Power Supply Going Bad?

D

DragonD

The Division of None
Joined
Jan 12, 2009
Messages
3,240
I'm pretty darn sure that my spiffy new computer, which I built ONLY 4 months ago....the power supply is going out. (See comp specs below).

It started about a week and a half ago, when I was playing CoD4, when all of a sudden my computer shut off. Not power off, just well...like somebody had unplugged it. Odd....but I just shrugged and figured may CoD4 had crashed my rig of some reason...I rebooted and went on as usual.

Well, over the next few days, it became apparent that something was wrong. I thought at first maybe i was over heating, but...I ruled that out by keeping a close eye on all the temps.

Maybe it's a driver? That would make sense, specially since MOST of the time when it's crashing, is when I launch something that kicks in the vid card. I've ruled that out though, cause several times I booted into the bios, and let it just set there (and watched all the temps/voltages). At this point, there are NO drivers loaded yet. And after awhile...zap, off goes my rig.

I even (after some debate, prep work) upgraded my bios. I was about 5 or 6 versions behind (that's not something I like to do unless it really has to be done). I will say the bios upgrade did improve my network performance (was one of the bios releases)...but...

I checked all the connection to make sure nothing is lose (like perhaps the 'power off" button could have been shorting out). But everything looks good.

Unfortunately, all this past week I have not had the time to go pick up a new power supply yet. Well, really knew that I would not have time after work to play around with it. I'm going to stop and pick one up today...

What do y'all think? Power supply the likely issue? I know it's only 4 months old..but hey, that does not really mean anything.




  • Case - Antec Twelve Hundred Black Steel ATX Full Tower Computer
  • PSU - Antec CP-850 850W Continuous Power CPX SLI Certified
  • AMD Phenom II X4 940 Deneb 3.0GHz 4 x 512KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache Socket AM2+ 125W Quad-Core Black Edition
  • ASUS M4N82 Deluxe AM3/AM2+/AM2 NVIDIA nForce 980a SLI AMD Motherboard
  • G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Kit
  • Rosewill RCX-Z5 92mm Two Ball Bearing / FDBB CPU Cooler
  • EVGA 896-P3-1170-AR GeForce GTX 275 896MB
  • 300G Velociraptor
  • WD 1.5 terabyte drive (32M cache, 7200 rpm)
  • LG Black SATA 22X CD/ DVD Burner
 
Yeah it sounds like your PSU is dieing on you. If it's still under warrenty I'd call their tech support and send it back. Sucks that it died so soon :/.

Nice specs by the way.
 
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I have had 2 power supplies go out on me. The original small one that was in my computer, and a 650w. Both times they went out, I was in Call of Duty and the game just crashed and my whole computer was off. But I wasnt able to re start my computer. It wouldnt start up. If you can still power up to your desktop, then I am a little confused.

My question is, has it crashed anytime the video card hasnt kicked in?
 
This is the system requirments for that Card -

XFX RECOMMENDED REQUIREMENTS
PCI Express or PCI Express 2.0-compliant motherboard with one dual-width x16 graphics slot
Two 6-pin PCI Express supplementary power connectors
Intel Pentium 4, AMD Athlon XP class processor or higher
140MB of available hard disk space
1 GB system memory (2 GB recommended)
Microsoft Windows Vista or Windows XP Operating System (32 or 64-bit)
CD-ROM/DVD-ROM drive


SOFTWARE

Windows XP / