PSU go Boom

greymack

greymack

greymack

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12 Oct 2009
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288
Location
Scotland
Christmas day over and with a full 2 weeks of holidays ahead of me i thought i'd stick the pc on this morning for a quick blast of battlefield BC2.
Switched on at the mains, pressed the button on pc...3 seconds into the boot....BOOM ......a loud noise similar to a balloon popping.
Oh no.
I sort knew the problem right away but i tried changing the fuse, even the cable itself but nothing, there is no power going to PC.
The router and monitor are powering up ok but there's no lights showing on M\B which i usually get even when the PC is off but on at the wall.
So i'm left with the obvious (unless u think different) the PSU has blown up.
It's a seasonic 600 bought about 4 years ago and has been a great performer, very quiet too.
A quick search of a custom pc magazine tells me the antec T-650 is excellent as is the seasonic X-650 all be it £30 more expensive but i'm drawn to the seasonic because of the good name they have plus how quiet they are.

So really just wondering on Boxing day if anyone out there has any suggestions on what i should be looking at?

Merry Christmas folks.
 
Sorry to hear about your PC.

You're definitely right that the PSU has blown, I just hope it hasn't hurt any other parts.

With that in mind, I'd get a replacement Seasonic. Seasonic are probably the best PSU manufacturer around, whereas Antec tend to be more of a mixed bag. Unless somebody can vouch for the T-650, I'd play it safe with the Seasonic.
 
Don't freak me out guys, the prospect of the motherboard, cpu being fried is a scary thought.
According to custom pc the antec is indeed built by seasonic but antecs design, it is highly rated but it did state at full load the fan does make a loud swooshing sound.
Defining howe loud a swooshing noise is in words is very difficult. Recently i have become quite sensitive to my pc's noise after having my fingers burnt when i purchased a gainward GLH GTX460 graphicvs card which should have been named Loud as hell.

A friend has a corsair HX650 which he says is quiet but then he has an antec case with about 100 fans running so anything would sound quiet in his case :)

All of a sudden £100 for a PSU doesn't sound too bad if i can get away with just the psu being fried.
 
Absolute worst case scenario, absolutely everything in the case is FUBAR and the case is the only thing you can save.

However, particularly with well-made PSUs, they tend to blow up without taking too much with them. It's extremely rare that a Seasonic unit will completely kill your PC, but it's possible. Likelihood is that it's just the PSU.
 
appreciate all the responses only one way to find out the complete damage and thats to order a replacement and see where we are.
Only trouble is the time of year if i order tonight i'm not sure when i'd actually receive it :(
I might have to sit with the family and watch tv ;)
 
Only thing to watch with Antecs is the age of the review. Antec have changed suppliers (and thus the entire PSU) without changing model numbers. So you could buy a PSU based on a review of a completely different one.

The Seasonic X series are excellent.

It's possible that it isn't the PSU. If the motherboard power circuitry is goosed then that could cause it not to be able to draw power from the PSU, which means the PSU could appear to be broken when it isn't. It's likely to be the PSU though. You can get a tool to bridge two pins on the PSU plug which will allow you to test a PSU. I can't see one on sale from OcUK. Basically it;s just a 24 pin PSU connector socket with two pins connected that will cause a PSU to turn on. You simply plug a 4 pin molex fan into the PSU and the bridging tool and switch the PSU on. If the fan turns then the PSU isn't totally dead. All that said it's still likely to be the PSU.

Finally, don't Seasonic retail PSUs all have a 5 year warranty?
 
Good point Halk re the warrant, i think the model i have is the S12 and it's certainly something i intent to look into but even if i'm covered a and i still have proof of purchase from 2006 it's not going to happen quickly so i will order a new one and hope to recoup some cash through the warranty option.

Currently i am favouring the seasonic x-650 although OCUK don't seem to stock seasonic :(
 
They used to. I got mine in July from OcUK, it's a shame they've stopped. All that aside though I'd head off to JonnyGuru and read reviews on the PSUs that OcUK does sell, to see if you can find the right one. I find his reviews not only enjoyable to read, but harsh enough on the kit to show up bad products.

Alternatively get yourself a cheap PSU to cover you while you wait on the Seasonic RMA? You'd probably be able to either keep hold of the OcUK PSU as a spare afterwards? Long and the short of it is that it's probably significantly less efficient, and noisier, but why fork out for something you'll use for less than a month.
 
Good point again but i'm concerned that the warranty option may require proof of purchase and i really am not sure if i still have the receipt, i can't even remember where i got it from.
So i really think my route is too buy a replacement then see if i can recoup costs through the warranty option, i could always sell any replacement i may get.

The big thing is i'm on holiday and i don't have a working PC....NIGHTMARE !!!!

P.S. Using wives netbook :(
 
You have wives? That's illegal in the UK, you're only allowed one!

Depending on how you do your email then have a look back... you do have the time to do it! Plus check with Seasonic's site, they may not equire proof of purchase (long shot).

I bought a Dell monitor on eBay years back. 1 month before the warranty expired it failed, I managed to find the eBay transaction and contact the company who sold it to me, got their purchase number and went back to Dell technical support and got the monitor replaced FOC. So it is possible :)
 
greymack said:
there's no lights showing on M\B which i usually get even when the PC is off but on at the wall.
Click to expand...
That means also 5V standby went out and without that motherboard couln't even tell PSU to start.
5Vsb circuitry has couple small capacitors but if noise was very loud it might have been big primary capacitor.
Smaller caps can also shoot flame downwards which might show on surface of PCB.


The Halk said:
Alternatively get yourself a cheap PSU
Click to expand...
Wouldn't use that one except as paper weight.
Price pretty much tells that you can't trust it to give quaranteedly more than 200-250W and capacitors are surely such crap you never know when they'll say BOOM and it's even less sure that it has any kind protections to shut it down in case of component failure before it either blows up totally or circuit breaker goes off.
 
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