very very strange

[Sniper82]

Lastnight I shutdown my PC for the night. Well mobo fans and everything shuts down no fans going other than the PSU fan. Well I look down at the HDD light and PC on light and they are both on. So I felt the back of the PSU fan to see if it was still blowing and it was. I tried holding the power button in for like 10secs to see if it would power off. It wouldnt so I just flipped the switch in the back. After doing that I flipped it back to see if anything was dead. The PC does nothing. This morning I checked it out and it still does nothing so I barrowed a PSU off a friend and it fired up no problem.

What in the world happened here ppl? I didnt know PSU could die like this. I just paid $44 for a 300watt ESI(never heard of this brand but it says AMD Aproved on the box) because I didnt want to wait a week just to save $10-20. Anyway this one seems to work ok other than on MB probe I am getting a warning beep under voltage/V where the -5 is. According to MB Probe I am getting 5.59 on something but it beeps constantly if I check the box. Any ideas whats going on?

 

[WarCon]

Wonder if the back surge from powering down your peripheral's (granted should be small), actually was the final straw for some component in the supply.

I would take/send it back to whoever you got it from and get a new one.

P.S. Couldn't find ESI listed as a recommended power supply for AMD at any speed. In a pinch, I might use one, but would replace it when I could.

 

[Sniper82]

Well after giving $44 for this I am gonna use it till it dies. When I get some extra paypal I may buy a backup PSU. The women working at the PC shop said it was a Deer. You know how these companys do. So who knows? The one that died I bought off here and the dude said it was a AMD approved PSU but I didnt see the brand listed which was a HiVision.

I do know it says on the PSU that it has some kind of thermal sensor that slows the fan down if the PSU is cool and speeds it up when it starts to warm up to help keep noise levels down. But I don' know. But I do know I could have got it online for $25 or so shipped but just couldnt wait a week. Anyone have any idea on the MB probe deal? It has something to do with the PSU.

 

[WarCon]

Yeah it looks like your going 10% over on the -5volt rail, that is out of spec (so the sensor's tripping). I couldn't tell you for sure if its just measuring the voltage wrong or if you have a problem. You could just disable that sensor. I don't know for sure if the -5volt rail is used for anything anymore or not. Maybe someone else will know for sure.

Bump for more info.

 

[Sniper82]

the -12 has 12.47 but its not going off. What I thought was strange is everything(fans at least) was shut down other than my PSU. What could have caused it to keep running after it shut down all the other stuff in my PC?

Only fan that was moving was the PSU fan.

 

[WarCon]

Is it truely shutting down or going into sleep (hibernate)? If not, I am pretty certain that I would yank that powersupply before it goes kamakaze and takes out your mobo and/or chip and/or memory, etc..

Can't you explain to the person/shop that you bought it at that you simply don't trust it anymore because of its behavior. You might just ask them if they are going to warranty everything in your case if they don't exchange. I bet you they think about it and decide its safer (for them) to exchange it, unless they have no scruples.

 

[jklesel]

consider yourself lucky sniper, i have had 3 DEER power supplies go bad, two of which have taken the MOBO with them.

Stay away from DEER power supplies!

 

[Sniper82]

Well I am gonna buy another PSU online but which is most reliable and not to loud? WarCon I think you mis-understood me. The one that was still running after my PC was shut down did this once. That was the only time and last time it did it. Flipping the switch in the back finished it off I think. My new one(ESI 300watt) that I bought from my local PC shop was the only thing they carried. It is working perfect other than -5 is 5.59 and -12 is 12.54 in BIOS and MB Probe. In MB probe the -5 gives a warning but I don't know if this will hurt anything.

 

[hans007]

it only gives the warning because its 10% over . its not that bad.

 

[woolmilk]

with ATX the PSU has one message cable to the mobo (i think its for features like remote power on or wakeonlan). Even when your PC is switched off, the mobo should get at least one voltage (I think its 5V?). When you press the power button on the front, the mainboard tells the PSU "give me full power" and when you do shutdown, it also tells "power down" through this line.
When this cable is damaged, you get exactly the same symptom as you describe: the power will stay on after shutdown and worse, it wont get full power when it was completely off.
If you want to repair your old PSU, you could check this cable, but maybe its not woth messing around with a power supply.

 

[WarCon]

Ahh, I did misunderstand. I thought it was the new one that was acting strange already (more strange than running out of spec).

I hear that the Sparkles are pretty good and are reasonably priced, don't know how quiet though. A little more expensive are the Antec's and Enermax's. I think the Antec True series are pretty quiet, I can't say that for the Enermax Whispers (I have owned two and both have a noticable level of noise).

 

[Submit]

Same thing happened with one of my pc's. It would shut down unless I pulled the plug. Got a new PS to replace the cheapo $15 PS I was using and all is well.

Yesterday, at work, I was moving a pc for a user (1 year old Dell) and the it would not fire back up. Replaced the PS in it and all is well...

I will not be buying any more $15 PS

 

[Sniper82]

wool which cable should I be examineing? I done too the PSU apart to see if maybe the fuse or something was blown. If I can figure out whats wrong with this one I could use it for a backup instead of buying one.

 

[woolmilk]

I found a description of the ATX power connector here
http://www.compute-aid.com/atxspec.html
So the power-on cable is at pin14. If you find this one, the next thing would be searching for the fault which could be a bad connection in the plug, a broken cable, a bad soldering point or a faulty logic in the PSU itself.
While the first and second could be fixed, i would stay off from opening the PSU itself. At least it explains why the PSU behaves so mysteriosly.