Is this power supply safe to use?

[zandrax]

Re: Is this power supply safe to use?

mhm..why do you think hair dryer would affect so much?

most rfi it does are in spectrum that disturbs antenna reception because of sparks etc., i think.
ie i didn't saw problems when i had cheap psu...

any small problems that could occur on mains will be soaked up by mains cap that's behind the rectifier...

rfi filters probably mostly protects mains from psu itself, than protecting psu from mains...heh...

I suppose you have a point: I noticed improvements into my father's audio equipment and an old 14" crt tv when I connected their plugs into a filtered outlet (far fewer interferences in tv, lower background noise in the old stereo), so I extended this to pc psus without any evidence with them.

Back to Newbie2 phrase, I think the best experiment he could show to his brother is, if he owns an oscilloscope, scoping the Best Power and a good, reliable psu for noise and ripple. Hopefully his brother woul'd persuade himself the Best Power isn't best at all.

Zandrax

[i4004]

Re: Is this power supply safe to use?

i think gdement has a right idea(to face him with loosing all of his data on hdd), but what if his hdd doesn't have anything of value to him anyway?

i would just swap his psu while he's not watching...hehe...
what would he know?

[Newbie2]

Re: Is this power supply safe to use?

i think gdement has a right idea(to face him with loosing all of his data on hdd), but what if his hdd doesn't have anything of value to him anyway?

i would just swap his psu while he's not watching...hehe...
what would he know?

His hard drive is full of games (no work actually since its his gaming computer) so if I back up all his save game files and his hard drive fails then that would not be much of a worry.

He would notice a different PSU changed behind his back though, his case has a window on the side panel and if he doesn't see the Best Power PSU's red fan and something else is there he would start questioning me and telling me to change it back.

Hmm, not so sure: Willa's one has a sticker on the main transformer containing the CWT acronim, the BP hasn't. Are there some CWT reference on BP's pcb?

There are no CWT references on the Best Power PSU's PCB, the only reference to anything at all is the fuse section with the "ISO-300, ISO-350" etc. markings to show what fuse to use for what model of ISO power supply. The heatsinks used in the middle of the PCB are even different than the typical heatsinks found in CWT-made power supplies. Comparing the picture of the Best Power PSU and the ISO PSU, the color of the PCB looks different.

This could be just a cheap clone of CWT's ISO brand power supplies. However, a cloned power supply design would in a similar or almost identical (sometimes even totally identical) way like the original CWT-made ISO power supply. Even if it didn't come out of CWT's factories, it would still be designed by CWT.

[Krankshaft]

Re: Is this power supply safe to use?

That best power is complete junk a good way to easily tell if a PSU is good is by looking at the transient filter components.

The transient filter stage prevents hobos from getting into the power supply .

But seriously a good supply should have at least:

Two ferrite coils, two ceramic capacitors (Y capacitors, usually blue), one metalized polyester capacitor (X capacitor) and one MOV.

This separates the good supplies from the junk because a power supply can function fine without these components however if the manufacturer didn't take the time here then odds are that the rest of the supply design got the same treatment.

[Krankshaft]

Re: Is this power supply safe to use?

Not to mention that the PSU with inadequate filtering could output switching transistor noise back onto the power line which could cause interference problems on other electronic devices.

[i4004]

Re: Is this power supply safe to use?

however if the manufacturer didn't take the time here then odds are that the rest of the supply design got the same treatment.

yes indeed.

[gdement]

Re: Is this power supply safe to use?

what were those drives(manufacturer), and what symptoms did you experience?

1) Maxtor D740X 40GB (I think that drive is technically a Quantum). I just looked up my old failure report at storagereview.com to refresh my memory on it:
It ran great for about 3 years in a good (but old) HP workstation. Then I upgraded to newer stuff, using a cheap case and a PowMax 400W power supply. Eventually I started having problems with the drive not spinning up at boot, and according to what I wrote at storagereview, it "occasionally hangs while in use."

Note that my troubles with the D740X *might* have occurred while it was still installed in the good HP machine. I don't remember very well. I know I ran the 40GB alongside a newer 160GB (mentioned below) before the 40GB died.

The next 2 drives I remember more clearly, and I know they died on the PowMax.

2) I had a 120GB Seagate 7200.7 which ran for about 8 months on the PowMax, then started having problems spinning up, and would sometimes hang when left idle. I came back to my computer to find a BSOD a few times. If I listened close, I could hear the drive making a spin-up whine noise, then *CLUNK*, then spin-up again, *CLUNK*, repeat, repeat.

3) I shipped that drive in for warranty replacement. The refurb (another 7200.7 120GB) came back and worked for about 2 months, then it started doing exactly the same thing as the drive it had replaced.


It was at this point I realized there was a pattern. After dumping the PowMax, the refurb 120GB seems to work fine again (I still have it). I don't trust it anymore but it's apparently not totally broken - it just doesn't like cheap power supplies anymore. I haven't worked it very hard though.

The curious thing is I had a 160GB version of the 7200.7 ever since before I ever got a 120GB, and it never suffered this problem. It lived through the entire PowMax episode, while 2 of the 120's came and went. It only recently died from bad sector problems, long removed from the PowMax days, and worked harder than the 120's ever did.

[Newbie2]

Re: Is this power supply safe to use?

I have never had a hard drive die on me while in use, since I had them hooked up to at least an acceptable power supply during their use. I wouldn't doubt the excess ripple and noise coming out of a cheap generic power supply along with unstable voltages will damage the hard drive over time until its failure.

I do have one old hard drive starting to fail though, and it's an old Western Digital 84AA 8.45GB ATA/66 hard drive. It's not that bad yet and when it works it still runs, but on occasion it has problems trying to start up, and it was hooked up to an L&C power supply when it did that. I removed it, and replaced it with an old Seagate Medalist 10232 10.2GB ATA/66 hard drive.

A few of my relatives have a bunch of dead hard drives, and the power supplies they use are the special lightweight generic power supply that comes with their case!

My brother's hard drive is still perfectly fine hooked up to the Best Power "500W" power supply.