Dead Men Walking

dMw Chit Chat => The Beer Bar => Technology Section => Topic started by: TeaLeaf on July 10, 2012, 06:49:17 PM

Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: TeaLeaf on July 10, 2012, 06:49:17 PM
When I shut down my water-cooled behemoth last night it shut down uneventfully right up until the point where once it powered off completely the PSU started making a double beep and there was a solid red LED light on at the back of the PSU.    Pressing the reset (& hold) cleared it, but when you try to power cycle again the PC does nowt and immediately goes into PSU making double beep noises again.

The PSU is an Enermax SGalaxy 1000W and it's been pulling some heavy duty since Feb 2008.   For the first 3-4 years it was pretty much on 24/7 with only weekly reboots and it's handled overclocking, multiple drive arrays, SLI and of course the water cooling pump, so I think it has probably reached the end of its natural life.   I read something about fans going and it being possible to replace them if you splice in some new connections, but I don't want to be messing with that kind of stuff as I'm likely to crosswire it with my fridge by accident.   The other possibility I read about inferred the PSU was totally dead, but I'm not sure exactly what is wrong with it.  If anyone knows what a double beep and a constant red LED means......
 
Anyway, assuming the worst, I suspect that it might be the politically correct time to make use of this most fortuitous failure to strip down the system down and do a major upgrade.  

Anyway, as it's upgrade time I need to get a decent PSU to run the new system.  Recommendations for something beefy enough to run water-cooling too plz!  

Now to go find a good CPU/Mobo/RAM & Gfx combo.  Anyone got some favourites?

I don't want to go scary price on gfx and on this system I don't need to be overclocking heavily, I use water for the quietness in my office.  I just want fast enough and reliable.
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: Gorion on July 10, 2012, 07:30:21 PM
Take a look at the enermax platimax psu's, there's even more models with insane wattage coming out, up to 1700w.  I've also been using the galaxy1000 since Feb 2007 and it's still rocking solid.

http://www.enermax.com/home.php?fn=eng/product_a1&lv0=1&lv1=52

 (http://www.enermax.com/home.php?fn=eng/product_a1&lv0=1&lv1=52)
As for cpu/mobo/ram, check the z77 ivybridge/z77 sabretooth/ and your choice of ram.
 
As for gfx, check the nvidia 600 series.
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: kregoron on July 10, 2012, 09:10:37 PM
Quote from: TeaLeaf;354496When I shut down my water-cooled behemoth last night it shut down uneventfully right up until the point where once it powered off completely the PSU started making a double beep and there was a solid red LED light on at the back of the PSU.    Pressing the reset (& hold) cleared it, but when you try to power cycle again the PC does nowt and immediately goes into PSU making double beep noises again.

The PSU is an Enermax SGalaxy 1000W and it's been pulling some heavy duty since Feb 2008.   For the first 3-4 years it was pretty much on 24/7 with only weekly reboots and it's handled overclocking, multiple drive arrays, SLI and of course the water cooling pump, so I think it has probably reached the end of its natural life.   I read something about fans going and it being possible to replace them if you splice in some new connections, but I don't want to be messing with that kind of stuff as I'm likely to crosswire it with my fridge by accident.   The other possibility I read about inferred the PSU was totally dead, but I'm not sure exactly what is wrong with it.  If anyone knows what a double beep and a constant red LED means......
 
Anyway, assuming the worst, I suspect that it might be the politically correct time to make use of this most fortuitous failure to strip down the system down and do a major upgrade.  

Anyway, as it's upgrade time I need to get a decent PSU to run the new system.  Recommendations for something beefy enough to run water-cooling too plz!  

Now to go find a good CPU/Mobo/RAM & Gfx combo.  Anyone got some favourites?

I don't want to go scary price on gfx and on this system I don't need to be overclocking heavily, I use water for the quietness in my office.  I just want fast enough and reliable.

