Mad Dog MD-430WPS

[Pentium4]

I've only ever seen one other Mad Dog PSU before, and it was a well built Super Flower unit, which I recapped and has actually been running 24/7 for 15,000 hours now in a friend's machine Back on topic...

I'm mildly confused about the companies involved here...lol. It's made by Topower, I knew that before opening it because of the twisted wires. I figured Mad Dog Multimedia was the one re-branding and distributing the PSU but there is a Spire sticker on the top of the fan, a Spire logo on the exhaust grille, and on the label it says "Manufactured for Mad Dog Multimedia Inc. by Spire USA (Corporate Office)." Is this because most Spire units were made by Topower? Did they just have a bunch of units, and sent some for Mad Dog to sell? It's fairly unique to me because Mad Dog dissolved and Topower stopped making PSUs

The first thing I noticed about this PSU (Besides the awful caps) is that it completely cuts off the AC Live/Neutral at the switch. I wish more PSUs did this. It's got a decent input filter with two varistors and 470uF Jenpo caps.

The switchers are 2SC2625. So good for probably 300W since spec wise they're in between 13007 and 13009.

5VSB uses a Viper22A! Cool!

This thing uses a 30A schottky for 5V, 30A schottky for 12V, and 20A schottky for 3.3V. It does not have two 12V rails like the label claims. Either way, I was very surprised to see a 30A TO-247 part in spot of the 12V rail.

All of the caps are junk They are all Jenpo or Asia'X. None of them looked bulged, but I'll check to see if they are bad. I think this thing is worthy of a recap. I just ordered some more caps for my stash I'm weird in that I like keeping things alive from defunct companies, just because they become more unique over time. None of the filtering caps are over 1000uF which is worrisome, but the PI coils are good sized at least.

The Globe Fan spins really well, but I will put some oil in there when I reassemble it. The fan curve is pretty aggressive.

The soldering absolutely SUCKS! Come on, Topower. There are tons of blobs, flux, glue everywhere. Truly ugly, the pictures don't show it all. All of the wiring is 18AWG. What do you guys think?

[Dan81]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

I've only ever seen one other Mad Dog PSU before, and it was a well built Super Flower unit, which I recapped and has actually been running 24/7 for 15,000 hours now in a friend's machine Back on topic...

I'm mildly confused about the companies involved here...lol. It's made by Topower, I knew that before opening it because of the twisted wires. I figured Mad Dog Multimedia was the one re-branding and distributing the PSU but there is a Spire sticker on the top of the fan, a Spire logo on the exhaust grille, and on the label it says "Manufactured for Mad Dog Multimedia Inc. by Spire USA (Corporate Office)." Is this because most Spire units were made by Topower? Did they just have a bunch of units, and sent some for Mad Dog to sell? It's fairly unique to me because Mad Dog dissolved and Topower stopped making PSUs

The first thing I noticed about this PSU (Besides the awful caps) is that it completely cuts off the AC Live/Neutral at the switch. I wish more PSUs did this. It's got a decent input filter with two varistors and 470uF Jenpo caps.

The switchers are 2SC2625. So good for probably 300W since spec wise they're in between 13007 and 13009.

5VSB uses a Viper22A! Cool!

This thing uses a 30A schottky for 5V, 30A schottky for 12V, and 20A schottky for 3.3V. It does not have two 12V rails like the label claims. Either way, I was very surprised to see a 30A TO-247 part in spot of the 12V rail.

All of the caps are junk They are all Jenpo or Asia'X. None of them looked bulged, but I'll check to see if they are bad. I think this thing is worthy of a recap. I just ordered some more caps for my stash I'm weird in that I like keeping things alive from defunct companies, just because they become more unique over time. None of the filtering caps are over 1000uF which is worrisome, but the PI coils are good sized at least.

The Globe Fan spins really well, but I will put some oil in there when I reassemble it. The fan curve is pretty aggressive.

The soldering absolutely SUCKS! Come on, Topower. There are tons of blobs, flux, glue everywhere. Truly ugly, the pictures don't show it all. All of the wiring is 18AWG. What do you guys think?

Topower...not sure what to think.

Also,weren't Mad Dog PSUs actually rebranded Superflower units?

[Behemot]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

That silicone on the SB caps is to prevent them from bulging or what? So they go when the pressure rises enough?

[Wester547]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

The UL number suggests it's a PSU made by Forepoint (AKA Focus AKA Fortrex)... who are in fact owned by Superflower. But the transformer markings do look akin to Topower, and Topower was the OEM for Spire PSUs IIRC. Maybe Forepoint only supplied the PCB. The silicone glue atop those capacitors would make it harder for them to properly vent so maybe they'd outgas by way of the elastomer (rubber) seal or... ... all depending on how fast the electrolyte vaporizes (too fast for the pressure relief vent to operate, so slowly that no visible deformity can be observed, or all be it, somewhere in between). Most of the hydrogen gas does escape through the bottom seal.

