How long does a good PSU last in typical home environment?

DejaWiz

DejaWiz

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Hello [H] Power Suppliers,
For a good quality PSU, is there a good "rule of thumb" to go by as to the usable life span?

I ask only because I am on the home stretch of building my 1155 system, and I currently have a Cooler Master Real Power Pro 750W that's getting to be about 5 years old. It's been powerering the system in my sig since purchased new. On average, I'd say my computer is on about 20 hours a week, with 15-18 of those hours used for 3D gaming. The rest of the time it is either powered off or in Sleep Mode.

Should I consider a new PSU, or should the RPP 750 keep chugging along for quite some time yet?
 
There is no way to measure lifespan. You might get lucky and get one that lasts 10 years or more, or you might get unlucky and have one that gives out after 3 years. Most of the time, they will last at least as long as the length of their warranty.

The best advice I can give you is just buy one and have it on hand, so when it does fail, you'll have minimal down time. You have time, since it's still working, so just take your time and pick the best deal you can get.
 
Tsumi said:
There is no way to measure lifespan. You might get lucky and get one that lasts 10 years or more, or you might get unlucky and have one that gives out after 3 years. Most of the time, they will last at least as long as the length of their warranty.

The best advice I can give you is just buy one and have it on hand, so when it does fail, you'll have minimal down time. You have time, since it's still working, so just take your time and pick the best deal you can get.
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Yeah, I know it's impossible to measure lifespan, so I was wondering if anyone went by any kind of rule of thumb, so to speak. At 5 years old with a 5 year warranty, my current PSU is starting to enter that "proceed with caution" zone since it's:

1. A pretty damn good PSU, but...
2. Not the absolute best, and...
3. Used/degraded for 5 years and now out of warranty.

I think I'll take your advice and get a replacement to at least have on hand if not install right away.

The part of all this that makes me nervous is that if it ends up taking a huge steaming dump instead of just slipping away softly, I don't want to risk it taking out anything else with it like the MoBo, CPU, etc and have no warranty to lean on.
 
99% of the time, good power supplies die quietly without taking anything else out with them. They're designed to kill themselves first before killing any components (especially true of during surges, etc). Degradation doesn't really mean much in a good power supply.
 
Tsumi said:
99% of the time, good power supplies die quietly without taking anything else out with them. They're designed to kill themselves first before killing any components (especially true of during surges, etc). Degradation doesn't really mean much in a good power supply.
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I hope that's the case with any and every PSU I ever own... 5-6 years ago I wouldn't have cared less if a catostophic failure occured and just dished out the cash to replace all the components that got nuked. But, now married, 3 kids, mortgage, all the other bills that comes along with it, I have to be frugal and actually think (unneccessary obsessive worrying, I suppose) about these things now.

If degredation were a concern at some point, I suppose it's not so much anymore... with each generation of components coming out that draws much less power than the previous, that is. hell, if my current 750W is more than ample for my 125W TDP proc, GTX 570 with an OC, and everything else crammed into my case, then it'll be perfectly fine for a 77W quad core IB and a couple of SSD's.

It'll be a pretty cool day sometime in the future of computing life when power draw is so small, a fanless 500W PSU will suffice for a system with a 16 core proc, a half-dozen internal storage drives, and quad XFire/SLI. :D
 
Not going to happen, because the top-end cards that can do quad crossfire/sli will always be pushing the maximum power envelop to get the maximum performance available ;)

But going to just IB and a 570, I would recommend you to start looking in the hot deals section and places like slickdeals for a good deal on a 500 watt or higher power supply. You can either toss it in immediately, and keep that Cooler Master as a backup spare, or run it into the ground before replacing it.
 
^ that was pure jest in a wishful thinking sort of way.

I'm leaning towards something in the 850W-900W range in case I decide to SLI my 570. I've been eyeballing the Enermax/Lepa Gold 900W units (twins) 120A combined. Or the Corsair AX850. Dunno *shrug*
 
99% of the time, good power supplies die quietly without taking anything else out with them.
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That is what I have seen at work. Not sure if a home power supply has ever died on me in the 20 to 25 years that I have had PCs.
 
I've got an Enermax 350W that's been chugging since 2002. I've never had a power supply die, they get thrown away or sold before then. I do notice that some power supplies have degraded efficiency and peak output as they get older.
 
750 watts would be plenty to cover you for a SLI 570 system.

Like I said, your power supply is fine for the moment, just be patient and wait for a good deal to come along. One of the biggest avoidable costs of building computers is buying parts when you need them instead of when the best price comes along.

But yes, I get what you're saying. Computers have become so much more powerful, all while using much less power.
 
Antec 480watt from '04 going strong.

My exp over 10 years has been all over the board, but with quality supply it should out last warranty by atleast 2years or so. It would be hard to give an average b/c it is so spread across the spectrum.
 
