Problems with Ultra Xconnect PSUs

D

Deity

Limp Gawd
Joined
Dec 25, 2002
Messages
185
I am making this thread under advise of some of the guys in the video card section who were helping me out with a problem I was having with my 6800GT.

I have had my 6800Gt for about a month. About 2 weeks ago I thought I would do it a favor and buy it a newer bigger and more powerfull power supply. Like any computer geek I grinned ear to ear when seeing the Xconnect 500 watt. "pretty" great idea actually, I liked the looks of it very much. Hell it costs a 100 bucks it must be good right? WRONG. Soon after installing it (about a week and a half) I started to have problems with my video card. Artifacts, Flashing screen, game lockups the works. Naturally I thought the card had had it. Since I had the replacement plan on the card from best buy I got it exchanged (a whole other adventure in and of itself during christmas rush) I installed the new card, and things seemed fine. I even benchmarked it. All seemed well. the next day I fire up some TRON 2.0 and low and behold the game crashes AGAIN! All the while I had been posting about this problem on Hard Forums. some guys mentioned the power supply as a possible culprit. I thought no way, that PSU is brand new, no way is it bad. Well I was wrong. I installed the card in an identical system. I benchmarked it and gamed on it all night without one hitch. So when I put it back in my other machine I also switched back to my old Antec PSU, and it now works perfectly. Just a word of warning for those of you considering buying one of these. It may be more attactive to look at, but that doesnt mean its better.
 
should have spent more time in here
weve known that supply was a wannabe rockstar for a long time
simply a low to mid range ATX12V v1.3 supply posing as a quality supply
its actually manufacturerd by Leadman (infamous for burning the uninformed)
maker of the POWmax, RAIDmax and Robanton brands

Your first clue should have been its price with all that eye candy
the second clue would have been only rudimentary specs
the third clue was its limited accptable range for AC power
and the last clue, any PIC out there of its guts

when it was first released, it was attributed to Ultra Products
and farmed out to casemod sites for review
the problem is that there where no qualified reviewers in the first second and even third round of reviews

cheerleading squads happy for the freebies, patently incapable of doing a real PSU review,
as they dont even own half the equipment needed and
most having a fundementally flawed understanding of how to test a PSU
or even confusion about the ATX12V v1.3 spec

it was only after Mike Chin at SilentPCreview got one that real info and testing started to come in
he found it consistently high on the +12V rail and none too stable
recently MaximumPC also panned it, though I havent read the actual test proceedure
they did alter the AC load with a Variac
the verdict which I have heard was it is an overhyped poser
not much of a suprise

>
 
mine just died after only owning it for a month. started locking up and randomly shutting off. i suspected the psu right away, swapped it out with my friends and sure enough my computer ran great. i bought it from performance-pcs waiting for an email, i dont know what their return policy is. i hope they replace it, or let me trade it for a cheaper, better psu.
 
BossNoodleKaboodle said:
you know, the ones who control our thoughts and....
Click to expand...
get up and make a turkey sandwich
then access your bank account and paypal me the contents
 
Problem is, if it gets stickied, Kyle will probably get sued by another second-rate company who's pissed off by our speaking the truth.
 
Kyle gets sued because he doesnt back down to attempts to stifle opinion ;)
( I wish I could give you a quote I have but its privileged, suffice it to say, he wont lower the falg till at least one shot has been put across the bow)

but then I do try to make this a fair forum
and in fairness, the Ultra-Xs arent the same peices of dangerous junk that most of the rest of the Leadman products are

they arent half as good as many people seem to think
but they arent as bad as some people think eiither

with care (read a UPS and cool operating environment) and provided they dont have too great a load on them
they will likely suffice, after all power supplies are all about the worse case senerio
there isnt much of a difference between a simply adequate or even poor PSU and a really good one
until something unusual happens or you ask too much of it
of course when things do go wrong, a poor supply has the potential to take components worth exponentially more than it is, with it

Right now I think Computerpro3s before you buy a PSU thread has a sufficient warning
and the board is already fairly aware that the Ultras have been over hyped ;)
 
hmmm i have one in my dual 2400+ Mp box with 8 hdd's and have had no probs at all
 
If Im not mistaken, wouldnt that board be powering those CPUs off the +5V rail?
(actually it could go either way with that vintage I think, ATXEGS or ATX12V supplies being the typical spec to power those, a board that is using ATX12V could be using either +12V or +5V to power the CPUs)
board has a 4 pin (2x2) or 6 pin (1x6) Auxillary +12V power connector?
 
Ummm..I have one of these PSU's and havent had any problems to date. Of course doing my once a month round through this forum I see there are problems a plenty with it. Now I am nervous about it. Guess I should have stuck with the Antec I had in mind when I came across this Ultra X.
 
Kckazdude said:
Ummm..I have one of these PSU's and havent had any problems to date. Of course doing my once a month round through this forum I see there are problems a plenty with it. Now I am nervous about it. Guess I should have stuck with the Antec I had in mind when I came across this Ultra X.
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I have an UltraX and a Neopower. Both have worked well for me. Most of the "problems a plenty" seem to be just baseless brand bashing. Has anyone on this board actually had an UltraX fail on them? Has anyone had a Neopower fail (MaximumPC #1 rated PSU)? I bet the actual numbers are pretty similar. Maybe a user poll would generate some actually useful information for potential buyers and not just a continuation of the "it sux" and "it rocks" threads.
 
c1001 said:
for me.
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There have been members with Deer Power Supplies that are working for them
starting a reliability poll for something that only fails in a worse case senerio wont reveal alot
even if the actual load and useage pattern, the operating temperature and source power are reasonably accounted for, there is still considerable unknown factors and levels of damage that can occur (see ESD & Electromigration Rant) and are impossible to definatively attribute

and until PSU manufacturers actually start to provide real information, we will have these little threads to discuss the brands veracity of information

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1049958&CatId=1483

"For the very best performance in continuous, dependable, ultra-cool power, you can rely on Ultra. Ultra - the best power supply products at the world’s lowest prices!"
Click to expand...

a patently false statement

I will without hesitation bash any manufacturer that fails to provide real specifications
and especially any manufacturer that lies about their specifications
I will also continue to inform the board about "new" companies that are in fact old companies with a new trick

fool me once shame on you
fool me twice shame on me


POWER SHMOWER by Mike Chin

or How PSU Power Ratings Mean Almost Nothing

A frustrating fact about PSUs is that there does not appear to be a stringent or regulated standard for reporting, advertising and labeling rated power. This is despite the existence of standards like ATX2.03 or Intel ATX12V.

There are well-established standards for measuring and rating HDD capacity, an engine's horsepower, or the heat generated by a furnace... but not one for how much power a PSU can deliver. There are so many cases of people with "450W" PSUs having power stability issues running a system that can't possoibly draw more than 150W. And "300W" units that keep running where the "450W" units are faltering.

It's not just about bad PSUs vs better ones. It's a dumb situation caused by uncontrolled marketing competition. Real regulation would bring PSUs out of snake oil territory and into a more sensible consumer-friendly terrain.

There are many ways PSU makers fudge to make their units seem more powerful.

1) Out and out lying. You add up the power on all the lines in many PSUs and they fall short of the rated power by 10, 20 30W or even more.

There are more sophisticated ways:

2) Limit the AC input voltage to a very narrow tolerance. The best PSUs are able to deliver their rated power given a decent range of AC input power, say 90~130V for a 120V unit. It's much more demanding to produce 300W w/90VAC input than with 120VAC, so what some PSU makers will detail in their tech specs (usually not in their consumer brochures) is to specify 115-120VAC for input power. A PSU specified this way will not deliver full power if the AC voltage sags, if there is a brown-out. Surely it causes instability more often than a PSU rated to deliver full power with 90-130VAC.

