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weird stuff inside the PSU

D

d4li

n00b
Joined
Oct 15, 2014
Messages
11
i was cleaning my psu today for the first time, and noticed something inside
V1wGChl.jpg

can you guys please tell me what this is?
excuse my ignorance but i really know nothing about power supplies and electricity..
iv'e had this psu since 2008, it's a CORSAIR HX520W
thank you
 
Looks like a piece of shielding that came unglued.

Stay out of there unless you know what you are doing. Those capacitors can discharge a shitload of juice into you, and can hold a charge for a long time.
 
also, in the last few months iv'e had this crazy buzzing noise coming thru my speakers and and from microphone
i have tried a few different microphones and different speakers. also tried to replace the extension cords, and the psu cable, nothing helped
could the buzzing noise and the psu stuff be related?
 
DrLobotomy said:
Looks like a piece of shielding that came unglued.

Stay out of there unless you know what you are doing. Those capacitors can discharge a shitload of juice into you, and can hold a charge for a long time.
Click to expand...
thank you for your reply
so what does it mean exactly? should i get a new psu or is it fine and i can stay with this one?
 
Looks like hot glue to me - they use sometimes it to give bigger components some strength and keep from stressing the PCB connections so much. Just looks like it was installed a bit sloppy.

And yes to what DrLobotomy said - stay out of there if you know what's good for you.

Buzzing noise - maybe, but probably not. That's usually a poor ground or grounding loop somewhere in your analog audio line. Try a USB sound device and see if it does the same thing.
 
You should get a new one also he is wrong the cheap manufacture of that one pictured added a shield between the coil and the cap there the smoo you circled is a silicon based glue also normal though a bit messy in application.

The buzzing you are hearing is bad ground isolation Amazon.com: PAC SNI-1/3.5 3.5-mm Ground Loop Noise Isolator Works with iPod/Zune/iRiver and Others: Automotive you may need something like this between the pc and the speakers...

And unlike the rest of them just saying stay out of there the danger bits are the cylinders they can hold alot of juice and discharge it quickly into what ever touches it imagine 600v @1-2 amps if you survive your fingers will have nasty burns... and nerve damage...

As for if you need a new one I donno that would be one with seasonic internals i have 3 of them the oldest being 2004-2005 ish... replaced an antec 430w true power which replaced an enermax 350w... all of them are still working oldest dates back to 1999...
 
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yup hot glue from a sloppy assembler, nothing to worry aboot. try a ferrite choke to get right of your ground loop noise:
Ferrite Choke

edit: lol lunas was posting as I was typing. what he posted is the same as what I posted but in a fancy box.
 
Oh shit! That looks like ghost ectoplasm. Your PSU is haunted. Get an EVGA branded psu as they have a anti-ghost prevention module with ultra high quality ectosplasm resistant capacitors with a 10 year warranty.
 
thanks guys
the thing about the noise is even when i unplug the speakers from the wall my microphone still makes a lot of noise (when i talk to people in skype or teamspeak)
this means that the problem is in the wall right?
 
d4li said:
thanks guys
the thing about the noise is even when i unplug the speakers from the wall my microphone still makes a lot of noise (when i talk to people in skype or teamspeak)
this means that the problem is in the wall right?
Click to expand...
Not really that is 2 issues that may or may not be related... Besides you should have all your equipment plugged into a ups not directly into the wall anyway... What microphone are you using.
I have used a large number of them and stay away from cheap ones...
 
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DrLobotomy said:
Looks like a piece of shielding that came unglued.

Stay out of there unless you know what you are doing. Those capacitors can discharge a shitload of juice into you, and can hold a charge for a long time.
Click to expand...

Not really true. Properly designed PSUs have bleeder resistors that discharge the capacitors after the unit is unplugged. This process takes a minute at most and you can observe the discharge process with a voltmeter set to 500vdc with one probe from the primary side heatsink and the other probe on the case. When the voltage reaches 0, you're safe. Just don't short the primary heatsink to ground or you're going to have explosions and lots of smoke.

Even most junk wofat IED units have bleeder resistors in them. I've repaired well over a hundred power supplies over the years and I have only ever seen one unit that didn't have bleeder resistors in it.
 
GiGaBiTe said:
Not really true. Properly designed PSUs have bleeder resistors that discharge the capacitors after the unit is unplugged. This process takes a minute at most and you can observe the discharge process with a voltmeter set to 500vdc with one probe from the primary side heatsink and the other probe on the case. When the voltage reaches 0, you're safe. Just don't short the primary heatsink to ground or you're going to have explosions and lots of smoke.

Even most junk wofat IED units have bleeder resistors in them. I've repaired well over a hundred power supplies over the years and I have only ever seen one unit that didn't have bleeder resistors in it.
Click to expand...
You say not really true , then you give a case where it is true. It is obvious he has no clue. He has no business in there.
 
DrLobotomy said:
You say not really true , then you give a case where it is true. It is obvious he has no clue. He has no business in there.
Click to expand...

If the guy wants to clean the inside of his PSU then that's his own business, he just does so at his own risk. By the time you get a PSU unplugged and apart, it will be pretty much completely discharged.
 
Regarding the buzzing there are quite a few possible suspects. Is there anything more to your audio setup than just the single mic and speaker set plugging directly into the jacks? Are there any splitters, combiners, extensions, or anything plugged into the aux input?

Dirty power's another potential culprit. As others have said, get a good surge protector with noise filter and this should be a non-issue. In fact dirty power is a pretty common perpetrator in otherwise unexplained crashes and errors, so it's just good form to have your PC on surge protection.

Also, probably an obvious question, but you do have the speakers at less than max volume, right? Sometimes volume mixers get turned down in Windows making you crank up your speakers to compensate, and many systems tend to have some slight hum at max.
 
Fractal Design NA said:
Regarding the buzzing there are quite a few possible suspects. Is there anything more to your audio setup than just the single mic and speaker set plugging directly into the jacks? Are there any splitters, combiners, extensions, or anything plugged into the aux input?

Dirty power's another potential culprit. As others have said, get a good surge protector with noise filter and this should be a non-issue. In fact dirty power is a pretty common perpetrator in otherwise unexplained crashes and errors, so it's just good form to have your PC on surge protection.

Also, probably an obvious question, but you do have the speakers at less than max volume, right? Sometimes volume mixers get turned down in Windows making you crank up your speakers to compensate, and many systems tend to have some slight hum at max.
Click to expand...

well there's the speakers (altec lansing atp3)
and also i have an asus xonar dgx 5.1 audio card wtih headphones and a mic plugged into it
the speakers and all of my setup is plugged thru a 5 socket extension cable
iv'e tried to plug them all separately, in different sockets around the room(the speakers in one socket, the pc and monitor in a different one), that didn't make any difference

and yeah they make noise even when they at 1%, i won't hear the music but ill hear the noise
 
I don't like the brown spot on top of the stator on the "WEBA" labeled transformer in the bottom right corner corner of the picture.
Also, IIRC both of my HX520s had black PCBs.
Other than that it looks fine. However I too have had issues with audio noise using both my HXs. I sold them and as far as I can tell they are still trucking along.
 
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