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Grinding Power Supply?



 
 
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  #1  
Old September 28th 03, 11:33 PM
PawsForThought
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Default Grinding Power Supply?

When I first start my computer, there is a grinding/vibrating noise that sounds
like it's coming from the power supply. It's not a constant noise but rather
it comes about every 10 to 15 seconds. Once the computer is warmed up, the
grinding noise goes away. I was hoping it was the case fan so I replaced that,
but no luck. I have an AMD Athlon T-Bird with a Biostar M7VKB motherboard. My
current power supply is a 250.

Can anyone tell me if they think I should just replace the power supply? When
it's making the grinding noise, I can feel the power supply vibrating. If I do
get a new power supply, what would you recommend and what wattage?

Thanks in advance.
  #2  
Old September 29th 03, 12:50 AM
kony
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On 28 Sep 2003 22:33:57 GMT, olitter (PawsForThought)
wrote:

When I first start my computer, there is a grinding/vibrating noise that sounds
like it's coming from the power supply. It's not a constant noise but rather
it comes about every 10 to 15 seconds. Once the computer is warmed up, the
grinding noise goes away. I was hoping it was the case fan so I replaced that,
but no luck. I have an AMD Athlon T-Bird with a Biostar M7VKB motherboard. My
current power supply is a 250.

Can anyone tell me if they think I should just replace the power supply? When
it's making the grinding noise, I can feel the power supply vibrating. If I do
get a new power supply, what would you recommend and what wattage?

Thanks in advance.


The odds are that the power supply has a sleeve bearing fan that has
lost lubrication, and as a result the bearing has worn some. The risk
is that when the fan finally does fail, it will seize, just won't
spin-up at all when the system is powered-on, so no noise to notice.
At that point it will start overheating, begin progressively wearing
due to heat-stress. It is not a good idea to operate the system at
all once the fan has seized.

As an interim measure you may want to oil the fan bearing. A single
drop of heavyweight oil is fine, far better than a light oil or
non-lubricant like WD40, but practically a drop from a car dipstick
will be fine. This should buy you some time, to look around and
decide if you want to only replace the fan (which is a fine option if
the power supply was OK for the system, and if you're inclined to
splice wires or solder, or just find a fan with the right plug).

Obviously a replacement power supply is another option. You might as
well get a 300W since the price-point for that capacity has dropped to
make it the best bang-for-buck, but if you have any desire to reuse
the power supply someday, on a more modern and power-hungry sytem,
then buy an appropriately larger power supply. 400W+ should suffice.
Either way choose a well-known name-brand, not being mesmerized by an
attractive exterior since the interior of a power supply has nothing
to do with how pretty it is outside, is one of the marketing decisions
that helps sell overpriced generics as well as good power supplies.
Generic 550W power supplies are often worse than 300W name-brands.

Popular brands that are easy to find, should be fine for that system
(at 300W rating), include:

Sparkle/Fortron/SPI/AOpen
Antec
Thermaltake/Chieftec/Highpower/Enlight
Herolchi
PC Power & Cooling
Enermax

In general the cheaper power supplies in the above list may have
shortcomings like sleeve-bearing fans or slightly less output
filtration. It's less of an issue on a relatively lower powered
system such as yours, would matter more as the load approaches the
limits. This is of course assuming you have only a moderately
powerful video card, and mid-range T-Brid. A Radeon 9700 and T-Bird
1400 might make a ~350W power supply a good choice for the current
system. Generally, unless you find some low sale prices, the best
performance per $ is found from Sparkle/Fortron.


Dave
  #3  
Old September 29th 03, 04:01 AM
Vanguard
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How comfortable are you with removing the power supply and removing its
case screws to open it up? Feel like you are capable of replacing the
fan?

It probably is an 80mm fan. You can remove the screws on the backside
that hold the fan, remove the fan, and replace it. If the old fan has a
2-pin connector, you can usually just slide on the 3-pin connector and
leave the RPM lead disconnected. If the old fan's are soldered onto a
circuit board, clip the wires close to the fan to leave you the longest
length, screw in the replacement fan, and strip the ends of the fan and
circuit board wires to join them (using wire nuts and then silicone the
cup, or solder them and use wire nuts or heatshrink tubing, and make
sure to position the wire so it doesn't get caught in the fan). Make
sure you orient the new fan so it blows out the backside of the power
supply through the grill. There usually are arrows on the fan case to
indicate the direction of blade rotation and also for the direction of
airflow.

You could put in a thermally-controlled fan, like from Vantec, so that
you might end up with it running much slower if it doesn't have a lot of
heat to expel. This would make the fan quiet but still leave it capable
of speeding up if your computer puts out more heat than it can expel at
the slow speed. I just put in a Vantec stealth fan and it runs all the
time, but it is very quiet. However, stealth fans may not have a high
an airflow rate (i.e., they have a lower CFM rating) so you'll need to
monitor your temperatures to make sure you system is getting
sufficiently cooled.

