PSU went pop!

[Cjwinnit]

:(

Had unplugged my tower from the mains over the weekend. Came back to it, plugged it in and turned the power switch on at the wall when the rig made a loud "POP/BANG" noise and failed to work. PSU has the smell of death (faintly) about it. Now just praying it didn't take anything with it...

Long story short, I need a new PSU (and probably a new board :cry:)

Was using an FSP460-60PFN (9 molexes!! :D) but was thinking of getting either an FSP blue storm or a OCZ SilentXstream. Have a few hard disks, one passively-cooled AGP card, a 90w P4 chip and a pile of fans so need about 400-500w, mostly on 12v.

I'm a little tempted by This (http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/AOpen-Fortron-Source-FSP550-60PLN-550W-P4-PSU-20-4-6_W0QQitemZ200284960530QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_Compu ting_PowerSupplies_EH?hash=item200284960530&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=72%3A1300%7C66%3A2%7C65%3A12%7C39%3A1%7C 240%3A1318) Fortron 550w psu (£16 is about $22) though i'm getting sick of the sound of psu's with 80mm fans, apart from the fact I'm now somewhat wary of second-hand supplies, even Fortron ones.

Questions:
1/ Can you think of a better supply than already thought?
2/ Which would be best for a standard 3-year-old setup?
3/ Does FSP have anything on any of it's sites about warranties? (had no luck when i tried).

Thanks.
Thoughts?

[Viol8ted]

Not sure about the OCZ SilentXstream, but I had a gamextreme that pooped out on me.

[Super Nade]

:(


Questions:
1/ Can you think of a better supply than already thought?
2/ Which would be best for a standard 3-year-old setup?
3/ Does FSP have anything on any of it's sites about warranties? (had no luck when i tried).

Thanks.
Thoughts?

It sounds like you had an MOV failure. If so it can be repaired easily. If it is out of warranty, could you open it up for pics? :)

The unit on Ebay is probably a Sparkle unit. Reliable but inefficient. All I can say is you get what you pay for. If you only want to spend a few bucks, be prepared to deal with the associated headaches. :shrug:

[Cjwinnit]

It sounds like you had an MOV failure. If so it can be repaired easily. If it is out of warranty, could you open it up for pics? :)

Will do: there's a small yellow box connected to the power socket, is that it?

Just checked on another psu, the motherboard seems to have survived!

[AngryArtichoke]

The OCZ SilentXstream is a good power supply for the money, even if OCZ's marketing department butchered the name.

[JonSimonzi]

I assume you mean StealthXstream, I've had a 600w one for quite some time. Don't have a problem with it.

[Super Nade]

Not the yellow box. That rarely fails (high energy surge capacitor). You should be looking on the primary side i.e. the region where there are big tower capacitors. Post pics of that area. Also check the fuse. If the fuse blew out, you may need to replace it.

[Cjwinnit]

Pics taken, as you can see the internal layout of this supply is truly horrendous! Found a fuse; all white, no markings. will try and find some way of testing it.

Edit: fuse is functional. The capacitors are all fine apart from the largest one in that group, the black 10v 4700uF, labelled "fujy yu" TNR. Has a slightly convex top. The brown ones are 3300uF, labelled SEK, all seem fine. There are numerous small ones but all seem ok, though I can't see them without further disassembly.

There's a massive black cap on the lower board (second picture, bottom right) but doesn't seem too bad: I'd expect that to be covered in slime if it had failed.

[Cjwinnit]

Tried getting a close-up of what i think are the MOV's. I may get a new power supply and continue to try to get this psu fixed in my spare time, as I guess it may take a while. The whitish goo is adhesive I think. I take it I should solder these off at some point and test using a multimeter?

[Oklahoma Wolf]

Those are X capacitors for the AC transient filter. The MOV's S-N's talking about will be right next to the main filter capacitors. You may not be able to see them with the upper PCB still in place.

