Power outage killed PSU

[metroplex]

The ATX PSU in my AMD box (AMD XP 2100+, Abit kX7-333) died during today's power outage fiasco.

I'm in NJ. At around 4pm EST the power went on/off rapidly - and my AMD PC refused to shut off so it was turning on/off maybe twice per second and eventually a loud POP came from the box and the smell of burnt PCB/capacitor came from the PSU exhaust vent.

I popped open the box and nothing odd appeared on the mobo or CPU but the PSU appeared to have blown a capacitor - it was an odd shaped object with a smaller taper object on top of it.

Doesn't look like any standard capacitor, inductor, resistor, or diode. Anything it melted completely and it no longer starts up even when you jumper the green wire to ground.

What are the chances my mobo and CPU also died????

I ordered a new 600W ATX supply at $40 shipped. I think I can repair the PSU but I'm not sure if I want to use it 24/7 on an important system.

 

[Trader05]

damn...i'm in NJ...didn't get any power outages...im lucky i guess! Its possible that the board or cpu or both are dead but i'd doubt it, try to borrow a PSU off a friend.

 

[Keego]

I'd freaking talk to your power company if I were you :disgust:


they most likely don't care though :/

 

[zephyrprime]

Pretty good chance that some of your components are dead. The HD's might have been fried too.

 

[metroplex]

What I don't get is why the PC didn't just shut off. It kept trying to stay on!!!

The other PCs immediately shut down.

I suspect this PSU was already "weak" and this outage killed it. I didn't smell anything or see anything from the motherboard area.

 

[brunswickite]

Originally posted by: metroplex
The ATX PSU in my AMD box (AMD XP 2100+, Abit kX7-333) died during today's power outage fiasco.

I'm in NJ. At around 4pm EST the power went on/off rapidly - and my AMD PC refused to shut off so it was turning on/off maybe twice per second and eventually a loud POP came from the box and the smell of burnt PCB/capacitor came from the PSU exhaust vent.

I popped open the box and nothing odd appeared on the mobo or CPU but the PSU appeared to have blown a capacitor - it was an odd shaped object with a smaller taper object on top of it.

Doesn't look like any standard capacitor, inductor, resistor, or diode. Anything it melted completely and it no longer starts up even when you jumper the green wire to ground.

What are the chances my mobo and CPU also died????

I ordered a new 600W ATX supply at $40 shipped. I think I can repair the PSU but I'm not sure if I want to use it 24/7 on an important system.

jeez, same thing happend to me at 4pm, in NJ, i am so lucky mine didnt die out on me, it was a crazy power fluctuation.

 

[HGC]

http://www.apcc.com/products/category.cfm?paramcategory=13&web_displayed=all

 

[mindwreck]

Originally posted by: HGC
http://www.apcc.com/products/category.cfm?paramcategory=13&web_displayed=all

little too late for that

 

[HGC]

Not too late for the new power supply he just bought!

 

[bluntman]

My uncle had a similar situation when he turned off the power in his house. His computer wasn't attached to any sort of surge supressor and when he turned the power back on he fried his PSU, motherboard, hard drive and sound card. Lucky for him, he used this as an impetus to upgrade his system.

 

[ForbiddenDonut]

For those of you that don't know, power in the northeast from NJ to northern Ontario (canada) to michigan was either unstable or completely out yesterday starting around 4. I live in upstate new york and we lost power completely until about 3am.

The story as it stands...

In addition to New York, outages were reported in Cleveland, Ohio; Detroit, Michigan; Erie, Pennsylvania; Toronto and Ottawa, Canada; Niagara Falls, New York; Niagara Falls, Ontario; and other cities in Connecticut and New Jersey.

 

[metroplex]

Luckily I found an old 200W ATX power supply and powered up the AMD XP2100+, GeForce3, Abit KX7-333 system (how can a 200W PSU power up these things? I also have a Maxtor D740X ATA133 drive, an IBM 75GXP 75GB drive, and two optical drives, a DVD-ROM and a CD-R/RW) and started playing some games to test it out.

All is well I think. The PSU was the only casualty.

My other PCs just shut off during the power outage/fluctuations. I think this PSU was on its way out and the outage just accelerated it.

 

[uart]

it was an odd shaped object with a smaller taper object on top of it.

Most likely the bridge rectifier or possibly the NTC (negative temperature coefficient thermistor). Rapid switching of the AC power is very hard on the both the main capacitors and also the bridge rectifier, with the rectifier being a common casualty. You can very often replace just this component and recover the PSU.

This used to be the number one most common cause of older AT PSU deaths as the AC power was cycled much more often due to the "hard" AC power switch that they used. In about 90% of failure instances these PSU's would die immediately at AC power on and mostly it was the BR blown. I would very often just replace the bridge rectifier and continue using them.

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: ForbiddenDonut
For those of you that don't know, power in the northeast from NJ to northern Ontario (canada) to michigan was either unstable or completely out yesterday starting around 4. I live in upstate new york and we lost power completely until about 3am.

The story as it stands...

In addition to New York, outages were reported in Cleveland, Ohio; Detroit, Michigan; Erie, Pennsylvania; Toronto and Ottawa, Canada; Niagara Falls, New York; Niagara Falls, Ontario; and other cities in Connecticut and New Jersey.

Was about to post this.

I wonder if it could have been a surge - sometimes when power returns from an outage, there is an initial surge. Maybe there was a surge along with the outages.

 

[TheWart]

Originally posted by: HGC
Not too late for the new power supply he just bought!

ditto.

 

[amnesiac]

You know, sometimes a power supply will freak out but it won't be "Dead."

Hold down the power button for a good 10 seconds or so, release, and if it doesn't turn on, just press it one more time. I "resurrected" a few "dead" computers this way.