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"PawsForThought" wrote in message
...
When I first start my computer, there is a grinding/vibrating noise

that sounds
like it's coming from the power supply. It's not a constant noise but

rather
it comes about every 10 to 15 seconds. Once the computer is warmed

up, the
grinding noise goes away. I was hoping it was the case fan so I

replaced that,
but no luck. I have an AMD Athlon T-Bird with a Biostar M7VKB

motherboard. My
current power supply is a 250.

Can anyone tell me if they think I should just replace the power

supply? When
it's making the grinding noise, I can feel the power supply vibrating.

If I do
get a new power supply, what would you recommend and what wattage?

Thanks in advance.



  #4  
Old September 29th 03, 04:11 AM
kony
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

On Mon, 29 Sep 2003 03:01:24 GMT, "Vanguard"
wrote:


You could put in a thermally-controlled fan,


snip

Installing a thermally-controlled fan in a power supply introduces
another issue to beware of... many power supplies having the typical
off-fan, thermal fan-throttling circuit can't effectively use a fan
with it's own integrated thermal control. Such combinations may not
spin at all, or only spin after the power supply gets VERY hot.

It's possible to do so and can be a very effective way to reduce
noise, but very easy/common to end up with a non-spinning fan. Trial
and error is needed to find the optimal combo.


Dave
  #5  
Old September 29th 03, 08:33 AM
Bronney Hui
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Default

Change for a new PSU immediately.

My buddy was lazy and let it grind for 3 months and the heat actually melted
(I don't know how but it did) the PSU plug that plugs into the mobo (white
thing). Dang.

Now he's screwed cuz he can't unplug the PSU plug without breaking his mobo.

-bron

"PawsForThought" ¦b¶l¥ó
¤¤¼¶¼g...
When I first start my computer, there is a grinding/vibrating noise that

sounds
like it's coming from the power supply. It's not a constant noise but

rather
it comes about every 10 to 15 seconds. Once the computer is warmed up,

the
grinding noise goes away. I was hoping it was the case fan so I replaced

that,
but no luck. I have an AMD Athlon T-Bird with a Biostar M7VKB

motherboard. My
current power supply is a 250.

Can anyone tell me if they think I should just replace the power supply?

When
it's making the grinding noise, I can feel the power supply vibrating. If

I do
get a new power supply, what would you recommend and what wattage?

Thanks in advance.



  #6  
Old September 29th 03, 02:07 PM
PawsForThought
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

From: kony

The odds are that the power supply has a sleeve bearing fan that has
lost lubrication, and as a result the bearing has worn some. The risk
is that when the fan finally does fail, it will seize, just won't
spin-up at all when the system is powered-on, so no noise to notice.
At that point it will start overheating, begin progressively wearing
due to heat-stress. It is not a good idea to operate the system at
all once the fan has seized.


Thank you very much for your responses everyone and thank you, Dave, for a very
informative reply. I greatly appreciate it! I was afraid you'd say something
about it overheating and that's why I've been shutting down the computer
whenever I leave the house. But after reading your post, I see it's time for a
new PSU. I have replaced drives and installed PCI/AGP cards and memory. But
I've never replaced a PSU before. It looks like there are 4 screws and a
ribbon cable to attach to the MB. Is this correct? Do you think it would be
fairly easy for someone with my experience?

As to lubricating the fan bearing, I am assuming this means taking apart the
PSU. I think I'd rather just replace the PSU since I don't have experience
taking apart PSU's.

My video card is just a 32 meg GeForce MX2 agp card. I mostly use this
computer for surfing the net or scanning in photographs. The processor is a 1
gigahertz T-Bird and I have 768 megs of ram. The computer is about 3 or 4
years old and I think instead of upgrading anything else, I would opt for a
whole new system somewhere in the future in a few years. So, with that being
said, and with your advice on brands, I found these:

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....requestid=3636

I was thinking of the Antec SmartPower 350-Watt, Model: SL350. Or, the
TruePower 330.

I read a review he http://mikhailtech.com/articles/psu/truepower330/

What do you think of the smart power idea, and also having dual fans?

Thanks again for your help.
  #8  
Old September 29th 03, 04:51 PM
kony
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Default

On 29 Sep 2003 13:07:02 GMT, olitter (PawsForThought)
wrote:


Thank you very much for your responses everyone and thank you, Dave, for a very
informative reply. I greatly appreciate it! I was afraid you'd say something
about it overheating and that's why I've been shutting down the computer
whenever I leave the house. But after reading your post, I see it's time for a
new PSU. I have replaced drives and installed PCI/AGP cards and memory. But
I've never replaced a PSU before. It looks like there are 4 screws and a
ribbon cable to attach to the MB. Is this correct? Do you think it would be
fairly easy for someone with my experience?