So that's a 430W PSU? Those 470uF input capacitors and 2SC2625 switchers (possibly comparable to TO-220 13009s in that TO-3P package) may limit it to a more reasonable 250W at anything above 25ºC ambient, but with those output rectifiers and the aggressive fan curve, 300W may be possible above that temperature range. Personally, I enjoy keeping old electronics (even from defunct companies) alive as well, because today's consumer electronics just aren't built to last...

[Dan81]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

The UL number suggests it's a PSU made by Forepoint (AKA Focus AKA Fortrex)... who are in fact owned by Superflower. But the transformer markings do look akin to Topower, and Topower was the OEM for Spire PSUs IIRC. Maybe Forepoint only supplied the PCB. The silicone glue atop those capacitors would make it harder for them to properly vent so maybe they'd outgas by way of the elastomer (rubber) seal or... ... all depending on how fast the electrolyte vaporizes (too fast for the pressure relief vent to operate, so slowly that no visible deformity can be observed, or all be it, somewhere in between). Most of the hydrogen gas does escape through the bottom seal.

So that's a 430W PSU? Those 470uF input capacitors and 2SC2625 switchers (possibly comparable to TO-220 13009s in that TO-3P package) may limit it to a more reasonable 250W at anything above 25ºC ambient, but with those output rectifiers and the aggressive fan curve, 300W may be possible above that temperature range. Personally, I enjoy keeping old electronics (even from defunct companies) alive as well, because today's consumer electronics just aren't built to last...

As far as I heard,it was Sun Pro that was used for Spire PSUs. I might be wrong though.

[Drack]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

Topower-spire-superflower-topower-forepoint-spire-Maddog OK... Now my head hearts
Jokes aside, for a low power PC it may do the job after a proper recapp, 18awg OK for that power level, 35 transformer, decent line filtering, it's not 430w but it would do 250w/275w I think.

[Dan81]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

Topower-spire-superflower-topower-forepoint-spire-Maddog OK... Now my head hearts
Jokes aside, for a low power PC it may do the job after a proper recapp, 18awg OK for that power level, 35 transformer, decent line filtering, it's not 430w but it would do 250w/275w I think.

35 transformer might actually manage 300-350w.

[Behemot]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

Or 1.5 kW too. It all depends on the topology and efficiency.

[Drack]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

I said that because it looks like it's half bridge, and I know they don't have the best efficiency, I don't know as much as you guys it's just that I don't like to push thing past 80% of what they can do

[Behemot]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

Enhance's resonant half-bridge platform in Cooler Master V550 and V550S has 80 PLUS Gold efficiency. It's sometimes good to consider the world has moved from these terrible 80's/90's designs.

The full-bridge V650 in my yesterday-launched review managed to push over 1 kW before it overheated and shut down. It could most likely provide more but I just had nothing else to hook to it.

[Drack]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

I would love to see those and not that old things I have in my PC's, hope I knew more about PSU,
well I think you saw my PSU the one with the green sleeved cables, it's really close to this one (Maddog) and I have a 150w tdp graphics card on that Pc working OK for 1 year
Btw did you did a cheapo PSU round last year? Haven't check the page on a couple of weeks

[PeteS in CA]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

The heatsinks look a bit light for 300W, though the TO-3P and TO-247 packages are a plus. Noticed the Y-caps are genuine. The thing is a little short of 11 years old, so even good lytics would be getting long in the tooth.

[Behemot]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

I would love to see those and not that old things I have in my PC's, hope I knew more about PSU,
well I think you saw my PSU the one with the green sleeved cables, it's really close to this one (Maddog) and I have a 150w tdp graphics card on that Pc working OK for 1 year
Btw did you did a cheapo PSU round last year? Haven't check the page on a couple of weeks

I review on per unit basis so no more rounds. There have been couple gutless wonders last year and I have just started working on another one.

[Drack]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

Ohh, that's sad I liked those...

[Behemot]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

Effort vs. benefit ratio of pretty much any "roundup" is pretty poor, many informations have to be dropped out so that's disadvantage for the reader and also I don't really have the funds to buy dozen different craps at once. And than spend a month working through them but got payed like for any other article translation which "only" takes about 15-20 hours. The site's still not making money even to pay for the costs running it, the only thing which does are translations sold to PCT.

But that's kinda more for separate topic, or maybe to move to the topic in Announcements section.

[Drack]

Re: Mad Dog MD-430WPS

Yeah, and those gutless can kill equipment, that would be an unnecessary lost of money