3) Specify a low operating temperature for rated output. This is quite common, but again not often seen in consumer brochures, but rather tech spec sheets provided usually only on demand by engineers or corp buyers. A typical PSU operating temp statement is somthing like this:

0ºC ~25ºC for full rating of load, decrease to zero Watts O/P at 70ºC

Examine what that says. Full power (let's say 400W) is available when the unit is at 0ºC ~25ºC. Hmmm. Think about this.

Have you ever felt air blown out of a PSU in a PC running absolutely full tilt (which it would have to do to get anywhere near 400W output) that felt cool to the fingers? 25ºC airflow would feel exactly that: Cool, given that normal body temperature is 37 °C.

So this PSU cannot deliver full rated power when its temperature goes over 25ºC. OK, what happens to the max power output capacity above that temp? It decreases gradually so that by the time the PSU temp reaches 70ºC, the PSU cannot deliver any power at all. So if you assume that this power drop as temp rises is linear, then max power capacity will drop by ~9W for every degree over 25ºC.

Now having examined as many PSUs as I have over the last 2~3 years, I have to say there's not a single PSU in ANY PC I have ever used or examined that would not measure at least 30~35ºC almost anywhere inside the PSU under almost any kind of load. And if/when it is pushed, 45ºC is nothing at all, especially for or near hot running components like voltage regulators.

So let's say 40ºC is a fairly typical temp inside a PSU. This 400W rated unit would actually be able to deliver a max of just 220W at that temp. Hmmm. Interesting, isn't it? At 50ºC, the available power would drop to just 130W. No wonder some PSUs have 3 fans each capable of 50 cfm!!

Here's a simple fact: Really high quality PSUs are actually rated for full power output at as high as 40ºC. The trick is get a hold of the spec sheets that tell such information so you can compare apples to apples. Or ask.
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or

from dansdata
Unethical PSU Marketing 101.

Here's how to make overly optimistic power supply specifications. It's really simple.

First, power the thing up. You can make an ATX power supply that isn't connected to a motherboard turn on by grounding pin number 14 on the big motherboard power connector. It's easy to spot that pin, because it's the only one with a green wire going to it.

Use any handy bit of wire - like the paper clip in this picture - to connect pin 14 to any ground contact. The ground contacts are the ones with the black wires going to them. Presto, the PSU will turn on.

Now, break out your brick-sized power resistors and load the heck out of one of the output rails - the +5V rail, for instance. Measure the current as you increase the load, until the voltage sags unacceptably far below the rated voltage.

How do you tell what an unacceptable voltage sag is? Well, you could choose a nice conservative small permitted sag - say, 0.1 volts - so that your results are genuinely useful to your customers. Or you could just ignore the voltage and say that when a fuse (or some other component...) blows, that must have been the limit, right there.

OK. Now you've made a big fat amperage number for the +5V rail. If you blew up the PSU in the process, get another one, and repeat the process for +12V and +3.3V, and for the low current rails as well.

On no account, though, should you test more than one rail at a time. This is the key to the whole scam.

A big beefy PSU may be able to deliver 50 amps (say) on the 5V rail when nothing else is under load, and 25 amps (say) on the 12V rail when it's similarly all alone. But the 12V and 5V rails together may only be able to deliver, say, 350 watts between them, when they're both under load. Watts equals amps times volts.

In a real PC, all of the power rails will always be under load together.

But you're not testing what the PSU can really do - you're making pretty numbers for the sales brochure!

So test all of your rails alone, get an amperage figure for all of them, multiply that figure by the voltage of the rail it came from (the nominal voltage, not whatever the voltage had sagged to as the PSU pumped electrons through the dessert spoon you'd soldered to the circuit board), then take all of the resulting wattage figures and add 'em up. That's a wrap, folks. Ship it!
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Power Supplies are all about the worse case senerio
too high a draw, too high a temperature, too unstable a source AC Power
and supplys that under normal circumstances are adequate, blowup and often kill stuff
(this can happen to even quality supplies, but they should shutdown safely withoput killing components)
so we are a pretty conservative lot in here, considering the power supply has the potential to fry components worth exponentially more that it is.

