Power Supply Failure!

Post by **Apoptosis** » Tue Dec 21, 2004 5:19 pm

Well I woke up this morning and my computer was turned off.

First I was like thats odd then I was like "oh ****"

I didn't save my article on dreamweaver! So I lost my article and was yelling at my PC bright and early at 8am.

I turned on my PC only for it to turn right back off. With a gentle kick i turned it back on and it posted, but my retail boxed Intel HSF sounded like it was a variable speed fan at idle (which its not).

I got out the trusty old volt meter and figured out that my Antec TruePower 380W Power Supply that came with the Antec Sonata case shot craps. I was getting 10.1 Volts on the 12V rail!

Another PSU dies!

A10Pilot3 · Post by **A10Pilot3** » Tue Dec 21, 2004 5:44 pm

Damn! Antec's just aren't supposed to do that. They are all I use for PSU's

Post by **Apoptosis** » Wed Dec 22, 2004 11:55 am

Well I finally took my PSU out today and took one off the bench for use in my machine. All is back to normal for my desktop system and I'm shocked by what I found when I removed my old Antec True 380S Power Supply.

The 20-Pin ATX Connector

The 12-Volt Connector

My 12-Volt Rail was dropping down to 10 Volts and I'm guessing that the power draw caused the cable connectors to overload/heat. I'm glad my motherboard and 3.4EE didn't get fried or worse yet this thing catch fire and burn down the lab due to a PSU failure!

Bio-Hazard · Post by **Bio-Hazard** » Wed Dec 22, 2004 12:21 pm

By the look of those connector, you are extremely lucky that you still have a desktop system. It would have been so easy for it to have fried your MoBo and everything on it.

Xerxes · Post by **Xerxes** » Wed Dec 22, 2004 12:31 pm

yeah its a good thing the better power supplies have decent over/under voltage protection. I've seen similar things happen to cheap ones and alot of the time the mobo is dead too.

Post by **Digital Puppy** » Wed Dec 22, 2004 3:11 pm

Dang, man!!! That's crazy. I'm glad that you didn't have more damage to your rig. How old was the Antec?? I've never heard of a quality-brand power supply do this before....you sure it wasn't a re-branded Powmax??

I hope Antec steps up and helps you figure out what happened...if it can happen to you, I'm afraid it might be happening to others.

Keep us informed!

'DP

Post by **Apoptosis** » Wed Dec 22, 2004 4:02 pm

I've talked to the PR company that does all of antec's marketing and they have forwarded on this thread to Antec Tech Support who I guess needs to certify my RMA request on this PSU.

I'd say this system is 9 months old and has always been used in my personal system. When I first used it housed an Athlon XP 2500+ Barton system in it. Now it sports an Intel Pentium 4 3.4EE system. The only things it is used for is Internet, E-Mail, Folding, and site work.

Oh well I'm just curious why just the 12v rails melted.

infinitevalence · Post by **infinitevalence** » Fri Dec 24, 2004 10:13 pm

is your EE a LGA-775 and is it the one based off the prescott core, because i can see a highend prescott blowing an antec. They can pull as much as 25amps when overclocked to 4ghz just on the 12v rail so yours could have been pulling close to that antec's max on that one rail.