• We’re currently investigating an issue related to the forum theme and styling that is impacting page layout and visual formatting. The problem has been identified, and we are actively working on a resolution. There is no impact to user data or functionality, this is strictly a front-end display issue. We’ll post an update once the fix has been deployed. Thanks for your patience while we get this sorted.

Ancillary power supplies

C

cheesehead

Lifer
High-grade medical surplus power supplies are extremely cheap - $30 will get you one capable of providing a 20A into 12V plus 12A into 5v, perfect for powering disk drives, fans, and all the power-hogging electronics off of your motherboard. A similar setup might be used for powering a power-hungry PCIe video card.

Has anyone tried this?
 
With only 4V and 5V you are not taking anything off the PSU. All fans and drives use 12V as there primary voltage. Besides the fans, HDD, and optical drives are a very spall percentage of your PC's power usage. The CPU and video card are nearly 75% of the system's power draw.

now high end system have been run off 2 or more PSUs. You can get a plitter that allows up to 4 PSUs to be used in a single system.
http://www.frozencpu.com/produ...-XSU-BL.html?tl=g11c28

Then there are suplamental PSU like these that are for powering the video card to help releive that load off the system.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16817104019

but for a few more $$ you can get a single PSU to power the whole system.
 
I prefer not to use a extra supply unless that supply was designed for it.
Most ATX power supplies are not designed expecting there to be another supply installed and so the regulation isn't expecting another voltage source. In theory it is possible to have a situation where the voltage from one supply is being summed with the second supply allowing neither supply to properly regulate the voltage it outputs.
Supplies that are designed for use with multiple supplies take that into account in the design.
 
Originally posted by: Modelworks
I prefer not to use a extra supply unless that supply was designed for it.
Most ATX power supplies are not designed expecting there to be another supply installed and so the regulation isn't expecting another voltage source. In theory it is possible to have a situation where the voltage from one supply is being summed with the second supply allowing neither supply to properly regulate the voltage it outputs.
Supplies that are designed for use with multiple supplies take that into account in the design.
Click to expand...

I can see how this might theoretically be a problem, though from my (admittedly very limited) experience building power supplies, I'm not sure how. Does anyone know if the 12v connector on PCIe cards is connected to the 12v leads on the PCIe bus?

Also, an ancillary PSU would work perfectly for powering fans, optical drives, and hard drives - all of which are effectively isolated from motherboard power.
 
The 12V PCI-e power is not tied into the 12V lines on the PCI-e slot. The only place you have to worry about cross voltages like that is with the CPU and motherboard. The CPU and motherboard connectors should come from the same PSU. All other items you don't have to worry about.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Back
Top