Need PSU troubleshooting help

[TheGurgeMan]

So I've got two pcs, Lets just call the PC 1 and PC 2

PC 1 is an established PC with a Thermaltake Toughpower Grand RGB 650W PSU that works great.

PC 2 is a new PC with a brand new EVGA 22-b5 650W PSU that has I am having issues with.

In PC 2, none of the HDD's will spin up, it is as if they are not being supplied power.
I take the same HDDS and plug them into PC1 SATA power, and they spin up and work as normal
PC2's SATA power is not dead because I can plug a 12v lightbar into the SATA connector and it works.

On PC2 I have used a Molex to SATA connector with the same result, disk does not spin up.

On PC2 with the same molex connector, the 12v lights turn on.

I have no idea why the hdd's spin up on only PC1, while I can confirm that PC2 is supplying SATA power as it can turn on 12v lights. Any ideas?

[GhostRoadieBL]

you could have a weak 12v rail, the Light bar will probably run anywhere from 10v-13v (maybe as low as 8v) without issue but the motor on the HDDs need at least 11.8v to 12.4v+ in order to get past the friction of being stationary and spin up the platters (or they have a low power detection which keeps them off for the safety of the drive) this will have the same situation with molex to sata running on the same 12v rail.

 

if you have a multimeter you can check the output of a molex's yellow and black lines and the red and black should have 5v

[TheGurgeMan]

15 hours ago, GhostRoadieBL said:

you could have a weak 12v rail, the Light bar will probably run anywhere from 10v-13v (maybe as low as 8v) without issue but the motor on the HDDs need at least 11.8v to 12.4v+ in order to get past the friction of being stationary and spin up the platters (or they have a low power detection which keeps them off for the safety of the drive) this will have the same situation with molex to sata running on the same 12v rail.

 

if you have a multimeter you can check the output of a molex's yellow and black lines and the red and black should have 5v

So I've got the yellow wire running at 6V, and the red wire is at 25.5 Volts. I feel as though something is wrong there.

[GhostRoadieBL]

Yes that's very wrong voltage, your psu needs replacing

[Juular]

1 hour ago, TheGurgeMan said:

So I've got the yellow wire running at 6V, and the red wire is at 25.5 Volts. I feel as though something is wrong there.

That's like, completely wrong. What voltages do you get doing the measurements with the same DMM on the first PC's PSU ?

[TheGurgeMan]

3 hours ago, Juular said:

That's like, completely wrong. What voltages do you get doing the measurements with the same DMM on the first PC's PSU ?

Yeah I'm just an idiot, for some reason I forgot power supply outputs would be DC and not AC so that's why the measurements were messed up.

I changed the settings on my voltmeter and it came back with this.

PC1 Red 4.8V Yellow 12.0V
PC2 Red 3.2V Yellow 11.9V

Time to ship the PSU back?

[Juular]

What's the connector you're measuring it on ? Yellow, on both SATA and Molex is supposed to be 12V, if they're somehow swapped around your PC would've been dead already. So i'm not sure what and where are you measuring there even. Take a photo of it maybe.

[TheGurgeMan]

4 minutes ago, Juular said:

What's the connector you're measuring it on ? Yellow, on both SATA and Molex is supposed to be 12V, if they're somehow swapped around your PC would've been dead already. So i'm not sure what and where are you measuring there even. Take a photo of it maybe.

Yeah the yellow is reading within margin of error on both PC's, I'm more concerned with the red wire only providing 3.2V on PC 2 with no load at all.

[Juular]

Ah, nevermind, you got 12V on yellow. If you're measuring this on SATA power cable, red is supposed to be 5V indeed, if it's somehow 3.3V there - that's your problem. Have you got that PSU new ? Are you sure you're using the right cables ?

[TheGurgeMan]

17 hours ago, Juular said:

Ah, nevermind, you got 12V on yellow. If you're measuring this on SATA power cable, red is supposed to be 5V indeed, if it's somehow 3.3V there - that's your problem. Have you got that PSU new ? Are you sure you're using the right cables ?

Yeah I got the PSU new from Amazon. I am using the same cable for testing between the 2 PSU's so its not the cable at fault, it looks like I just got a lemon then.

Thanks for the help!

[IkeaGnome]

4 minutes ago, TheGurgeMan said:

I am using the same cable for testing between the 2 PSU's so its not the cable at fault

Those PSUs have different pinouts. This is part of where your confusion is happening. On the component side the pins are standardized. They are not standardized across manufacturers or even model lines of a same manufacturer. 

If you use the correct Sata cables for each PSU do you get correct readings?

[Guest]

22 minutes ago, TheGurgeMan said:

Yeah I got the PSU new from Amazon. I am using the same cable for testing between the 2 PSU's so its not the cable at fault, it looks like I just got a lemon then.

Thanks for the help!

WAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT A MINUTE!!!

 

DUDE!  That's why it's not working!!!!

 

You CAN NOT use Thermaltake cables in EVGA PSU or EVGA cables in a Thermaltake PSU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[TheGurgeMan]

3 hours ago, IkeaGnome said:

Those PSUs have different pinouts. This is part of where your confusion is happening. On the component side the pins are standardized. They are not standardized across manufacturers or even model lines of a same manufacturer. 

If you use the correct Sata cables for each PSU do you get correct readings?

Are you kidding me... That was it! I never would have thought that cables were not standardized. Using the other set of cables lets the disk spin up properly now. Thanks for the help!

[IkeaGnome]

43 minutes ago, TheGurgeMan said:

Are you kidding me... That was it! I never would have thought that cables were not standardized. Using the other set of cables lets the disk spin up properly now. Thanks for the help!

Be happy you found this with a multimeter and not a drive or something more expensive.

 

Edit: forgot you had hooked this up to a drive. 
make sure all the cables are correct and count yourself happy you didn’t fry anything.

[Juular]

5 hours ago, TheGurgeMan said:

I am using the same cable for testing between the 2 PSU's 

Lol, that's your problem

[TheGurgeMan]

11 hours ago, Juular said:

Lol, that's your problem

Yeah I thought it would have been smart to reduce 1 more variable by using the same cable for testing, but it turns out that is what ended up causing the issue lol.