At what age should I consider replacing a psu ?

[Sil3ntDragon]

I have a PSU that I bought back in 2009, it have been running together with my main gaming rig since then. 
back then I bought a monster of a PC I7 940 paired with 2 GTX 295 from NVIDIA. 
and about 12gb ram. 

Anyway the PSU I chose to pair off with that system back then was a "PC Power & Cooling" 1200w PSU 

today I'm still using it together with a 7700K 16gb ram and a 670gtx a card I expect I will upgrade very soon.

I've overclocked now and then in the years but never really anything that pushed the PSU at all.

Now I'm starting to think about how old it is and how long of a lifetime it might have left. 

how old can a PSU get ? 
When does a PSU start to deteriorate beyond the original parameters.

And most importantly should I start to look at a replacement or could I wait years still ? 

[Guest]

Depends. If it is a nobrand psu then i would replace it asap, if it is like a corsair(or any other good brand) psu with a 10 year warranty then i wouldnt worry.

[Sil3ntDragon]

4 minutes ago, Some Random Member said:

Depends. If it is a nobrand psu then i would replace it asap, if it is like a corsair(or any other good brand) psu with a 10 year warranty then i wouldnt worry.

the brand is: "PC Power & Cooling" Like I wrote in my original post. 
I wouldn't call it a nobrand and it was not cheap back when I bought it. 

[Guest]

59 minutes ago, Sil3ntDragon said:

the brand is: "PC Power & Cooling" Like I wrote in my original post. 
I wouldn't call it a nobrand and it was not cheap back when I bought it. 

I did some research of this brand and yeah it seems fine. I would use it for a couple more years and then maybe get some rgb psu.

[andrewmp6]

Knock on wood i have ran the same corsair hx750 psu for 8 years and it runs prefectly.If you buy a good name brand one it will run a long time,I use to use the cheapo brands and had nothing but problems out of them.

[Sil3ntDragon]

1 hour ago, andrewmp6 said:

Knock on wood i have ran the same corsair hx750 psu for 8 years and it runs prefectly.If you buy a good name brand one it will run a long time,I use to use the cheapo brands and had nothing but problems out of them.

I've just found my original invoice under technical specifications it says MTBF 200.000 hours... so I'm good for another 10 years or is that just a bull marketing term ? 

 

[MrShinny]

13 minutes ago, Sil3ntDragon said:

I've just found my original invoice under technical specifications it says MTBF 200.000 hours... so I'm good for another 10 years or is that just a bull marketing term ? 

 

Well. if it's technical specs, then it would be more of a actual spec. MTBF stands for Mean Time Before Failures. So I'm pretty sure that's how long the PSU is rated for.

 

Is that 200 thousand hours? Sorry I'm from the US

[Guest]

1 minute ago, MrShinny said:

Is that 200 thousand hours? Sorry I'm from the US

Well only 200 hours would be a little weird for a psu, so the most logical assumption would be yes, 200 000 Hours.

[MrShinny]

1 minute ago, Some Random Member said:

Well only 200 hours would be a little weird for a psu, so the most logical assumption would be yes, 200 000 Hours.

Just making sure haha.

[Sil3ntDragon]

3 hours ago, MrShinny said:

Just making sure haha.

yes I'm sorry 200 thousand hours

I'm used to using a dot as a thousand separator. often forget that the internet is so varied in it's separators.

so the psu is rated for 22 years non stop running how in the world do they rate something like that accurately...?

[STRMfrmXMN]

That PC Power and Cooling unit became something from OCZ later. It's definitely not a terribad PSU, but it's really old and I would replace it.

[LienusLateTips]

That thing is ancient. PC Power and Cooling went out of business, when? Like 2012?

[Mattias Edeslatt]

2 hours ago, LienusLateTips said:

That thing is ancient. PC Power and Cooling went out of business, when? Like 2012?

Well, he bought it in 2009 so... Yes it's ancient in computer years. But there are lots of vintage computers that runs of 30+ years old PSU:s.

 

On the other hand, I wouldn't use a PSU that old (almost 10 years) in a new build. A PSU can last several generations of hardware upgrades. But 7+ years and I would take that cost of a new PSU in a new build. You can get a good, reliable, quality PSU for less than a licence for Windows 10 from Microsoft and in the total cost of a PC it is far from the most expensive part. But it is the part that literately is the heart and soul of your computer and if it fails, it can take all your new hard earned parts with it in its fall, or more likely a bang!  

 

It's always a bad idea to let the magic smoke out.

[Guest]

10 years.

 

[Sil3ntDragon]

3 hours ago, jonnyGURU said:

10 years.

 

which one of my 3 questions is that an answer to ? all of them or only one of them ? 

how old can a PSU get ? 
When does a PSU start to deteriorate beyond the original parameters.

And most importantly should I start to look at a replacement or could I wait years still ? 

[MrShinny]

7 hours ago, Sil3ntDragon said:

which one of my 3 questions is that an answer to ? all of them or only one of them ? 

how old can a PSU get ? 
When does a PSU start to deteriorate beyond the original parameters.

And most importantly should I start to look at a replacement or could I wait years still ? 

He just told you, 10 years.

[Guest]

18 hours ago, Sil3ntDragon said:

which one of my 3 questions is that an answer to ? all of them or only one of them ? 

how old can a PSU get ? 
When does a PSU start to deteriorate beyond the original parameters.

And most importantly should I start to look at a replacement or could I wait years still ? 

10 years.

 

[Sil3ntDragon]

11 hours ago, jonnyGURU said:

10 years.