Tsumi said:
750 watts would be plenty to cover you for a SLI 570 system.

Like I said, your power supply is fine for the moment, just be patient and wait for a good deal to come along. One of the biggest avoidable costs of building computers is buying parts when you need them instead of when the best price comes along.

But yes, I get what you're saying. Computers have become so much more powerful, all while using much less power.
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This. I'm in a similar situation, started to assemble parts for an Ivy Bridge build. Since IB isn't out for another 3 months, I'm watching for deals on the components which will not change (i.e. no new technology in that category in the next 2-3months, price drops unlikely) such as the PSU, case, heatsink, SSD, possibly RAM.

I'd buy a new PSU as well, just for the peace of mind and knowing you are set for another 5+ years. Since you have a busy life, is it worth dealing with the headache of a PSU failure down the road? Only took me 2 weeks to find a good deal on PSU, Seasonic X-760 (80+ Gold full modular) for $120 from NCIX (Canada only deal it seems).
 
as long as its never been close to capacity and well ventilated and such it should still be okay

but its nice to do case and psu with every new build, just because of wear and tear
 
ikilledmyagoia said:
as long as its never been close to capacity and well ventilated and such it should still be okay

but its nice to do case and psu with every new build, just because of wear and tear
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That's what I was thinking of...wear and tear over time since this PSU has been in service for just over the warranty expiration length.

I'm not too worried about my case.. it's pristine and has only had 2 motherboards in it (Venice 3000+ and current X2 6400+) since new.
 
Ive always used "poor quality" power supplies (raidmax, hec, rosewill, or lesser names) and i cant remember any of them dieing on me with one exception. I had this "allied" power supply i used it on 3-4 builds of my own before giving it away to someone.
 
buttons said:
Ive always used "poor quality" power supplies (raidmax, hec, rosewill, or lesser names) and i cant remember any of them dieing on me with one exception. I had this "allied" power supply i used it on 3-4 builds of my own before giving it away to someone.
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You should come to our labs. Most of the time the reason "poor quality" PSUs don't fail is because people aren't pushing them past even 30% of their rated power.

For example - we bought a $39 PSU rated on its box for "600W". We bought six of them for testing purposes.

We put together a basic system (Core i5 2500K OC'd to 4 GHz, H80 cooler, GeForce 560 Ti, etc.) and it ran fine. Its draw from the wall? 380W at full load. Since the "600W" PSU claimed to be 80 Plus rated, we assumed it would actually be producing closer to 304W out - or roughly half its rated power. It worked fine - no problem at all.

Then we added a second 560, power jumped to about 490W at full load. Which means around 400W output. It still worked fine for the most part though we did have one heat shutdown from the PSU.

Plugged them into our Chroma tester, and each one failed testing at 100% load. Our PSU engineer found the OEM, contacted them, and they confirmed that this PSU platform was rated for a maximum of 450W at room temp (25C).

To be honest, when we tested another few (we killed the first six on the tester) we found that even at 25C and the 450W spec from the OEM, ripple and noise on the +12V were out of regulation, DC Voltage on the +5V/+3.3V was way out of spec, and a number of the internal components were running hotter than their rating allowed.

So a lot of the time - a "value" PSU can be kind of a ticking time bomb, if you'll forgive the melodramatic phrase. It could work fine, it could die, and like somebody above me said, when they die they usually just take themselves and nothing else - but we've seen motherboards, CPUs, video cards, and hard drives killed by bad PSUs. We've seen it happen quite a bit.

But it's a risk some people take. You don't need to spend hundreds of dollars to get a decent PSU these days - even a $60-$70 PSU can be decent (read: within ATX specs and rated at 40C).

For me, even building a system for my grandmother, I used a decent PSU because I don't want to have to troubleshoot odd power issues or go out and replace it one night so she can skype with my cousins.
 
This "capacitor aging" and the whole idea that the output of a power supply decreases over time is little more than over-hyped bullshit. Not to say it doesn't happen, but not in the span of 4 years. It might begin to become noticeable after maybe 15-20 years.

A power supply having a decreased lifespan is going to be due to abuse and/or neglect. That can include things like not dusting it out at appropriate intervals, overloading it, overheating due to poor case airflow, or power surges without the use of an appropriate surge protector.

Only you can know the degree to which you've neglected or abused your power supply over the years, but assuming you've taken good care of it, you could easily still be using it a decade from now.

My server is still using the original EPS12V power-supply I bought back in 2003 when I was building a dual-xeon rig. Most PSUs from that era wouldn't even have the 24+8 connectors for a modern rig, but this did due to being EPS12v. I used it in probably 4 or 5 different computers over the years, and it's still working great!

I have a vintage Yamaha home stereo amp, 240wpc/8ohms. That sucker runs HOT and can pull more current than any computer PSU. It was made in 1979 and still has 100% original caps. It has never performed anything less than perfectly... and it is now almost 33 years old...

