Power supply help for an AT format PC?

[Sandos]

Hi all,
My old computers quickly dying on me. Its an AT case, AT power supply and AT mobo. When i move the wires for the power connector it starts to waver and then reboots. What i want to know is, do i need a special kind of power supply to replace it? I mean apart from the physical size of the thing are there any specs i need? The mobo has an atx power port on it too so i was just going to get the cheapest atx supply i could find instead of a whole new case. Its a celery 400 with not much else in it other than a modem and a HD.
Thx for any help.

 

[Workin']

An ATX power supply has a different kind of power switch than an AT one. So if your case is AT-style it would be *much* easier to get another AT-style power supply rather than an ATX supply. Or just get a whole new ATX case+PSU and transfer the guts from the old case to the new one.

That ATX power connector on your mobo works great if you also have an ATX case.

 

[Buk]

You may just have a bad connection or two. Remove the AT connectors from the mobo and blow them out with canned air. Use a pipecleaner with just a little WD-40 on it to clean the connectors on the mobo -not much, you don't want to flood the mobo with it. While the ps connectors are off the mobo, check to see that the individual wires are connected properly by gently pulling each one (I had a ps connector with a loose wire once and it gave me fits until I found it). Put everything back together and try it out. Won't cost you anything to try and, unless you get sloppy or heavy-handed, it sure won't hurt anything. I regularly run a pipecleaner with a little Castrol Syntec oil on it into all the IDE plugs on power supplies when I'm putting together a system. It prevents corrosion and makes the connectors much easier to remove later. HTH............................

 

[Sandos]

Thx ill try cleaning the connectors, but the reason i wanted a new one was cause i took it off last nite and both connector and mobo port were burned black in parts so theres obviously a big problem somewhere. I had to replace the mobo with another one of the exact same i had (gigabyte babyAT bx440) to get it going again and dont wanna burn this one too.
On that note is it possable that winXP simply doesnt like that old mobo? cause ive been getting crashes constantly ever since i moved to xp and i need it for various reasons.

 

[Workin']

When you "moved to XP" did you do a clean install or an upgrade? If you did an upgrade then that is likely why you are having problems (if your PSU is not causing the problem), many problems have been reported when using an upgraded installation.

 

[Sandos]

Xp install was clean as can be and imaged right afterward which ive gone back to 3 times so far.