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What can damage and eventually kill a PSU?

Hi everyone, 

 

Huge dilemma, I'm currently running a fairly old desktop unit:

Asus P5B Motherboard

Intel Core Quad Q6600 @2.4GHz

AMD Radeon 7800 

4GB DDR2

Corsair RM650x Having had this PC for over a decade, I only had to replace the GPU twice and also added in an SSD. About 6 months ago, I started to have problems turning the unit on, having to press the power button multiple times before it'd actually start. This persisted up to the point when the unit wouldn't start at all anymore, so I replaced the old PSU with the Corsair one. Once replaced, my old desktop revived and I was able to power it up every time with no problems.

 

Soon, the PSU started to became extremely noisy (although advertised as dead silent o.O ) - my bad, couldn't be bothered to dig up the receipt and return the PSU - but more recently it started to suffer of the very same symptoms as the old PSU: it now takes at least 2-3 presses of the power button to power up and I'm worried I might again end up with another dead PSU.

 

My question is, has anyone heard of, say, a faulty motherboard affecting and eventually killing a PSU? I don't believe in this sort of perfect coincidences so I'm thinking there is something else affecting my new PSU. 

 

If anyone has any ideas (please, spare the power button being at fault, since after replacing the PSU worked just fine) about what other things could cause this, it would be very much appreciated to have them shared in here.

 

Many thanks

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1 minute ago, PraetorTM said:

My question is, has anyone heard of, say, a faulty motherboard affecting and eventually killing a PSU? I don't believe in this sort of perfect coincidences so I'm thinking there is something else affecting my new PSU. 

No, unless the motherboard or a component is causing a short on one of the rails.

 

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1 minute ago, M.Yurizaki said:

No, unless the motherboard or a component is causing a short on one of the rails.

 

 

Great, but then what else could it be? Is this a common symptom of a failing PSU and was I so unfortunate that the unit I bought didn't lasted?

 

Moreover, can this have anything else to do with the current setup / system I'm running the PSU on?

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15 minutes ago, iamdarkyoshi said:

Does the motherboard have any bulging capacitors by chance?

They'd look like this big blue one:

IMG_20181214_163553.thumb.jpg.706a92c15fb439e2102b3511aa08ae0d.jpg

Yes, i'd say it definitely has them - why, what are your thoughts?

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1 minute ago, PraetorTM said:

Yes, i'd say it definitely has them - why, what are your thoughts?

this indicates a capacitor at or near the end of its life

 

(it may work indefinably longer, but not at rated specs any more)

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2 minutes ago, Neo-revo said:

this indicates a capacitor at or near the end of its life

 

(it may work indefinably longer, but not at rated specs any more)

And how might this be connected to the failure of the PSU? I can understand the mobo being at risk of fault (or end of life) but I fail to understand why would my PSU also fail, along with it?

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mobo wants 120w, capacitor wastes 30w, and a dying capacitor wastes '60w'   (made up numbers)  and now the 180w pull on the 3/5v psu supply for the mobo has caused the psu to die before the mobo ultimately died too/along with a stressed psu

 

(theoretically)

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26 minutes ago, PraetorTM said:

And how might this be connected to the failure of the PSU? I can understand the mobo being at risk of fault (or end of life) but I fail to understand why would my PSU also fail, along with it?

I don't think this would cause a PSU to die. Capacitors that fail either fail to open circuit or short circuit and I think the types used in this case fail to open circuit. 

 

Though if you are able to eventually power on the PC, it's not at that point yet. It just has reduced capacitance.

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3 hours ago, PraetorTM said:

Yes, i'd say it definitely has them - why, what are your thoughts?

If your board has bulging caps, the board is at fault for not providing enough localized filtering and smoothing for its components to run properly. By installing a good PSU, you provided the board with cleaner power, but the board doesn't have good enough caps to run correctly anymore, and likely was just right on the edge of working when you installed the new PSU.

 

You'd either need to recap the board or replace it, I'll bet the PSU is actually fine.

 

Here's an extreme example of a board with similar symptoms I fixed at work:

IMG_20181029_161929.thumb.jpg.e555bc69e39a4fe8950a18dcf9e185f8.jpg

 

This system was extremely unstable, but worked flawlessly after replacing the capacitors and installing a new power supply.