Then again part of the reason for my good experiences is undoubtedly because I buy quality parts from reputable manufacturers. Don't buy cheap and you won't be disappointing.
 
I feel the best way to preserve a power supply's life is to run it a line conditioning UPS. Clean steady power will mean its not struggling with power dips or surges. And you can shut the PC down properly in the event of an outage.
 
I have been thinking about getting an adequate UPS for years and years now... Living in the Midwest with the power outage bringing storms that frequently roll through, it might be a wise investment.
 
I could swear the "rule of thumb" was represented by a MTBF (mean time before failure) rating that is present on the warranty or instruction manual.
 
I have some PSUs that have been running for nearly 10 years. Given there's not really any moving parts other than the fan that can easily be replaced, I don't think they're any more prone to failure than other components such as the motherboard. As long as they are not put under stress. I always buy mid/high end and run at a bit over half it's capacity. Having a UPS helps a lot too.

Where I used to work the power went out almost every day. The L2 guy was running around like a chicken with no head replacing PSUs all day because they bought crap ones and they were not UPSed.
 
Xeth said:
I I do notice that some power supplies have degraded efficiency and peak output as they get older.
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That hadppen to my old 2000 400w Antec. The 5v rail drop to like 4.35 but still works fine to this day. Now my 2004 535w Enermax has bad caps, sometime it will not turn till the power has been unplug for about 2 hours.
 
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just got a the system in my sig, still using a corsair hx520 that i bought in jan 07. Guess ill buy one if i decide to get a new video card
 
No one can tell you the exact answer. It mostly depends on luck. Sometime newly bought PSU might deceive you. However, age is a main factor in the life span of power supplies and since yours is 5 years plus aged, so I would suggest you to let it go and buy a new seasonic or corsair of equal wattage to stay on the safe side.
 
If the PSU is decent, then longevity depends almost entirely on the longevities of the fan and capacitors, as little as 3 years if the capacitors are junk (many original Antec TruePower and SmartPower models failed by about then), easily 10 years if they're good. I'm now using a 300W Delta PSU made in 1999 with only Japanese capacitors.
 
OP, right now you are in the best position for upgrading. You have a working power supply so watch the sales. Power supplies often have crazy low price sales compared to their normal price. Decide on the models you are interested in and then just keep an eye on the [H]ot deals forum. I got my seasonic x750 that way for $109 shipped. But yes, I would suggest you start looking for a new PSU as a back-up at least, but dont feel you have to rush out and get one this weekend.
 
Rise! Rise from the dead!

...c'mon people, this thread fizzled out in Feb. Check my sig.
 
Dejawiz, it doesn't matter how old it is. It is a good question that does not have a time frame on the answer.

To keep the thread on track. I prefer to keep a back up, I actually updated my PSU because of the efficiency of the newer ones and to feed a more power hungry Video card with proper amps.
 
i can say this,,,,,, a stinky thermaltake 420 bundled with TT matrix lastet over 5 yrs in my case .
At that time i smoked weed , cigarrettes everything near my PC. The PSU is still working (wife uses the PC)
 
DisrupTer911 said:
I feel the best way to preserve a power supply's life is to run it a line conditioning UPS. Clean steady power will mean its not struggling with power dips or surges. And you can shut the PC down properly in the event of an outage.
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i used UPS for many years and found it a waste of time. Specialy todays better PSU's are surely able to tackle anything that power instability throws at them . How do i dare to say that? expirience with even shitty PSUs that reached 3-5 yrs of duty...including uncountable electricity fallouts
 
notsure said:
i used UPS for many years and found it a waste of time. Specialy todays better PSU's are surely able to tackle anything that power instability throws at them . How do i dare to say that? expirience with even shitty PSUs that reached 3-5 yrs of duty...including uncountable electricity fallouts
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But, it still is smart to be on the safe side. Sure todays PSU's CAN handle it, but it still puts a strain on the unit. I need to get a cheap UPS for my girls house because we have had the breaker go 4 times within the month from both of us gaming and forgetting to turn the TV off. We make sure now, but just in case, would be nice for extra protection.
 
AliceCooper said:
But, it still is smart to be on the safe side. Sure todays PSU's CAN handle it, but it still puts a strain on the unit. I need to get a cheap UPS for my girls house because we have had the breaker go 4 times within the month from both of us gaming and forgetting to turn the TV off. We make sure now, but just in case, would be nice for extra protection.
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yeah but if you got a 800+ psu you need at least 1200+ ups to be on the safe side and thats a cost about approx 150 -200 euros .
 
notsure said:
yeah but if you got a 800+ psu you need at least 1200+ ups to be on the safe side and thats a cost about approx 150 -200 euros .
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I'de take the plunge if it means my system is that much safer from being fried. Not saying that it would automatically fry when the PSU goes, but there is always that chance. I don't like to take risks with my electronics ;).
 
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