WTF? Corsair TX650W SATA Power Leads Don't Fit

[boboko]

Am I going nuts? My trusty old PC finally gave up the ghost after five years of good service, so I ordered a new MB, CPU. PSU, memory, and video card from Newegg. The box arrived today and I spent the evening putting it together, using my old case, drives, and KB/mouse.

Long story short, everything went OK for a guy who hadn't done this in five years, until I went to hook up my SATA drives. The Corsair PSU has about a hundred SATA power connectors, but damned if I could get one to fit onto the drives. I know what you're thinking, but no, I'm not a moron, with my old PC I swapped drives in and out all the time because I switch around between Linux, XP, and Win 7. I have the drives outside of the case with the cables coming through an empty PCI slot, and I just switch the drives around rather than mess with boot managers. The point is I know the difference between SATA and IDE drives, and I have put SATA power cables on hundreds of times.

Anyway, just to make sure I hadn't bent the connector or something, I put a molex-to-SATA adapter on one of the Corsair's molex leads, and it slipped right onto the SATA drive, easy as pie. I took it off and tried the Corsair SATA lead again. No way, it's just too tight, and it only goes on a fraction of a millimeter. The orientation is correct, the L-shaped things are aligned, but it just won't go on.

I googled around and I didn't see anything about this. I can't believe that Corsair would just make one PSU with bad connectors, and I'm the only one who got it, but that's how it looks. Has anybody else run into this problem, or heard of it?

Oh yeah, forgot to say that the drives are fairly new, one Seagate 1.5TB, one WD 1.0 TB, and a Maxtor 750GB. None of them can take the Corsair connectors. All of them easily take both the molex to SATA adapter, and the SATA connectors from my old Antec PSU.

Thanks for any links or advice.

 

[Zepper]

Sorry, I haven't tried a Corsair PSU yet, but many of them are made by Seasonic, so I doubt the SATA power connectors should be anything other than standard ones they use on all their PSUs, but they could always get an out of spec lot, which should (of course) never make it onto the actual PSUs if their due diligence had been exercised. Contact Corsair and find out the straight skinny - be prepared with the numbers off the unit ( serial, lot, date of mfr., etc) when you call or email them. I've been fairly disappointed in the general looseness of the SATA connectors (both power and data), so I'd be glad for tighter ones, just not so tight one couldn't even connect them. I'd check the inside of the connectors with a bright light and magnification and if I found no obvious obstruction, I'd try a bit more force.

.bh.

 

[Yellowbeard]

I checked with our PSU product guru and he asked if you could post a picture. If you can, post a picture with the Corsair power leads and the molex adapters side by side so we can compare.

If the problem is with the PSU, we'll take care of you ASAP.

 

[Yellowbeard]

Check your PMs, I don't think you can post a pic here. You can either email me and/or start a thread at the Corsair forum where you can post a pic.

 

[videogames101]

Yeah, my Corsair PSU has perfect SATA connectors, much tighter then most, but I like the more secure fit, hopefully this is just a single bad PSU, because I usually recommend corsair PSUs

 

[boboko]

Yellowbeard, thanks for the reply.

This is not enough to make me return the unit. It is running quiet and cool, and I can make it work with the molex-SATA adapters. In fact, doing it that way makes cable management easier; only one trunk line from the PSU for all my internal drives, SATA and IDE, and the extra length from the adapters makes the drives easier to connect. Besides, I need the 8-pin MB connector for my GA-EP45-UD3R.

I don't have a camera except for a low-res webcam, but looking at them with a magnifying glass, it looks like the contacts inside the connector are lower than they should be. In my adapters, you can't see the contacts unless you tip the end up while you look inside; in the Corsair's, you can see them looking straight on. Also, i don't know if it matters, but they (the connectors as a whole, looking at the outside) are also much shorter than any of my connectors that fit easily.

When I took a drive out and just held it in my hand as I tried to connect it. I could get some of the connectors to work, although IMO it was too difficult. Others still wouldn't fit. I guess I'll just stick with the adapters. My new GA-EP45-UD3R MB comes with an ESATA adapter (with power leads that also fit very easily) that will take care of the rest of my drives.

Thanks again.

 

[Yellowbeard]

Can you email me the information at the bottom of the specification sticker than has the lot and revision code on it please? This is the only instance of this we have seen. But, if another pops up we'll know where to start looking.

Sorry you got an oddball and it's cool you found a beneficial workaround.

 

[zerocool84]

Sucks that maybe you got some bad connectors. I have the TX650 and it's the best PSU I've ever had. It has enough cables to strangle an infant.

 

[Zepper]

Well, the contacts out like that should give a tighter grip...

.bh.

 

[Yellowbeard]

The best idea might be an RMA if you are interested.

Start here for fast RMA service: http://www.corsair.com/helpdesk/default.aspx

 

[boboko]

Originally posted by: Yellowbeard
The best idea might be an RMA if you are interested.

No thanks, like I said it's working well with the adapters, and the thought of another two weeks without a PC is just scary. I'll email you the stuff on the sticker, you mean the sticker on the box, right? I don't see anything on the visible part of the PSU.

 

[OddJensen]

I had an OCZ PSU once on which the SATA connectors were such a tight fit that I was afraid to break something. Since I don't take no for an answer, it took me about 5 minutes with much cursing and pushing to get it connected to the hard drives, and for a moment I was considering just sending it back, hehe. Worked fine afterwards though. Never had it happen on other PSUs though, so you probably got an odd unit with duff connectors.

It has enough cables to strangle an infant

I don't know how well such a "feature" would go down in a commercial, but it made me lol. (No, I don't strangle infants).

 

[Zepper]

Some OCZ are also Seasonic made.

.bh.

 

[videogames101]

Originally posted by: zerocool84
Sucks that maybe you got some bad connectors. I have the TX650 and it's the best PSU I've ever had. It has enough cables to strangle an infant.

That was the only way you could describe it?

 

[thom_s]

I found this post while researching the same problem for the same reason. I have Seagate 1.0 and 1.5 GB SATA drives and have been using MOLEX to SATA adapters with my old motherboard. With the new board, I wanted to redistribute power and use the SATA connectors provided by the PSU. My old PSU is a CORSAIR TX650, about 1-1/2 years old, and my new one is an ULTRA LSP 750 v2. Both PSUs show the same problem of not fitting the Seagate's power connector, while the adapters fit fine. After reading several posts on the same topic on several sites, I am convinced that very many power supply brands show the same problem. I looked closely at the connectors, and I don't believe the problem is with the shell. The main differences I found with the connectors is that the adapters have 4 wires overmolded by the connector shell and rather light gauge contacts, while the power supplies have 5 rather heavy and stiff wires terminated in crimp-and-insert contacts that appear to be made of heavier gauge stock. That might explain the difference in insertion force. I was able to get the power supply connectors of the ULTRA power supply to fit the Seagate connectors after experimenting with the insertion angle. I found that if I rocked the connector up and down 5 or 10 degrees from the horizontal while inserting, I would eventually find the "sweet spot" that let the connectors mate. I think we all have expectations of low insertion force with SATA connectors based on the data cables, and these power supply connectors simply have much higher insertion (and removal) force than expected.