 

 

@jonnyGURU might be able to provide some input here

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51 minutes ago, iamdarkyoshi said:

If your board has bulging caps, the board is at fault for not providing enough localized filtering and smoothing for its components to run properly. By installing a good PSU, you provided the board with cleaner power, but the board doesn't have good enough caps to run correctly anymore, and likely was just right on the edge of working when you installed the new PSU.

 

You'd either need to recap the board or replace it, I'll bet the PSU is actually fine.

 

 

@jonnyGURU might be able to provide some input here

This is very true.

 

The whole reason I got into testing PSUs in the first place is because I was in tech support and would see a number of motherboards and graphics cards with bulged capacitors and fried VRMs under a year of use.  Turned out the users were using really cheap PSUs they bought down the road from us and they were so bad that they were killing the components with poor voltage regulation and high ripple that the boards couldn't filter out themselves.

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16 hours ago, jonnyGURU said:

This is very true.

 

The whole reason I got into testing PSUs in the first place is because I was in tech support and would see a number of motherboards and graphics cards with bulged capacitors and fried VRMs under a year of use.  Turned out the users were using really cheap PSUs they bought down the road from us and they were so bad that they were killing the components with poor voltage regulation and high ripple that the boards couldn't filter out themselves.

 

17 hours ago, iamdarkyoshi said:

If your board has bulging caps, the board is at fault for not providing enough localized filtering and smoothing for its components to run properly. By installing a good PSU, you provided the board with cleaner power, but the board doesn't have good enough caps to run correctly anymore, and likely was just right on the edge of working when you installed the new PSU.

 

You'd either need to recap the board or replace it, I'll bet the PSU is actually fine.

 

Here's an extreme example of a board with similar symptoms I fixed at work:

IMG_20181029_161929.thumb.jpg.e555bc69e39a4fe8950a18dcf9e185f8.jpg

 

This system was extremely unstable, but worked flawlessly after replacing the capacitors and installing a new power supply.

 

 

@jonnyGURU might be able to provide some input here

Very interesting, this is the kind of response I had in mind, I just wasn't quite sure of the ins and outs of the actual relationship between the mobo and the PSU. Thank you

16 hours ago, jonnyGURU said:

This is very true.

 

The whole reason I got into testing PSUs in the first place is because I was in tech support and would see a number of motherboards and graphics cards with bulged capacitors and fried VRMs under a year of use.  Turned out the users were using really cheap PSUs they bought down the road from us and they were so bad that they were killing the components with poor voltage regulation and high ripple that the boards couldn't filter out themselves.

Very much doubt this was my case, since the prior PSU was a premium model when I bought it (thus it lasted 12 years o.O ) and the current PSU is a Corsair, which again is not at the cheap spectrum of PSUs. But probably this is a good argument to put forward to my missus to justify buying a new motherboard with everything else it entails xD

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On 12/17/2018 at 3:44 AM, PraetorTM said:

Hi everyone, 

 

Huge dilemma, I'm currently running a fairly old desktop unit:

Asus P5B Motherboard

Intel Core Quad Q6600 @2.4GHz

AMD Radeon 7800 

4GB DDR2

Corsair RM650x Having had this PC for over a decade, I only had to replace the GPU twice and also added in an SSD. About 6 months ago, I started to have problems turning the unit on, having to press the power button multiple times before it'd actually start. This persisted up to the point when the unit wouldn't start at all anymore, so I replaced the old PSU with the Corsair one. Once replaced, my old desktop revived and I was able to power it up every time with no problems.

 

Soon, the PSU started to became extremely noisy (although advertised as dead silent o.O ) - my bad, couldn't be bothered to dig up the receipt and return the PSU - but more recently it started to suffer of the very same symptoms as the old PSU: it now takes at least 2-3 presses of the power button to power up and I'm worried I might again end up with another dead PSU.

 

My question is, has anyone heard of, say, a faulty motherboard affecting and eventually killing a PSU? I don't believe in this sort of perfect coincidences so I'm thinking there is something else affecting my new PSU. 

 

If anyone has any ideas (please, spare the power button being at fault, since after replacing the PSU worked just fine) about what other things could cause this, it would be very much appreciated to have them shared in here.

 

Many thanks

What was your previous PSU?

Do you switch off/unplug the power to the computer when you aren't using it?

What is your PC on? Carpet? Wood floor?

What's your case, and with direction is your PSU facing?

Is the power LED on your motherboard on?

Have you tried switching the power button and reset button on your case to be the inverse? (Turn the PC on with reset button, restart with power button)

 

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