speculation on effects of plugging a 110v device into a 220v AVR

[ZippyDan]

I had a friend over to my place, which has 220V at the receptacles (overseas).

I also have AVRs around the house, which have both 110V and 220V outlets (the AVR transforms the 220V input down to 110V for some outlets) The particular AVR for this story is servo-motor controlled.

She attempted to plug in my (US - 110V) Xbox One to a 220V outlet on my AVR. This, of course, blew out the Xbox One power supply (hopefully not the console) and also tripped the relevant breaker in the house panel for the receptacle to which the AVR was connected. (P.S. The stupidity gets worse because she was actually trying to plug in an ASUS laptop that was next to the Xbox. She ignored the fact that the Xbox Powersupply says “XBOX” on it and is also 4-times too large to be a laptop power supply and is also clearly not plugged into the laptop).

Anyway, the AVR has a 10A replaceable cartridge-type fuse (I assume 220V since the AVR runs on 220). My question is: why did the panel box breaker (220V 20A) trip before the AVR? Is it possible that the AVR suffered any damage from this mistake?

 

[sm625]

It blows out the rectifiers which are probably rated at 180 volts. 220AC would put something like 300+ volts onto those rectifiers. It shouldnt kill the xbox though.

 

[Mark R]

It depends on the time-delays on the fuse and the circuit breaker.

Usually on this type of power supply, the fuse tends to be of a "slow blow" variety, where there is a long time delay before it blows. However, circuit breakers for home use tend to be fast trip, and will trip off instantly with only a minor overload.

In industrial use, where you might have heavy duty motors which take a big switch on surge, you may have time delayed circuit breakers, so that the motor doesn't trip the breaker when you turn it on.

 

[Dude111]

She attempted to plug in my (US - 110V) Xbox One to a 220V outlet on my AVR. This, of course, blew out the Xbox One power supply (hopefully not the console) and also tripped the relevant breaker in the house panel for the receptacle to which the AVR was connected.

Wow.... Check and se if it has a FUSE.. I hope it didnt get hurt from the high voltage.....


Try not to be mad @ your friend,she didnt mean it (Probably unaware of such things)


Good luck buddy!!

 

[freeskier93]

Does Microsoft really only design the power supplies for one voltage? Seems like it would be cheaper to have 1 power supply that can accept 110-220 like every other consumer electronic device.