Yes it's pretty straightforward, just unplug the old, unscrew it, then
reverse the process for the new. There are power cables from the
power supply to all drives too, not just the motherboard.

Two things to watch out for are to check the voltage switch on the
back (if it has one) next to the power cord. It should be set
appropriate to the AC in your region (110V vs 220). The other thing
is to make sure the wires are kept secure enough, out of the way so
there's no chance of them contacting the fan blades.


As to lubricating the fan bearing, I am assuming this means taking apart the
PSU. I think I'd rather just replace the PSU since I don't have experience
taking apart PSU's.


It would have to be taken apart if the whole fan label isn't accesible
in the rear. Some power supplies have a chrome grill in back that can
be removed to access the label (which would be peeled back or
completely off to expose the bearingway). Others have a
stamped-in-metal grill, necessitating disassembly of the power supply
and removal of the fan. It's not THAT hard to do, but of course the
pwer supply should sit unplugged from AC for the better part of an
hour to be sure it's drained.


My video card is just a 32 meg GeForce MX2 agp card. I mostly use this
computer for surfing the net or scanning in photographs. The processor is a 1
gigahertz T-Bird and I have 768 megs of ram. The computer is about 3 or 4
years old and I think instead of upgrading anything else, I would opt for a
whole new system somewhere in the future in a few years. So, with that being
said, and with your advice on brands, I found these:

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....requestid=3636

I was thinking of the Antec SmartPower 350-Watt, Model: SL350. Or, the
TruePower 330.

I read a review he http://mikhailtech.com/articles/psu/truepower330/

What do you think of the smart power idea, and also having dual fans?


300W in a name-brand such as those should be fine, with 350W offering
even more reserve capacity. Either of the models you mentioned should
be adequate for your system, but the prices look a bit higher than I'm
used to seeing. You might consider buying online, someplace like
Newegg.com (which also offers a good deal on a 300W Sparkle):
http://www.newegg.com/app/manufactor...alog=58&DEPA=0

Dual fans shouldn't be necessary for your system but nonetheless could
help slightly reducet the noise and help remove heat more directly,
especially if your case doesn't have a rear fan under the power
supply. Since your system doesn't need much power (relatively
speaking) you might find a Fortron - P300XFPN to be a good choice for
noise-reduction and similar benefits to dual-fans:
http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproduc...ion=17-104-979


Dave
  #9  
Old October 1st 03, 07:02 PM
PawsForThought
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From: kony

300W in a name-brand such as those should be fine, with 350W offering
even more reserve capacity. Either of the models you mentioned should
be adequate for your system, but the prices look a bit higher than I'm
used to seeing.


Thanks so much, Dave. I was going to buy from the newegg.com site you listed.
However, I had to go to CompUSA for something and I had a $20 gift card. I was
looking at their power supplies but they were pretty expensive. Then the
salesperson said they had some open box ones. I told them I didn't want one
that had been returned. He said these are ones that have been opened in store
and taken out of the box. I had my doubts. But nevertheless I asked to see
what they had. He brought out a 400W with a CompUSA brand sticker on it. It's
chrome and it has 2 fans, one of them being belly mounted. He told me they are
actually made by Antec but that CompUSA puts their sticker on it. I opened the
box and the screws, warranty card and power cable were still sealed in bag and
everything looked new and in good condition. I asked the price. He told me it
was half off the $69.99 regular price. So that made it $35, plus with my free
$20 gift card I had gotten previously, it came out to $15. So, with that in
mind, I decided to get it, figuring that since my computer is 3 years old
already and I don't really want to drop a lot of money into it. What do you
think?

They told me they could install it for me for free but that I would have to
leave my computer for 4 to 7 days. I want to attempt this myself and I see
what you were talking about with the cables for all the drives. Maybe I can
find a website for some more instructions?

Two things to watch out for are to check the voltage switch on the
back (if it has one) next to the power cord. It should be set
appropriate to the AC in your region (110V vs 220).


I looked on the back of the PSU and right now it's in position of 115. Is that
right? I live in the USA.
  #10  
Old October 1st 03, 07:09 PM
PawsForThought
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Here is the one I got. It also says this on the box:
http://www.compusa.com/products/prod...584&pfp=BROWSE

Supports Pentium 4 and AMD Athlon CPUs
Complies With ATX Version 2.03 And ATX12V Version 1.2
Supports Fan Speed Monitoring
Super Cooling! Two Visible Ball Bearing Fans
Protection Circuits For In-Rush Current, Over-Current And Over-Temperature
FCC Class B Approved
UL Approved

Motherboards Supported: ATX
Input Current Type: AC (Alternating Current)
Input Voltage Supported: 115 V
230 V
Power Rating: 400 W
 




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