To make matters worse there are very very few reviewers able to review a supply, the best that can be said for most of them is that it didnt blow up their config that day, because the power from their outlet happend to be stable that day, they didnt overload it and it wasnt too hot.

exceptions are rare
http://www.leesspace.com/Published_reviews.htm
http://www.silentpcreview.com/section4.html

so get as good a UPS, Thermal Solution, and PSU that will actually power your config with room to spare as you can afford ;)
 
Best quality at the world's lowest prices eh? Thats a bit of an overstatement considering the guy who started this thread had a pretty basic setup(not 10HDD's or anything crazy) and it fragged his Ultra right out of the box.

Was it brand bashing when people stayed away from exploding Firestone tires? Was it justified?

Their cost to value and reliability ratio seems far too low to bother with them at all, unless the shiny is all you care about. I recommended painting the case of their "ugly" Antec or Enermax with automotive paint to someone before and in this case I think its true again. The powmax(maker of Ultra-X) 450W PSU's can be had for $30 and are light as a feather, which indicates to me that they're either made out of carbon fibre and space age materials or they're crap thats falsely advertizing their capabilities.
 
Ice Czar said:
There have been members with Deer Power Supplies that are working for them
starting a reliability poll for something that only fails in a worse case senerio wont reveal alot...;)
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But it will reveal a lot more to potential buyers than merely saying that "they suck, stay away from them" from people that haven't owned or used them. When I buy a product I like to read professional reviews but I also like to get actual user feedback as well, because what is important to an uber-geek technical reviewer may not be tremendously relevant to some users. I.E. A Car & Driver editor might have sais that VW Beetles were unreliable, but people loved them because they were so simple to fix...and they are still around.

And to BossNoodleKaboodle statement about brandbashing and exploding Firestones: where are the exploding UltraX's? I am sure some will fail. But so do all other makes and models of PSUs. Real user data (Deity's thread starter), even if unscientific is more helpful to a potential buyer than "I heard it sucks".
 
Id nominate the FSP Group (Fortron, Sparkle, many rebrands) as the
"the best power supply products at the world’s lowest prices" they aint fancy
but they consistantly exceed their labled specs, and are very affordable in a given class of spec

if there is eye candy involved I always question the supply itself
eye candy without a substantial increase in price above a similar spec supply from a trusted manufacturer, isnt a good sign, and is often indicative of value engineered components

keep in mind that the basic components in the various classes of quality that make up a PSU are commodity items, assembly of almost all supplies being done in job shops in China
that arent even owned or run by "manufacturers", assembly being another commodity
and that most supplies would have a very simliar labor cost
eye candy tends to increase component costs at the expense of the real components
(more expensive lighted fans, windows, sleeved cables, lights, fancy fan guards, plating\painting and unusual metal stamping)
its far less likely you be getting better filtering (AC Ripple, a basic problem with switching Power Supplies) tighter load reguilation, better capacitors ect)

most manufacturers are simply fullfillment organizations, marketing and maybe a fulltime engineering department more likely freelance engineering, the eye candy is selling supplies to a certain class of buyer, but its often costing those buyer in the long run
they are as a group not the same informed consumers that typically deciphered PSU manufacturers claims in the past (largely being engineers for OEM manufacturers or enterprise integrators)

its a network of incestuous relationships with case manufactures making PSU cases and PSU manufacturers supplying commodity supplies for those cases, integration of components being a buyer beware senerio, the only recourse for the buyer being education

which is why we are all here ;)
 
c1001 said:
I have an UltraX and a Neopower. Both have worked well for me. Most of the "problems a plenty" seem to be just baseless brand bashing. Has anyone on this board actually had an UltraX fail on them? Has anyone had a Neopower fail (MaximumPC #1 rated PSU)? I bet the actual numbers are pretty similar. Maybe a user poll would generate some actually useful information for potential buyers and not just a continuation of the "it sux" and "it rocks" threads.
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Can't say I have seen much of the 'baseless brand bashing' going on in this sub-forum. I usually ignore the "it sux" and "iit rox" threads and replys for simple reasons. With the failures and inconsistancies I have seen on this and other forums, I am personally doubting my purchase decision. WIll the Ultra X PSU work for others? I am sure it will. I am not confident that it will continue to work for or in my system. I'm not putting my vote down for bad or good on this PSU. Just not for me.
 
