Re: psu help
 

I use a paper clip or a piece of wire all the time to power up a psu and have never damaged a psu from it, or even shocked myself.

All you need to do is make sure you only connect I think it's the green to any black cable on the 24 pin connector, and it will power up the psu as if you had pressed the power button.

I now have a 24 pin extension cable that I use for it, as it's the safest way to power up a psu to fill a water loop and it's a common way to do it, if you don't have a external power supply for doing it.

Re: psu help
 

I have not done the paper clip test , and I have looked at the switch on the back of the PC .


Any one have any idea what psu I would be best to get ? Do you thing I would be better geting one with more power , maybe a 600w one ?


Thanks for all the help so far

Daz300

Re: psu help
 

Have you added any more components (memory, drives, fans, etc.) to the machine since you bought it? They are usually sold with the lowest possible power rating PSU, so adding components can demand more power which will eventually kill the PSU.

As for the paperclip trick, it does work but will hit the PSU hard as it's expecting a resistive short not a total short to kick it into life. And as Heero yuy said, it's not a good idea to go inside a Switched Mode PSU without a lot of training... they bite hard even after being powered down for ages!

Re: psu help
 

While I do not wish to insult the original poster as I do not know what level of technical knowledge they have, but bearing in mind they've come on a forum asking for advice on buying power supplies as they appeared not to know that PC PSUs have standard fittings, do you *really* think it's a good idea to advise him to poke around inside a device that has mains electricity running round inside it with a paper clip?

Re: psu help
 

Hi , I do know something's about pc I just have never had to get a new psu

My mb is a P5N-E SLI

I all so have 2 DVD drives and 2 GeForce gts450 g cards and a fan controler and 2 sets of blue LEDs.

Any help will be brill even a link

Hope that helps

Thank you

Daz

Re: psu help
 

As I said, I didn't mean any insult. Just don't think it's a good idea to advise someone to poke around in a device that has mains electricity inside when you don't know their level of ability.

Re: psu help
 

I would recommend looking at the average-high power draw of the components you have and buying a PSU with 20% more capacity than that.

Buying an excessively overpowered PSU is just a waste of money - both for an unneccessarily overpowered PSU, and also because the higher the power the PSU, the less efficient it is at lower output levels, where your PC is going to be operating 90% of the time. Power supplies are most efficient when operated at around 80% load.

---------- Post added at 18:43 ---------- Previous post was at 18:41 ----------

To be fair the 'paperclip test' does not involve poking around inside the PSU in anyway, nor does it involve going anywhere near any cpmponent that has mains electricity running inside it.

The paperclip is meant to replace the power switch on the mainboard. It's not meant to be randomly poked around into any hole you find.

Re: psu help
 

Have a look at this web site for a power supply wattage calculator. http://support.asus.com/powersupply.aspx?SLanguage=en Ken

Re: psu help
 

Your Recommended Minimum Power Supply is 750 Watts

But I only had a 550w psu in the PC when it came .

Re: psu help
 

Perhaps that is why your power supply failed!:( Ken

Re: psu help
 

You maybe right there ken

Re: psu help
 

My daughter got a Stone PC with only half the RAM it really needed to run properly, so I offered to buy the extra RAM.

The bill appeared with the cost of the RAM, but also £45 for an "upgraded" proprietary-shaped PSU... that was a whole 50W extra.

"No more powerful PSU, no warranty" I was told.

Re: psu help
 

Highly unlikely. To exceed the output of a quality 550w power supply you'd need an ultra-high end gaming PC with two £500 graphics cards running at full throttle along with a 4-8-core CPU also at 100% at the same time.

That site, like most sites trying to sell you overpowered and overpriced power supplies, overestimates your needs by a huge amount and borders on being a complete lie.

Just to prove how ridiculous it is it thinks my PC needs a 1000w power supply. It's been running just fine off a 430w supply for 5 years. Average usage is 90w while idle, 350 while gaming.

It also thinks my machine at work, a fully certified Dell server with 100% Dell certified and guaranteed components, needs a 750w supply yet Dell supplies it with only a 550w - and it barely uses 120w most of the time.

Re: psu help
 

Ok more info on the PC I have

Motherboard : Asus psn-e sli
Graphics cards : 2x he force gts 450
Hard drives 80 gb and 2 tb
2x blue ray drives
8 gb ddr2 ram

Thank you for your help .
Daz

Re: psu help
 

What CPU?