PSU (I think) made a series of very loud cracking sounds and the computer rebooted.

[Damri]

Hi so I have my month old RM650i, and today while at medium load the tower made pretty loud crackling noises (it sounded as if someone was opening a bag of crisps for a second) and a moment later pc just rebooted, no blue screens, no errors, everything turned on normally and works fine since. Should I be RMAing it immediately? Is the system at any risk with using it at this point?

Is there anything else in the system that can make crackling noises (it was seriously loud, I had music playing and I could clearly hear every one of them)

Would really appreciate some help with this.

 

[huvik]

did it smell like burning?

 

[InvalidError]

Have a look all around the inside of your PC. While you are at it, sniff around to see if you find a burning electronics smell anywhere along the way. If you find no obvious signs of something having gone wrong inside the PC, use a flashlight and look through the PSU's openings to see if there might be visible signs of trouble in there. Try the smell test on the PSU too.

If you see or smell anything obviously wrong in the PSU, RMA it. In a PSU, the thing most likely to fail without causing an immediate catastrophic failure is output caps and those may generate loud "cracks" when they pop.

The only other thing I can think of that might generate loud cracks without failing would be if something was arcing on the primary side, causing a loud crack when the input caps dump their charge in the arc.

 

[Damri]

Have a look all around the inside of your PC. While you are at it, sniff around to see if you find a burning electronics smell anywhere along the way. If you find no obvious signs of something having gone wrong inside the PC, use a flashlight and look through the PSU's openings to see if there might be visible signs of trouble in there. Try the smell test on the PSU too.

If you see or smell anything obviously wrong in the PSU, RMA it. In a PSU, the thing most likely to fail without causing an immediate catastrophic failure is output caps and those may generate loud "cracks" when they pop.

The only other thing I can think of that might generate loud cracks without failing would be if something was arcing on the primary side, causing a loud crack when the input caps dump their charge in the arc.

Hi, I did a check of the system today, no burns or anything out of the ordinary on the motherboard, when I looked inside the psu however... it looks as if someone spilled some shave cream in a few places. I know next to nothing about how psus are made but I'm guessing their insides arent suppose to be swimming in white paste, will corsair honor the warranty on that or is there any way that could've been my fault?

EDIT - also no I don't recall smelling any burning but I had a window open and it was pretty windy outside so if the smell were to be subtle I probably wouldn't catch it so I wont really know.

 

[InvalidError]

The "shaving cream" is likely adhesive/cement (ex.: Silastic) to keep large parts in place to prevent their leads from breaking due to vibration over time.

 

[Damri]

The "shaving cream" is likely adhesive/cement to keep large parts in place to prevent their leads from breaking due to vibration over time.

Wait so is it suppose to be slapped on like that? I've checked an old psu's insides for comparison and it's clean and adhesive/cement-free, by free i mean its not drowning the coils and capacitors like it does in the RM650i in question.

 

[InvalidError]

Wait so is it suppose to be slapped on like that? I've checked an old psu's insides for comparison and it's clean and adhesive/cement-free, by free i mean its not drowning the coils and capacitors like it does in the RM650i in question.

Some manufacturers apply the stuff more liberally than other. Many units don't have any at all.

But if you see large globs of stuff across multiple tall components, usually between tall caps, tall inductors/chokes, heatsinks and transformers, then that's 99% likely to be adhesive to improve vibration endurance. Even an exploded capacitor won't create large globs covering inductors and other stuff.

 

[Damri]

Wait so is it suppose to be slapped on like that? I've checked an old psu's insides for comparison and it's clean and adhesive/cement-free, by free i mean its not drowning the coils and capacitors like it does in the RM650i in question.

Some manufacturers apply the stuff more liberally than other. Many units don't have any at all.

But if you see large globs of stuff across multiple tall components, usually between tall caps, tall inductors/chokes, heatsinks and transformers, then that's 99% likely to be adhesive to improve vibration endurance. Even an exploded capacitor won't create large globs covering inductors and other stuff.

Hmm alright, well I'm still going to rma it since I've tested other psu, and the noises of any kind are gone from the system so there was definitely something up with it, thanks for the help and explanations!