to negative . This causes heat as a waste product.

And why the wire and the plug when you look at it may be melted on four of the pins of the eight pin power block.

The voltage, wattage or amps sent down the cable due to the demand or power being drawn by overclocking the cpu from the motherboard exceeded what the wires could safely deal with so they melted.

Think of electrons like water flowing though a tap, the more you open the tap the faster the water can freely flow.
But if you turn down the tap the amount or stream of water that comes out of the tap slows down and come out at a much slower rate.

So the thinner a wire is in AWG rating the less electricity can flow down that cable.
Electrons flow slower and bunch up resulting in heat generated as a by product..

Make the cable larger in diameter with more copper strands, electrons flow faster and more easy.
The cause very cheap wire used with a very poor AWG gauge to keep production costs down.

Buy a better branded PSU and the wires will be thicker in diameter, and the power supply will be of a higher wattage and amp rating for 12v power = no more fire hazard.

People may moan about the price of a branded power supply tier rated. and at a higher wattage output.
But it`s cheaper than having to buy a new house due to fire damage, because you opted for a cheap power supply isn't it ?

 

[boju]

Nice answer Shaun o very intricate.

Reminds me of F1's bottlnecking in a tight corner on a circuit

 

[techgeek]

Heat build up in connectors is caused by poor connections. Oxidizing of the contacts is a big culprit here. It adds resistance to the connection. Current that passes through resistance creates heat. Heat is a direct result of power. A simple formula for DC is P=i^2 * R (so current squared multiplied by resistance). So as R goes up, so does the power, more power more heat.

Often time just removing and reseating connectors will improve the connection. Other times more aggressive cleaning is needed. In the case of contacts that are made and broke over and over again, you will get loose connections usually from the female contact getting loose. Sometime the crimp of the contact to wire can be subpar, or oxide can build up in the crimp, both of which will cause heat in the crimp / connector.

Though I do agree with the advice to replace the PSU, not necessarily for this issue, but because it is poor quality. An ounce of prevention if you will.

 

[SanjithXtremer]

Thanks shaun....thats very helpful..☺ great explanation...
Sprados..actually my cooler is iceedge 400fs..and it maintains temp quite well....i had the same doubt as urs so i took the mb out and removed all other components except processer and ram..and puton the 24pin and 8 pin connecters....i could feel the 8 pin socket heating up at the same time processor was cool...

 

[SanjithXtremer]

Techgeek ..:Well i think cleaning that socket is not a relevant idea..on this case the plastic is melted inside the holes of connector part(coming from psu)i tried cleaning and connecting a no of times but it still heats...

 

[techgeek]

Techgeek I did read the "I tried cleaning and connecting a no of times but it still heats..." and i added the how air is moving and some fans to help you but some people belived my post was not for this thread and they delete it.

Because the heat is inside of a connector (and it shouldn't be there), you can't really cool it this way. The air can't get into the connector as the plastic shell stops the airflow. Beyond that, the problem isn't airflow, it's a poor contact. The only way to fix it is to either fix what's wrong with the EPS connector or replace the connector. In the OP's case, he probably needs to replace his PSU with a better one. This should also fix the connector overheating as it will be a new connector.

 

[techgeek]

The issue isn't the fans. The reason you haven't had this issue is you didn't have a contact issue with your connectors. I'm not sure how I can explain this any better for you. This isn't hard drives, graphics card, CPU, chipset, running hot, it's inside of a connector. Fans may be able to lower the temps inside the case, but no amount of airflow will cool a connector (maybe the outside) or the contacts. So this comes down to a quality control issue. Most likely with the construction of the EPS cable.

I've never owned a computer with this issue and I've built many many computers. I have run into this type of thing many times at work (Electronics Engineering Technologist) with many styles of connectors (not just PC) and I've seen the results. Cooling was never the issue. I found either the female contact had relaxed and didn't provide enough surface area contact with the mating male pin. I've seen bad crimps where the contact is crimped on the wire. Again low surface area connecting the wire to the contact. Oxide between the wire and contact at the crimp can also cause problems. Oxide in the female contact or on the outside of the male contact can cause this issue. Ultimately it's the surface area for electrical contact. Less surface area equals greater resistance, greater resistance equals more heat.

 

[maxalge]

new connector, new psu, new motherboard and all these for 2-3 years i have this machine running more than 10 years with noctua fans without 1 problem.

you got lucky


your luck ran out