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Power Supply questions:
- Thread starter Carl224
- Start date
larrymoencurly
[H]ard|Gawd
- Joined
- Jul 18, 2002
- Messages
- 1,635
PSUs typically last 3-8 years, so for most people, replacement every 5 years might be a good idea, assuming the PSU was reasonably well made. OTOH if you have a 750W $10 Ebay special, replace it right away, or at least no later than when NewEgg or TIgerDirect runs a sale on a Corsair or Antec. Every 1-2 months they seem to offer a 430W - 500W Corsair for $20-30, after rebate. The most common PSU failures seem to be fans, electrolytic capacitors, and power transistors & diodes, and if your PSU has high quality capacitors and ball bearing fans, it can easily last 10 years. My current PSU is a 300W made in 1999, and just a year ago its Japanese capacitors still tested good for ESR and capacitance.
Motherboards generally last about the same as power supplies, and the main causes of failure are worn capacitors and, in the case of overclocking, capacitors and MOSFETs blowing out, but zaps from static electricity (such as from petting you lucky cat before plugging in a device) or lightining surges can also destroy them.
Motherboards last roughly as long as PSUs and also fail a lot from bad capacitors or, when overclocked, blown transistors, but they can also get zapped by static electricity (even USB ports aren't immune to this). OTOH a motherboard with a high CPU power rating and made from only solid polymer capacitors (all silver colored, even on the sides) or Japanese brand capacitors (except TK -- Toshin Kogyo, or certain Chemicons -- models KZG and KZJ) can easily last 10 years.
Be suspicious of used motherboards made with inferior capacitors because they often fail in 3 years. You want caps that are solid polymer (all silver colored, not just on top) or Japanese, but a couple of Japanese ones are bad -- TK (Toshin Kogyo) and models KZG and KZJ from Chemicon.
Test every port and bus slot, even those you don't plant to use (i.e., built-in video when you have a video card) and even internal headers, because sometimes damage to one later spreads to others. And test at the fastest speed and heaviest load because damage may be only partial, so a USB port may run at USB 1.1 speed but not at much higher 2.0 speed, and if there are 4 DIMM slots, install 4 DIMM slots. It takes so long to test everything, even with a Linux live CD, that I don't like shopping for used motherboards.
Motherboards generally last about the same as power supplies, and the main causes of failure are worn capacitors and, in the case of overclocking, capacitors and MOSFETs blowing out, but zaps from static electricity (such as from petting you lucky cat before plugging in a device) or lightining surges can also destroy them.
Motherboards last roughly as long as PSUs and also fail a lot from bad capacitors or, when overclocked, blown transistors, but they can also get zapped by static electricity (even USB ports aren't immune to this). OTOH a motherboard with a high CPU power rating and made from only solid polymer capacitors (all silver colored, even on the sides) or Japanese brand capacitors (except TK -- Toshin Kogyo, or certain Chemicons -- models KZG and KZJ) can easily last 10 years.
Be suspicious of used motherboards made with inferior capacitors because they often fail in 3 years. You want caps that are solid polymer (all silver colored, not just on top) or Japanese, but a couple of Japanese ones are bad -- TK (Toshin Kogyo) and models KZG and KZJ from Chemicon.
Test every port and bus slot, even those you don't plant to use (i.e., built-in video when you have a video card) and even internal headers, because sometimes damage to one later spreads to others. And test at the fastest speed and heaviest load because damage may be only partial, so a USB port may run at USB 1.1 speed but not at much higher 2.0 speed, and if there are 4 DIMM slots, install 4 DIMM slots. It takes so long to test everything, even with a Linux live CD, that I don't like shopping for used motherboards.
- Joined
- Apr 6, 2012
- Messages
- 253
I have no scientific proof or fancy charts and graphs, however I believe I killed my AX1200 running tri 7970s ballz out all the time for one year. Had to RMA it, got a new one and we were off again. Who knows.
Crappy PSUs claim to be able to deliver x amount of wattage, but can only deliver part of that without failing. They get away with it because most users really don't use very much power; most of the rigs we talk about here on HardOCP probably don't actually consume more than 300 or 400 watts, and your typical consumer who just runs MS Office and browses the web probably stays under 200 watts. When these crappy units fail, they go pop, can damage other parts of the PC as they die, and even catch on fire. They can fail at any time, or never if you never actually push it.
Higher-quality PSUs deliver what they say they can. There's always a few defective units where the capacitors may go, but they don't take out the rest of the PC when that happens. What usually happens when they die of really old age (5 to 7 years and beyond) is that the fan finally gives out, which results in the insides running hotter which reduces lifespan of those parts. These days the high-end PSU makers are designing the fans to not even turn on until there's enough load to warrant running them, so it's hard to say what will fail first.
A 7 year warranty is a forever warranty on a PSU; you're likely to replace it for some reason other than its age past that point. PSUs that were being made in 2006 don't necessarily have the plugs that you need in a PC today, and I imagine PCs will be at least that much more different in 2020, in ways we can't anticipate now.
Higher-quality PSUs deliver what they say they can. There's always a few defective units where the capacitors may go, but they don't take out the rest of the PC when that happens. What usually happens when they die of really old age (5 to 7 years and beyond) is that the fan finally gives out, which results in the insides running hotter which reduces lifespan of those parts. These days the high-end PSU makers are designing the fans to not even turn on until there's enough load to warrant running them, so it's hard to say what will fail first.
A 7 year warranty is a forever warranty on a PSU; you're likely to replace it for some reason other than its age past that point. PSUs that were being made in 2006 don't necessarily have the plugs that you need in a PC today, and I imagine PCs will be at least that much more different in 2020, in ways we can't anticipate now.