I have a X-connect i have not installed it yet. from what ive read in max pc mag and other forums im afraid of it. if i have a clean input(a UPS) will that help it? should i even use it? is it damageing to my pc?
 
Ice Czar said:
it was only after Mike Chin at SilentPCreview got one that real info and testing started to come in
he found it consistently high on the +12V rail and none too stable

>
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I find the above post interesting because here is Mike Chin's Conclusion:

While the Ultra X-Connect 500W PSU is certainly competent in its ability to deliver power, it doesn't really fit SPCR's critera for a quiet component. The overall performance of the sample is more than adequate from a power delivery perspective, but leaves much to be desired from an acoustic perspective. Even at low power loads (65-100W), the power supply measured well above 30 dBA/1m in our sound tests.

The efficiency of the unit was fairly good, but far below that of some recent PSUs to pass through our rigorous testing procedure. Active PFC is increasingly seen on higher priced PSUs; its absence here is a bit disappointing.

The modular cabling system is an excellent, well executed feature. We'd love to see more PSUs come with similar implementations to help prevent case clutter and facilitate efficient airflow. It should also be said that with a bit of modding, this PSU could be quite good acoustically -- swapping out the stock fans with Panaflos is a move some quiet-oriented but bling-driven modders might consider. Lastly, if you're looking for looks -- snazzy fan grill, UV-reactive cables, and high-gloss paint finish -- along with high power, then the Ultra X-Connect is certainly worthy of your consideration.
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Hrrm... Not one mention of instability or the high voltage being an issue, and he does recommend it to people who want a snazzy looking supply..... Wierd, I thought he was all negative on it.

From all the reviews I have read (about 5 so far) all of them found every rail about 1% to 4% higher on the voltage than they are supposed to be, so nobody was lying or mis-reporting simply because they were just happy to have one, and none of them complained or mentioned that was a particularly bad thing. Basically from what I have read everyone believes it to be an average mid-range supply, but not really good for high-end use.

So I will have to agree with Ice Czar's second post... Based on the available information this is merely a low-mid end high wattage PSU with snazzy looks and modular features. Something to consider if you aren't going to be taxing it too much, but if you are planning on running an OC'ed FX55 with dual Oc'ed 6800ultras and lots of harddrives and such.... You probably want to look for something rated to be incredibly stable over this thing.
 
If it was consistantly 4% low, however, there would be an outcry from reviewers...
sounds like general incompentence to me in review, as high voltage is detrimental just like low voltage, now to what extent comparably I don't know; gee, any thoughts?
 
arentol said:
Hrrm... Not one mention of instability or the high voltage being an issue,
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not sure which review you where reading
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article193-page3.html
1. VOLTAGE REGULATION was fairly good, with the exception of the 12V line being consistently high. The 12V rail typically provides power to the motherboard (for the CPU), disk drives, fans, and cooling devices, so proper operation is very important. Although it may just be this particular sample and not a common trend of the X-Connect, it is a bit troubling. Throughout the range of test power output levels, the range was as follows:

