PSU Testing

[ThatSoundGuy]

If you suspect that your PSU is malfunctioning and not giving the high wattage you are expecting, how do you test for this? Er, in this case, troubleshoot this issue?

[samiscool51]

buy a PSU tester, if it's sending the correct voltages then it's fine, if not it's faulty and should not be used

if i find a faulty PSU, i switch the red switch on the back of the PSU and power it on and kill it, 

because, a. it's the nice thing to do to it, it shouldn't live that type of life. b. it's realy fun to see a PSU blow up!

also it will trip the switch on your fuse box 

[zanthros]

I have a few different PSU testers and the highest load that any one of them can place on a PSU is 15 amps... Not Watts. If you believe that your power supply is not providing enough wattage then just replace it. 

 

What makes you suspect that it is not providing the high wattage you are needing?

 

If you want to test for the wattage being used then go out and purchase a Watt-O-Meter. This is a real device that you would plug in your PSU to it and plug the meter into the wall. Turn the system on and on the LCD it will show you the amount of wattage being consumed by the device. Simple.

[ThatSoundGuy]

5 hours ago, zanthros said:

I have a few different PSU testers and the highest load that any one of them can place on a PSU is 15 amps... Not Watts. If you believe that your power supply is not providing enough wattage then just replace it. 

 

What makes you suspect that it is not providing the high wattage you are needing?

 

If you want to test for the wattage being used then go out and purchase a Watt-O-Meter. This is a real device that you would plug in your PSU to it and plug the meter into the wall. Turn the system on and on the LCD it will show you the amount of wattage being consumed by the device. Simple.

I suspect that my PSU isn't giving me enough wattage because... There's honestly nothing left really for me to test to my knowledge... or at least there's nothing else wrong or that I think I can replace! My main issue is from, whenever I run a program, like UNIGEN's valley benchmark, or BF1, or HITMAN, or Overwatch.. Within 5-10 minutes of running the program openly, or in the background (Such as using google chrome while being on the BF1 Main Menu and checking my email or doing schoolwork), my computer will black screen, fans and lights inside the computer will turn off, then in 5-10 seconds they will turn back on quicker than it usually does if I normally turn it off and then normally turn it back on. There is no BSOD and it seems to run normally, until I try to run the game and it will repeat the cycle. I got a new motherboard pretty recently after RMA'ing it previously, reset the CMOS, did a clean install of all drivers, everything seems to be in perfect working order.... I just... I am really in a jam here...

[zanthros]

That does appear to be a power hiccup but in your BIOS in the power settings is your system set to come back on when "power comes back on?" Like during a blackout? I don't think that it is the PSU.

Does it do this every single time or is it more random?

[zanthros]

Post system specs please.

[ThatSoundGuy]

4 hours ago, zanthros said:

That does appear to be a power hiccup but in your BIOS in the power settings is your system set to come back on when "power comes back on?" Like during a blackout? I don't think that it is the PSU.

Does it do this every single time or is it more random?

 

 

 

It does this every single time I activate a game or a benchmark.

 

4 hours ago, zanthros said:

Post system specs please.

My Build Info.nfo

Here is my build in PCPartPicker

Also, my build is in my signature when I post.

EDIT: OS-Windows 10 x64, Purchased from a retailer and installed myself, I built my PC in March of 2016, and I have not reinstalled the OS, CPU-6700K, VideoCard is 980ti, Motherboard is a z170A Gaming, power supply is a 750W EVGA SuperNOVA P2 80+ Platinum, Desktop. BIOS Version is American Megatrends Inc. 1.C0, 10/19/2016

Edited November 5, 2016 by ThatSoundGuy

[zanthros]

OK, it's no secret that Windows10 power management is a little weak on the responsiveness side so why not try and see if it happens when you change the power management settings to high performance. See if this affects the system and prevents the shutdown/restart problem. You have to reboot for the change to take affect.

[ThatSoundGuy]

22 hours ago, zanthros said:

OK, it's no secret that Windows10 power management is a little weak on the responsiveness side so why not try and see if it happens when you change the power management settings to high performance. See if this affects the system and prevents the shutdown/restart problem. You have to reboot for the change to take affect.

 

Tried it out, and it unfortunately didn't work... any suggestions for where I might be able to have my computer looked at?

 

[zanthros]

This really seems like a power management issue. I would suggest that you make a request to RMA the power supply if it under warranty. As far as the reason for the RMA..... Power supply fails under load testing. The unit that you have is more than adequate for you system with plenty of reserve. I would go with your hypothesis of the PSU not providing the power that your system needs. It is a combination of amps and watts that is in shortage from the unit. The only way that I can think of to do a gradual test for the system is to use a watt o meter (can get this from LOWES) and just start opening up browser windows and start playing you tube videos until it crashes and pay attention to the Watt o meter and not at what wattage the system drops out. That is if you want to test it. If not I would go with an RMA request. If you do not want to wait for an RMA and the shipping to and from, just go and get a new PSU in the power range that you are using (750 watts or better if you like) and put it in. I really cannot provide you with any other info on this as I have only experienced a similar problem once before in the years that I have worked on PC's. It wound up being the PSU. The difference was that the PSU would power up the fans and the board...... but when it loaded the graphics driver it would crash and do the reboot thing only to have it happen again over and over. The PSU for some reason could not supply the needed voltage/Amperage/wattage for the system to fully boot. It could only supply  portion of what was needed and therefore created the problem. Took a while to nail down that gremlin. 

[ThatSoundGuy]

3 hours ago, zanthros said:

This really seems like a power management issue. I would suggest that you make a request to RMA the power supply if it under warranty. As far as the reason for the RMA..... Power supply fails under load testing. The unit that you have is more than adequate for you system with plenty of reserve. I would go with your hypothesis of the PSU not providing the power that your system needs. It is a combination of amps and watts that is in shortage from the unit. The only way that I can think of to do a gradual test for the system is to use a watt o meter (can get this from LOWES) and just start opening up browser windows and start playing you tube videos until it crashes and pay attention to the Watt o meter and not at what wattage the system drops out. That is if you want to test it. If not I would go with an RMA request. If you do not want to wait for an RMA and the shipping to and from, just go and get a new PSU in the power range that you are using (750 watts or better if you like) and put it in. I really cannot provide you with any other info on this as I have only experienced a similar problem once before in the years that I have worked on PC's. It wound up being the PSU. The difference was that the PSU would power up the fans and the board...... but when it loaded the graphics driver it would crash and do the reboot thing only to have it happen again over and over. The PSU for some reason could not supply the needed voltage/Amperage/wattage for the system to fully boot. It could only supply  portion of what was needed and therefore created the problem. Took a while to nail down that gremlin. 

 

Alright, thank you so much!