AS time goes by the capacitors age, and loose effeciency.. so after 4 years of heavy duty, it probably ran like a 800-900 watts :)

As for a new PC, whats the budget at?
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: kregoron on July 10, 2012, 09:29:54 PM
Intel i7 3770k 3.5Ghz Ivy Bridge LGA1155 - 257£
Gigabyte Z77X-UD5H LGA1155 motherboard 173,99
G.Skill TridentX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C10 2400MHz - 99£
MSI GeForce GTX 670 OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card - 310£
Corsair Professional Series AX1200 High Performance 1200W Modular '80 Plus Gold' Power Supply - 215£

This is all expensive stuff, and just dream stuff for most people... Not sure if you wanna spend this amount of cash on it, tho slap up  a number and ill sort you something out
And not sure if you got any brand preferences.. Motherboard, ram and often down to peoples own experiences, tho all brands i selected a solid brand with a good history

On ts in 20 mins if and onwards if needed
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: Guru on July 10, 2012, 11:18:59 PM
Sorry to hear about your blown up PC TL :(

CPU:

At the moment I'd recommend to go with Intel for sure, although I'm a big fan for AMD (the last CPU structure for AMD FX-8150 isn't that good atm).

So Yeah Ivey Bridge is the way to go.


Motherboard:

Now for the Mobo I'd recommend Asus: Maximus V GENE (Note: it is MicroATX so make sure that will fit in your case)

http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/Intel_Socket_1155/Maximus_V_GENE/

Two versions from this mobo:

1st - Standard

2nd - Mobo + ThunderFX audio bundle


Here is a review about the 2nd version:

[video=youtube;RfweEGbGr98]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfweEGbGr98&feature=youtu.be[/video]


RAM:

I'd go with Mushkin.. something like this:

http://www.mushkin.com/Memory/Redline/996996.aspx

Crossair and G.Skill are good too.



PSU:

Seasonic 1000W Platinum. I'm currently using this one and I simply love it specially the Hybrid button.

It works great under the stress (quite too) even with hitting 5.2 Ghz on my current AMD FX-8150 over-clocking.


http://www.guru3d.com/article/seasonic-1000w-platinum-power-supply-review/8


GFX:

My preference is always with ATi atm I'm using 7950 x 2 on crossfire.

7970 is really good choice too. Just don't be bother with crossfire unless you wanna have some fun with micro stuttering.

Mainly I'll go with HIS (they got a new none-refernce cooling on the 7900 series).

http://www.hisdigital.com/un/product2-692.shtml
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: Benny on July 11, 2012, 09:23:23 AM
Open the PSU and there's a big heatsink, invariably next to it will be a couple of discharge capacitors. take a screwdriver and hold it across the legs of the caps. The heatsinks dry out the caps and they stop discharging. (it's a built in eol which is ridiculous).

Worth a try.
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: TeaLeaf on July 11, 2012, 03:21:55 PM
Thanks for the input so far, I went with the Seasonic 80 Plus Platinum in the end and ordered one of those (the Platinum bit sold me and it was about the same price as the Corsair when I managed to find one in stock!).  Interestingly, the XFX PSU is simply the same Seasonic innards in an XFX branded outer box.  It should arrive tomorrow, so I'll attempt to rewire the PC and then take a bit more time to consider the other components and a budget for the upgrade.  

Many thanks folks, much appreciated!
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: kregoron on July 11, 2012, 08:55:57 PM
Quote from: TeaLeaf;354528Thanks for the input so far, I went with the Seasonic 80 Plus Platinum in the end and ordered one of those (the Platinum bit sold me and it was about the same price as the Corsair when I managed to find one in stock!).  Interestingly, the XFX PSU is simply the same Seasonic innards in an XFX branded outer box.  It should arrive tomorrow, so I'll attempt to rewire the PC and then take a bit more time to consider the other components and a budget for the upgrade.  

Many thanks folks, much appreciated!

Seasonic are ace m8 :D

Funny enough, most top end Corsair PSU's are Seasonic stuff innards ;)
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: TeaLeaf on July 12, 2012, 09:12:19 AM
Quote from: Benny;354513Open the PSU and there's a big heatsink, invariably next to it will be a couple of discharge capacitors. take a screwdriver and hold it across the legs of the caps. The heatsinks dry out the caps and they stop discharging. (it's a built in eol which is ridiculous).

