Silverstone ST60F goes *bzzt*

[Havlock]

I bought a brand new Silverstone ST60F power supply to put into my new system, and I think it has a problem, but this might just be normal. After I plug the ST60F into the AC power cable, then flip the switch on the back to the "on" position, the PS makes a *bzzt* sound for less than a second, and the lamp in the room on the same circuit as the PS dims somewhat for a moment.

I havn't tried to power up my system with this PS because I'm worried that under load it might "blow up" (figuratively or literally) and take my new PC with it. I'd like a fellow ST60F owner to confirm if this is the normal behavior of this power supply or if I got a defective one.

 

[Luckyboy1]

Could be an rMA issue, but I doubt it. Sounds more like the wall outlet and circuit the power supply is on is not up to the load in question. See the end of Luckyboy's Guide For Complete Users on how to fix all that and do so cheaply.

 

[Havlock]

I checked out whether or not the outlet/circuit was the problem by taking the power supply down to the laundry room and plugging it into the outlet the washing machine uses. That outlet I know is on its own circuit with nothing else on it. I also plugged an LED night-light into the other outlet on the "washing machine" circuit to see if the flicker/dimming showed up as well. When I turned the power supply on, I got the same short *bzzt* sound and dimming of the light as before, but if I turned the PS off then on quickly, it wouldn't go *bzzt* but the light would still dim slightly. This makes me think its related to charging capacitors, and they just havn't discharged fully when I flip it off and on repeatedly.

However, the best way I can see for finding out if this is normal is for another ST60F owner to tell me if their power supply does the same thing as mine. Please, if you have a ST60F, let me know if yours does the same thing as mine.

 

[Luckyboy1]

Could also be a short somep[lace? Check the wires and see if something's pinched or has the insulation scraped off of it. If not, then I'd say it's an rMA issue.

 

[Havlock]

I don't think it's a short, since when I first turned the power supply on, it was hooked up in my new system, and the power indicator LED on the motherboard was lit. If it was a short, the power supply would have tripped off or cut power or something. I tried disconnecting all the output cables from the PS (since this is a modular PS), and that didn't change anything, still makes the same small *bzzt*.

I don't think I'll be able to figure out if this is normal or not unless another ST60F owner comes forward and tells me if their PS does it too.

 

[Jules]

Hi, i also own the ST60F and i get the same buzz but its only when i get pretty close to the psu. you shouldnt have a problem with it

 

[Yreka]

I used to own one, and it did the Bzzt, lights dim for me as well *before I returned it for other reasons*.

 

[Havlock]

Thank you Yreka for confirming that it's normal for the ST60F to behave this way. My best guess is that when you turn it on, the PS pulls a heavy load to charge all its capacitors, but once charged it draws much less power. I'm going to wait for a few more confirmations before hooking this thing back up to my system, but I'm pretty sure it's OK.

 

[GalvanizedYankee]

Shooting from the lip..Err hip.

This is an uber powerful PSU. It is made by Enhance for Silverstone. Mine should be here in the next day or two. I bought the Enhance unit. Enhance is amoung the better of the best PSU builders. I believe it to be normal. Why??

It must have decent power storage for what is called Hold Up Time. This is the time needed for most UPSes (you DO use a UPS ) to pick-up the load during an outage. The PSU must be able to sustain the system for a brief time to enable a smooth transiant time.
It has to be able to do this while the PSU is under FULL load.

So, we have a mega PSU that has to charge up. This is called Inrush Current (Google it Plz) . I could not find it for this fine PSU but believe me when I say it will be high, upwards of 40-60 AMPS and it is just for an instant. Like a 120VAC air compressor kicking in and dimming garage lights. Once running little light flucuation is noticed.
Normal 115VAC draw for this PSU under full load is 10amps.

(Ever use a powerful flash for a still camera?? They have a capacitor whine that sounds like a siren. You gotta be close to hear it. The pro-flash units screem for 5 seconds to fully charge.)

If you look at pics of PSUs with the hood-up, you will see lots of silly-cone on coils and caps. This is done to reduce the normal noise of a switching power supply.

This is an article of interest and should be marked for a comfortable comprehensive read.
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,1932947,00.asp
It will offer info you just might need. It talks about the problems with the Zeus and these difficulties were addressed with the Strider series.

Here is the Silverstone spec. It irritated me that it did not show Inrush Current.
http://www.silverstonetek.com/downloao/installation%20guide/st60fmanual.pdf

EDIT#3: Inrush is listed, I was in a hurry and missed it. 50A@115VAC, 100A@230VAC.


Here is the Enhance spec. It offers a nice color coded pinout that might be nice to have/know.
http://www.enhanceusa.com/file/33_specification.pdf

The point of this long post and links is information.
Note: When the 5V line is lightly loaded the 12V lines can't offer full amperage. The thought here was if the system needed all the 12V can offer that there would be many loads on the 5V line. like 6-10 HDDs. If you run a very light load on the 5V but need all the 12V offers, a dummy load can be added to the 5V. Like a resistor mounted very near the case exhaust fan for cooling. I doubt you or I would ever need to do that. Look at the spec. Even at lite 5V loading the 12V output is still very substantial.

EDIT#4: The unit is SLI Certed and will not have any cross load problems at all.

Edit: TY OP for N/Ming the post in the stickied PSU thread.:thumbsup:


...Galvanized

EDIT: This PSU and many others should not be powered up W/O a light load. If you read the manual at all, plz note that the PSU protects itself from no load power-up.
When I power-up a PSU to check voltages outside the case, two old car head lights will be hooked up to the 12V line and several high wattage fans to the 5V line. This stabilizes the PSU for voltage reading or adjusting. Most PSUs don't need to have their voltages tweeked.

 

[Havlock]

Well, I took the plunge and started up my new machine with the ST60F. Nothing blew up or caught on fire, which is a good sign, and things seem to be running just fine for the moment. I'm going to boot MemTest86+ and have it run overnight, after I update and configure the BIOS. I'll let you know in the morning how things turn out.

 

[GalvanizedYankee]

As promised via PM, I powered-up the new Enhance unit that is the exact same unit as your Strider. UPS dropped it off at 6:00PM PST. I just powered it up this AM and it makes the noise your reffering too. It is the large yellow cap that can be seen through the exhaust mesh. It can't be missed as it's about the size of a large spool of thread. This probably holds the charge for Hold Up Time as explained earlyer.

Look at the linked pic, note how large the cap is, note the white silicone for noise dampening, note the slots cut in the extruded aluminum sinks. The Zeus that is a cross flow with an 80mm fan does not have slots cut in these same sinks and that is why cross flow PSUs need less cfm, because they have more sink area.

http://www.systemcooling.com/images/rev...lverstone_Strider_ST60F/image13big.jpg


...Galvanized

 

[Havlock]

Looks like everything is ship-shape over here. After 18 passes through the MemTest86+ standard test set, I am happy to report that it threw no errors. I think I got a winner.

Thanks for secondly confirming the ST60F noise Yankee. That put my last doubts at ease.