using a psu for powering electronics?

jewii

jewii

jewii

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Joined
12 Jul 2010
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334
hey i'm currently writing my personal statement for ucas and i need to check something.

I've used my pc power supply and connected the green wire (pin 16) to ground on the 24 pin connector to turn the PSU on.

i then used the 12,5 and 0 volt rails from a molex connector with soldered on wires to power basic electronic stuff on breadboards for home projects.

i know it works for me, the psu has got safety short wiring protection but if there anything wrong with this method?

what i'm basically asking is if i say i used my pc psu to power home project electronics will it discredit me? (i.e.will they think i'm an idiot) because otherwise it shows that i'm creative & determined to do things.
 
Provided the PSU isn't your main one and just a spare you had kicking about you'll be fine. The only cause for concern is something about low loading of the PSU, although I'm not sure if this is just an old wives tale or something that used to be a problem in days gone by.
 
thanks for your feedback. i googled your theory and i found a website which reviewed PSU's and had voltage regulations at different loads from 0-100%.

basically most Good powersupply's have good regulation from 0-100%, the only one i found was the xfx PSU's wouldn't start with 0% load but @ 1% load only -12 V was abit off.

i will mention good voltage regulation at low laod and short circuiting protection, just incase.

p.s. yeah the PSU is a spare
 
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You could demonstrate your awareness of the potential problem, saying you have a permanently connected minimum load to keep the PSU operating within it's spec. But do UCAS forms have so much technical detail nowadays? I'm sure mine basically said 'hello, I'm really super, please give me a place' :). As long as you know what to say if asked in an interview. What course you applying for?
 
My advice would be to say something of the ilk of "I enjoy fiddling about with electronic equipment and learning how it truly works", and expand upon it in an interview if asked. Still though, this is best to put down if you're doing a course in something like electronic engineering- it probably wouldn't look great on an application to study health and safety.
 
A few words on safety would not go amiss,

i.e.

You ensured that there was a suitable grounding of the psu chassis.

Precautions against static electrical charges were adopted.

The chassis was fully enclosed and fan blades protected against ingress of fingers and tools.

The cover was in place at all times and connections to the psu were made from the external proprietary cable sockets only.

Voltages were checked independantly by multimeter.
 
A personal statement isn't a technical report, you're going in to too much detail, and losing valuable space to talk about yourself elsewhere!
 
Makhaira said:
A personal statement isn't a technical report, you're going in to too much detail, and losing valuable space to talk about yourself elsewhere!
Click to expand...

This, basically. If your university cares about it, they'll ask. A UCAS personal statement is for listing your personal achievements that universities will be interested in, the detail (for the statement, at least) is not that important. If I was applying to do a computer programming degree for example, I could tell them I have working knowledge of lisp, even that I have created a second-order Laurent polynomial algebra system, but I wouldn't tell them exactly how I implemented it. They might ask though :)
 
Liampope said:
I'm sure mine basically said 'hello, I'm really super, please give me a place' :). As long as you know what to say if asked in an interview. What course you applying for?
Click to expand...

it's electronic enginnering, i'm trying to get into southhampton, it's one of the best ones in UK so if this personal statement gives me an edge to the other thousand people applying, it must be done.

yeah i've said briefly on home electronics, i'm just making sure that it sounds good, not an idiot putting his PSU in risk. i talked about making a clock and i used a crystal and some counters to make a accurate 1 Hz, i just said the fundamentals of the project, only took 1-2 lines.
 
Studied it at Sheffield myself, which at the time was the highest rated in UK, and I wanted to go oop north :).

So to summarize, saying you made a bench power supply from a PC PSU shouldn't ring any alarm bells, and should demonstrate your enthusiasm and resourcefulness as you hope. Dont go into any more technical detail than just mentioning it, but be prepared to if they ask during an interview.

Good luck :)
 
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