Refurbished Corsair TX850M PSU for $49.99... Too good to be true?

[ProtoflareX]

Planning a new rig at the moment, but the total of all of the parts I want ended up being... a little more than I would like it to be. As a result, I am looking to save money wherever possible. One potential saving opportunity I've found is with the PSU. I'm looking for an 850w PSU, and Amazon currently has refurbished Corsair TX850M PSUs avaialble for $49.99, whereas a new TX850m would run me around $99.99. In the PSU tier list thread, TX series PSUs from 2017 that are 650w and above are listed as tier 1 CPUs. I'm bothered by something, though; doesn't this seem a little too good to be true? Even if it's a refurbished product, doesn't half the price of a new model seem a little off? Corsair promises a one year warranty for all refurbished products, but that warranty would be rather meaningless if the PSU was faulty and toasted my entire system. At the same time, the money I'd be saving money is too enticing to ignore. What do you guys think? Is this a risk worth taking?

[emosun]

whats going in your machine that needs 850 watts

[ProtoflareX]

3 minutes ago, emosun said:

whats going in your machine that needs 850 watts

I'm looking to power an RTX 2080 TI and an AMD Zen 2 CPU later this year that I plan to overclock. There are rumors of Zen 2 CPUs using less power than the current Zen+ CPUs, meaning 750 watts might suffice, but I've heard that it's "healthier" for a computer to draw an amount of power that leans toward the middle of your PSU's rated wattage rather than the upper end of it. That's why I'm looking at an 850 watt model instead. Of course, all of that is hardly relevant to my current predicament.

[scottyseng]

I would avoid the Corsair refurbished models as someone who fell for them before. haha. I bought AX860i units for $99 (original price at the time was $199.99). They both died within three weeks. RMA'd them, got two more units. These two also died. RMA'd them again, got two working ones.

 

About a year and a half later, one died, so that's already a loss. One is still alive in my brother's PC but I have a spare PSU for it (I think operating for three years still?).

 

I regret not spending that extra $50 to get Cooler Master's V850 PSU at the time. The time lost to rewiring and shipping back the PSU when they do go bad was not worth the savings. Also data loss when the PCs suddenly shut down (My RAID card's battery backup proved it's worth. haha).

 

My cousin who bought a AX760 refurbished also had his fail after a year.

 

Though we got our units from newegg.

[ProtoflareX]

2 minutes ago, scottyseng said:

I would avoid the Corsair refurbished models as someone who fell for them before. haha. I bought AX860i units for $99 (original price at the time was $199.99). They both died within three weeks. RMA'd them, got two more units. These two also died. RMA'd them again, got two working ones.

 

About a year and a half later, one died, so that's already a loss. One is still alive in my brother's PC but I have a spare PSU for it.

 

I regret not spending that extra $50 to get Cooler Master's V850 PSU at the time. The time lost to rewiring and shipping back the PSU when they do go bad was not worth the savings. Also data loss when the PCs suddenly shut down (My RAID card's battery backup proved it's worth. haha).

 

My cousin who bought a AX760 refurbished also had his fail after a year.

 

Though we got our units from newegg.

Not what I was hoping to here, but can't say it was unexpected. There's obviously something strange about the fact that it's being sold for half price. Maybe I'll have to bite the bullet and buy a new model.

[scottyseng]

5 minutes ago, ProtoflareX said:

Not what I was hoping to here, but can't say it was unexpected. There's obviously something strange about the fact that it's being sold for half price. Maybe I'll have to bite the bullet and buy a new model.

Well, that's just my experience, but it seems to be a lottery with the things. When you get one that does work, it does stay working like a new unit. They are pretty much like brand new when you get them.

 

I actually sent the broken AX860i to a user for free on here because they wanted to see if they could fix it. haha.

 

Basically for us, when it's dead, it would attempt to start, but end up in a power cycle loop. They would also randomly shut down and go into the power cycle loop. It's strange, sometimes it would shut down within 10 min, other times for several hours or even a day.

 

Ah, you can also review the other reviews on newegg:

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139130

[ProtoflareX]

9 minutes ago, scottyseng said:

Well, that's just my experience, but it seems to be a lottery with the things. When you get one that does work, it does stay working like a new unit. They are pretty much like brand new when you get them.

 

I actually sent the broken AX860i to a user for free on here because they wanted to see if they could fix it. haha.

 

Basically for us, when it's dead, it would attempt to start, but end up in a power cycle loop. They would also randomly shut down and go into the power cycle loop. It's strange, sometimes it would shut down within 10 min, other times for several hours or even a day.

 

Ah, you can also review the other reviews on newegg:

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139130

Someone had their I9-9900K toasted by one of those refurbs. That's an incentive to stay away if I've ever seen one. Think I'll be going with a new model.

 

[scottyseng]

Just now, ProtoflareX said:

Someone had their I9-9900K toasted by one of those refurbs. That's an incentive to stay away if I've ever seen one.

Wow, that's a new one to me. At the time most of the reviews were like me, had the random shutdown and power cycling issue.

 

Yeah, I would say just to buy new or save up some more to buy a quality new unit. It seemed to plague the refurbished AXi series the most from what I've read though.

[Guest]

16 hours ago, ProtoflareX said:

Someone had their I9-9900K toasted by one of those refurbs. That's an incentive to stay away if I've ever seen one. Think I'll be going with a new model.

 

Link?

 

[ProtoflareX]

22 minutes ago, jonnyGURU said:

Link?

 

It seems as though I can't link a specific Newegg review, but if you type "9900" in the keyword box of the review section, it will be the first review that shows up.

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, ProtoflareX said:

It seems as though I can't link a specific Newegg review, but if you type "9900" in the keyword box of the review section, it will be the first review that shows up.

Oh.  Newegg review?  Nevermind. Probably user error. 

[Stefan Payne]

1 hour ago, jonnyGURU said:

Oh.  Newegg review?  Nevermind. Probably user error. 

You mean one of those geniusses that slammed a PCIe connector into the CPU Connector??

 

Or used the wrong cables from the wrong PSU...