+12V: 12.25 ~ 12.49V
+5V: 4.86~ 5.13V
+3.3V: 3.1 ~ 3.38V
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and it is a common trend ;)
look through the rest of his reviews and youll find excellent excellent and excellent voltage regulation
fair is something you'll rarely see

it faired worse in the Maximum PC torture test, larger fluctuation but thats to be expected in a mid quality supply when you drop the VAC to 60 :p
It actually survived that which I found suprising, but on second thought, it should have shutdown rather than allow too much fluctuation through
unfortunately Maxmum PC likely didnt use a DMM capable of sampling and logging overshoots adequately
(consider that the load is supposed to return to with the parameters within 1 ms,
Ive been talking to gee about true DC RMS DMMs capable of logging overshoots
think of the problem as trying to shoot a movie with a strobe light)
the other two that survived where the Neopower and the Turbo Cool 510,
the Neopower within its 3% and the 510 didnt even blink
 
I've had the X-connect 500W PS for about 3 weeks. I've used it with 2 Asus A7v8x-x mobo's and it's blown both of them. Luckily it hasn't damaged anything else. I have a question, is it normal to hear the electricity arcing when you plug the AC power cord in to the PS? Also, was there any loose debris/particles in any of your guys Ultra PS when you opened them? Well, regardless, the PS works still, but I'm moving on to a known stable PS...Antec...I'm tired of blowing motherboards...
 
I admit that I was wrong about the oem not being leadman for the xconnect but not all power supplies are made in job lots. Acbel and fortron have state of the art factories and have pictures of them on their websites. Also the picture of psu's being assembled one of the brands was powernics and on this website

http://www.dbnawa.co.kr/v5/product/brand_see.html?c1=1&c2=18&c3=&made_co=1122

none of their models have tiny heatsinks so they might have changed suppliers or just the heatsinks.
 
actually, the Ultra Xconnect really isn't very good.

I got it to replace my Antec 310 watt. As soon as I got it and installed it, I wasn't able to start my pc. It would start up, the fans would spin for a second, then turn off. So I put my old PSU back in, and everything was fine. So I RMA'd the Xconnect, got the new one, installed it, worked fine.

Then my Asus A7N8X-DX's speech reporter began repeating "System failed CPU test" over and over. Not just when my PC was posting, while I was in the OS as well.

So I checked the temps, and everything was fine and the system didn't show any problems. I went to Asus' site, checked their FAQ, and found this exact problem. Their answer, the voltage going to the cpu wasn't right. So I go into the BIOS and see that its set to defaults, nothing changed.

So I do some searching and find out that A LOT of people with Asus Motherboards are having this problem, a lot of them solved this problem by getting a new PSU. But it couldn't be, I just got the damn thing.

Then I read the Maximum PC review, and that kind of enlightened me. Then one last night, i was on my pc and shit shut off. I couldn't turn it back on. The power supply was acting just like the one I RMA'd. Tried my old PSU again, eveything is fine, and the "System failed CPU test" was gone.

SO yeah, that's my experience.
 
With OCZ and their Modstreams the need for X-Connects at all is gone... OCZ are just as cool looking and they have the specs to back it up...
 
Ok,

well, i hooked my old PSU back up to my computer, and now it just turns on the fan, nothing comes up on the screen, and it doesn't appear to be doing anything. I have my two DIMMs installed, my HDs, my videocard and thats it.

Is my Mobo fried?
 
mojovonious said:
Ok,

well, i hooked my old PSU back up to my computer, and now it just turns on the fan, nothing comes up on the screen, and it doesn't appear to be doing anything. I have my two DIMMs installed, my HDs, my videocard and thats it.

Is my Mobo fried?
Click to expand...
First reset the CMOS, as a bad PSU might have corrupted it.
 
I have an ULTRA X-Connect 500W which I've been using for 2 weeks without any problems. So far my experience with it is :).

I'm getting a new mobo, processor, ram, and graphics card on Jan. 24. So than I'll see what it can do.

It will be running:
MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum
Athlon 64 3500+ 90nm
ATI Radeon X800 XT Platinum Editon
Crucial Ballistix DDR500 1GB Kit
Creative Sound Blaster Audigy
Wireless Adapter Card
1 HDD, 2 Rom drives, 1 floppy
3 case fans
 
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