Although, IIRC this is an APFC unit... not sure it's worth the bother to troubleshoot by now.

[Cjwinnit]

Yeah I get the feeling this psu should be retired from the frontlines, but I'm a stickler for old bits of kit!

Edit: It came off! this is exciting. I take it the MOV is the orange thing between the two caps, though in the top-right of the picture on the daughterboard there is a component looking distinctly brown and a little sticky:

[Audioaficionado]

MOVs (metal oxide varistor) come in all kinds of shapes and sizes
http://images.google.com/images?q=Metal%20Oxide%20Varistor&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&sa=N&tab=wi

[Oklahoma Wolf]

Tried getting a close-up of what i think are the MOV's. I may get a new power supply and continue to try to get this psu fixed in my spare time, as I guess it may take a while. The whitish goo is adhesive I think. I take it I should solder these off at some point and test using a multimeter?

Actually, the MOV really is in that picture... I missed it earlier. It's the black heatshrink covered disc next to the two blue capacitors. Looks like it's ok yet. Your problem is likely elsewhere.

The orange thing between the two capacitors is a thermistor (I think). Look closely at all the parts on the heatsinks on that PCB and see if any have blown themselves apart. Look for black marks on the PCB as well - that could be a hint.

[Cjwinnit]

The brown thing in the last pic is the bottom of a small black square (a bit like a mosfet) with 4 pins at the bottom. The 4 pins (3 long pins one a little shorter) are encased in that brown stuff you can see (which is solid). The daughterboard seems to be called "PCB4 (+5VSBY)" which i guess is for the standby usb and mobo voltage. Probably explains how it blew without hitting the power on button. Hmm...

[Rich'[ard]]

guess how mine popped.

story:
*kneels under the desk and checks the back of the PSU*
"hmm...i wonder what this 115 to 230 switch does...let's see what it does...

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM"

[Cjwinnit]

Damn!

Received a Corsair 650TX and it worked perfectly! for a day. Now it seems to have died too, except that this one does try to start-up but stops after less than a second.

I think i'm an amateur PSU destroyer.. :(

[hafa]

Damn!

Received a Corsair 650TX and it worked perfectly! for a day. Now it seems to have died too, except that this one does try to start-up but stops after less than a second.

I think i'm an amateur PSU destroyer.. :(

Check your wall socket power with a multimeter. If you're not on one already, get a UPS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uninterruptible_power_supply) with AVR (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_Voltage_Regulator) regardless of results.

[Grayfox]

i hope it is just a PSU

i rather 3 PSU's go POP on me than the hardware that it powers

[Blazing fire]

Damn!

Received a Corsair 650TX and it worked perfectly! for a day. Now it seems to have died too, except that this one does try to start-up but stops after less than a second.

I think i'm an amateur PSU destroyer.. :(

My friend had a screw behind the motherboard and it exhibited the same problem. That's probably due to a short circuit. Perhaps your motherboard's fried?

[JamesXP]

'Just checked on another psu, the motherboard seems to have survived!'


Probably not.

[Cjwinnit]

Very weird. Did a full check of the environment of the motherboard and there isn't any loose metal, then plugged in a noname 300w psu. It's currently sitting quite happily in the BIOS screen and has been for a few hours now with no problems.

Tried the new psu before that, still no luck. Even tried rippng out all nonessential extras off the board, still no luck.

It's not completely dead, unlike the fortron PFU. the Corsair still tries to spin up momentarily. No word yet on an RMA..

[JamesXP]

What are your system specs? most importantly the board..

[Cjwinnit]

Chip: P4 560, 3.6 Ghz
Mobo: Gigabyte GA8IPE-775G
RAM: Mushkin 512*2 DDR
Vid: Geforce FX5200

Got the RMA for the Corsair and am sending it back today. Ran the noname PSU again on setup, it's flawless. I think it was just a lack of luck. I haven't let the magic smoke out for a while so I guess it was time...