PSU just went pop, what do I do?

Doctor McNinja

Doctor McNinja

Doctor McNinja

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First of all, the PSU is a Corsair AX650 that's about two or three months old. The full spec of what's inside my CoolerMaster CM 690 II Advanced is as follows-


Corsair AX 650w
i5 2500k @ stock speed
Corsair H100 (with two Gentle Typhoons, stock fans relocated to floor of case)
P8Z77-V Deluxe
Samsung Green 8GB (MV-3V4G3D/US)
2x Samsung 830 256Gb
1x WD Caviar Black 1Tb
1x WD Caviar Green 3Tb
1x Asus GTX 670 DirctCU II TOP (with stock factory settings, as with everything else)
1x Samsung BD-DVD (can't remember model off hand)


My PSU just made a loud 'pop' noise, like a light bulb does when it suddenly fails. The system just went completely dead and then either rebooted by itself or I rebooted it... I can't remember (it's late, I'm tired and... well, it scared me a little). If I had to put money on it, I'd say it rebooted itself, though.

I was playing GTA 4 at the time and heard the pop as everything went black. After the reboot I got a message listing the spec of my CPU, Mobo, RAM, what was plugged into my USB slots and the configuration of my hard drives followed by this message-

Power supply surge detected during previous power on.
ASUS Anti-Surge was triggered to protect system from unstable power unit!
Press F1 to Run SETUP
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I can post a picture if need be but it's kind of hard to read due to the flash.

It may not be important but my mobo was displaying an "A2" Q-code instead of the usual "A0" code. [EDIT] My mobo always displays the "A0" code which means "IDE initialization is started" despite the fact I don't have and IDE drives. "A2" means "IDE detect".

Not wanting to cause any more damage, I shut the system down using the front panel power button. I unplugged everything and examined what I could see. I couldn't see any damage on either the PSU or the rest of the system and there are no burning smells or smoke.

So what do I do? RMA it?... it's only three months into a seven year warranty after all.

[EDIT] Reading that back, I may have answered my own question but it being so late, I'm not thinking clearly and I thought I'd get the jump on the problem so I can get it resolved as quick as possible.
 
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Your PSU may be fine.
I've had pretty much the same thing where a surge caused it to instantly shut down/reboot accompanied by the 'pop' sound which obviously wasn't the sound of anything exploding. It's the same sound you get when you switch on a decent hifi amp.
I also had the same message pop up on reboot.
Haven't had any issues since.

Seems like the auto surge protection did it's job.
You could always try switching it on again :)
 
Bacon? said:
If its older than 30 days they dont have to take responsibility for it, no retailers do.
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That is complete rubbish. I suggest you read up on UK consumer law or do a search on the forum, where this subject has been covered plenty of times before.
 
dcsarge said:
That is complete rubbish. I suggest you read up on UK consumer law or do a search on the forum, where this subject has been covered plenty of times before.
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I actually contacted UK consumer law advice. You can send it back to OcUK but they dont have to replace it on site after those 30 days.
 
Bacon? said:
I actually contacted UK consumer law advice. You can send it back to OcUK but they dont have to replace it on site after those 30 days.
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No one mentioned on-site replacement :confused: but to suggest the retailer don't have to take any responsibility after 30 days is rubbish. The contract is with the retailer, not the manufacturer, and they have to deal with any faults (i.e. issue RMA and test items) within 1 year (2 if you want to go with EU directives).

There may not be a detectable fault that OCuk can find and sometimes dealing with manufacturer can be a better (although potentially expensive) option but I hate to see incorrect information given out like that.
 
I would contact OcUK via the customer support forum and ask their advice. They are a tier one Corsair dealer so have the best relations with them. Also, it is a lot cheaper to send the PSU to OcUK than to the Netherlands.
 
dcsarge said:
No one mentioned on-site replacement :confused: but to suggest the retailer don't have to take any responsibility after 30 days is rubbish. The contract is with the retailer, not the manufacturer, and they have to deal with any faults (i.e. issue RMA and test items) within 1 year (2 if you want to go with EU directives).

There may not be a detectable fault that OCuk can find and sometimes dealing with manufacturer can be a better (although potentially expensive) option but I hate to see incorrect information given out like that.
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If you return an item to them after 30 days unless the warranty is exclusively with OcUK (they have a list) then they will just RMA it the manufacturer, which takes longer than a customer sending it to them direct.
 
In the EU law is that you can send your faulty items to retailer within 2 years, they will deal with it, it might take weeks... but they will deal with it... You can send your stuff to Netherlands etc... but your postage is going to cost around 15 quid for 2kg...
 
Useful info guys, but we haven't established that the PSU IS faulty yet :)

From the description, it sounds like the surge protection did what it's supposed to do and kicked in to stop any damage occurring.
 
Bacon? said:
Yes you would need to RMA it to Corsair in the Netherlands.
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I am sure I read an older post on here, where one of the OCUK guys has taken the Corsair issue onboard and deals with this for you. So basically you send it to him at OCUK and he will deal with it...........unfortunately I have searched for said thread but cannot find it anywhere :o

but yeah, lets ascertain that it is dead before you go that route.
 
hlxbravo said:
I am sure I read an older post on here, where one of the OCUK guys has taken the Corsair issue onboard and deals with this for you. So basically you send it to him at OCUK and he will deal with it...........unfortunately I have searched for said thread but cannot find it anywhere :o

but yeah, lets ascertain that it is dead before you go that route.
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Oh yeh you can send it to OcUK but they don't replace it after 30 days they send it to Corsair in the Netherlands.
 
Bacon? said:
Oh yeh you can send it to OcUK but they don't replace it after 30 days they send it to Corsair in the Netherlands.
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It is the Supplier's (not Manufacturer's) responsibility to provide a remedy (repair, replacement etc.) within a reasonable timescale.

How the Supplier goes about this (repair themselves, replace at their own cost, return to the Manufacturer) is their business. :)
 
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