 

So just to be sure I understood you correctly, I'm going to recap my understanding of your "10 years" 

Any given PSU can get 10 years old at which point it is dead. 
after 10 years it will deteriorate beyond the original parameters. logical since it's dead. 

and I should start looking for a new psu after the PSU hit 10 years, meaning I should look after it is dead.

My PSU is 9 years old so you also recommend me to wait for 10 years more before I should consider looking...

So I guess I can run my PC without a PSU for 9 years out of the next 10 years before I should look for a new PSU.

I don't know it sounds like there is a mismatch between one number and my 3-4 questions... 

[Guest]

I wouldn't recap it at 10 years.  I'd recycle it and get a new one.

 

I've never been a fan of recapping.  Well... let me rephrase that... I used to be a fan of recapping until I saw recapped PSUs and other PSUs that are more than 10 years old die for other reasons.  Typically an MLCC (which people don't recap when they recap because they're SMT) or a FET or diode burns out.

 

Anyone who says fans and caps are the only things that die in a PSU has a very small sample to make that kind of judgement call on or needs to have their head examined.

 

On 7/17/2018 at 1:55 AM, Sil3ntDragon said:

PC Power & Cooling" 1200w PSU 

Most people will question the brand, as SomeRandomMember did, because it can be a questionable brand.  When they were a good product (by their time's standards), they were only sold in the U.S.  So Europeans, Asians, etc. know nothing about them.  They used a mix of OEMs and eventually got sold to OCZ where they started to go to shit.  Now they're owned by Fire Power where they recycle old designs.

 

So now let me ask you a question:  Which PCP&C do you have?  If it's 9 years old, I'm guessing either a Turbo Cool or a Silencer.

 

[cluelessgenius]

when your old enough to not have your parents be sued for neglect in case you die electricuting yourself

 

no in all honesty i have psu running from pre 2000 in some cases and its fine. im not saying nothings gonna happen but i personally have never has a psu die on me except that one time i bought a crap psu rated too close to what the system could consume so at the of a night of stress test it finally died on us on day 1 but as long as you dont get crap offbrand china stuff or leave no overhead room wattage wise it should be fine

[Sil3ntDragon]

54 minutes ago, jonnyGURU said:

I wouldn't recap it at 10 years.  I'd recycle it and get a new one.

 

I've never been a fan of recapping.  Well... let me rephrase that... I used to be a fan of recapping until I saw recapped PSUs and other PSUs that are more than 10 years old die for other reasons.  Typically an MLCC (which people don't recap when they recap because they're SMT) or a FET or diode burns out.

 

Anyone who says fans and caps are the only things that die in a PSU has a very small sample to make that kind of judgement call on or needs to have their head examined.

 

Most people will question the brand, as SomeRandomMember did, because it can be a questionable brand.  When they were a good product (by their time's standards), they were only sold in the U.S.  So Europeans, Asians, etc. know nothing about them.  They used a mix of OEMs and eventually got sold to OCZ where they started to go to shit.  Now they're owned by Fire Power where they recycle old designs.

 

So now let me ask you a question:  Which PCP&C do you have?  If it's 9 years old, I'm guessing either a Turbo Cool or a Silencer.

 

Well it is the PC Power & Cooling Turbo Cool 1200W that I bought. And just to be on the strange side I'm European

And back then when I was doing my investigation on what PSU I should have this one stood out because it was a single rail PSU with high watt with at the time a fairly good brand reputation online back then they might be shit today I don't know have not needed to get a new PSU Since. I do find it strange that you say that Europeans didn't know about this brand as Everywhere I asked for help amongst my many European data technician friends they all agreed that this was a good buy even though I thought it was a little on the expensive side.

[Sil3ntDragon]

1 hour ago, cluelessgenius said:

when your old enough to not have your parents be sued for neglect in case you die electricuting yourself

 

no in all honesty i have psu running from pre 2000 in some cases and its fine. im not saying nothings gonna happen but i personally have never has a psu die on me except that one time i bought a crap psu rated too close to what the system could consume so at the of a night of stress test it finally died on us on day 1 but as long as you dont get crap offbrand china stuff or leave no overhead room wattage wise it should be fine

yea I have the same, many old PSU's from pre 2000 still running but they where never on high end systems/ overclocking systems and never running anywhere near their peak. which might make a difference in life time I assume. and yea I also only have had one PSU die on me but mostly because of my own stupidity of using a PSU with too little power and too many rails. 

[Guest]

So here's the good news.....  That PSU is horribly inefficient and loud as hell, but it was built in Taiwan by Win-Tact.  It's more of a server PSU than a consumer level desktop PSU.  So it's more the exception than the norm.  It could last a lot longer than 10 years.

[Sil3ntDragon]

14 hours ago, jonnyGURU said:

So here's the good news.....  That PSU is horribly inefficient and loud as hell, but it was built in Taiwan by Win-Tact.  It's more of a server PSU than a consumer level desktop PSU.  So it's more the exception than the norm.  It could last a lot longer than 10 years.

yea I'm well aware that the PSU is loud which is why I'm using a Lian Li cabinet with soundproofing.
and I never went out looking for efficiency back then I wanted something stable and something that I could be sure would never be pushed over it's maximum if I decided to put more than one GPU in the system. 

I guess that is why it was so *Expletive*  expensive back then. 
What I hear you saying is that I would be safe a couple of years more.
just don't upgrade to new hardware that could start to put a larger demand on it than I'm currently having ? 
 

[Guest]

Yeah.  Don't replace it if you don't have to.  But I wouldn't go building a new system or doing any massive upgrade or hardware swapping without replacing it too.