Worth a try.
Thanks Benny, I'll check on this once the old one is out, it can then be pressed into service elsewhere if it works again!
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: kregoron on July 12, 2012, 10:42:02 AM
Quote from: TeaLeaf;354568Thanks Benny, I'll check on this once the old one is out, it can then be pressed into service elsewhere if it works again!

if the caps are blow you can see the top is cracked, solution to a fix is the same as Benny suggests.. tho not adviseable in a long run ;)

[ATTACH=CONFIG]1403[/ATTACH]
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: TeaLeaf on July 12, 2012, 02:30:04 PM
Enermax looked fine on the inside, if a little dust-clogged.  Wired in the Seasonic but now got zero response from the on/off power button.  Might try shorting the pwr on/off mobo pins to see if it is perhaps the water cooling pump failing?    There seems to be a relay on the on/off switch which will also kick in the pump when the system is powered on, so I guess it could be that.   If the systems starts when I short the pins then at least I know the fault is further up the chain in the water cooling bit.

Sheesh, why can't these things be simple.
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: DrunkenZombiee on July 12, 2012, 03:20:30 PM
If you have any-more issues let me know and I will try a and help.

If you do a CMOS reset on some MOBO's it will often automatically power the board on. Useful when you have the mobo out of the case and needs to test.

DZ
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: TeaLeaf on July 13, 2012, 11:01:57 AM
Did some more wiretracking today through the chassis in the area of the relay & water pump loom.   Seems that either Enermax had a different peripheral supply pin configuration on their PSU when compared to the Seasonic, or the guys who built my PC did some wierd wiring.   Either way, I replaced their wires with Seasonic cables and then plugged into the PSU system to try to power up.

The good news is I am now up and running on my main PC again. (30" panel is so much nicer than a 15" laptop screen!)

The bad news is that now it is working I'll haver a harder time persuading management to go for an upgrade.   :frusty:

So, the problem is confirmed as the Enermax SGalaxy 1000W PSU.  It's headed for the bin.

In other news, I am impressed with the Seasonic, it was supplied with a wholesale volume of cables & connectors of every type imaginable, all neatly braided and also embossed with their connection type.  It's also smaller than the Enermax and is quieter too, I can hardly hear anything from the PC now :)
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: TeaLeaf on September 06, 2016, 10:48:52 AM
Sorry for the thread necromancy, but just for the record, I applied for an RMA for my Seasonic Platinum SS-1000XP PSU today.  

The 1000w PSU had been transferred into a secondary system that I use in at office and I had started to see issues where when I powered up nothing happened with the PC.   It used to take multiple switching OFF/ON attempts on the rear of the PSU to get it to boot up.   Wires were checked, leads replaced and nothing made a difference.  So I bought a new PSU (Corsair CX750M) and swapped it in this morning - and immediately the PC started 'working as intended'.

So, let's see if the RMA gets anywhere as I have no idea how long the warranty is for this PSU, but 4 years for a top of the range PSU is not too good imho!
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: Chaosphere on September 06, 2016, 11:36:24 AM
Not good at all. I stick to Corsair, and touch wood never had an issue yet.
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: Sneakytiger on September 06, 2016, 01:16:05 PM
My new pc setup is : 6700k i7 ,asus rog maximus 8 hero,16gb ddr4,h100i v2 cpu cooler,corsair rm1000x Psu,seahawk x 1080 in a cooler master pro 5 case,I think it's a good setup.


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Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: Tutonic on September 06, 2016, 03:39:45 PM
Agreed, 4 years is pretty woeful for a 'premium' brand.

I've also been buying Corsair for a few years now, and they've been rock solid so far. Cue imminent PSU failure :)
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: BrotherTobious on September 06, 2016, 03:41:10 PM
Quote from: Tutonic;416680Agreed, 4 years is pretty woeful for a 'premium' brand.

I've also been buying Corsair for a few years now, and they've been rock solid so far. Cue imminent PSU failure :)

This ^^ and I have also not had a issue at all
Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: Sneakytiger on September 06, 2016, 05:10:21 PM
Did your Psu take anything else with it when it popped?


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Title: Great News! My PSU Blew Up!
Post by: TeaLeaf on September 06, 2016, 07:42:43 PM
Quote from: Sneakytiger;416693Did your Psu take anything else with it when it popped?
The pop was in 2012 with an Enermax.   The Seasonic just had some voltage spikes (BIOS picked them up) and the PC regularly did not want to switch on without cycling the PSU multiple times.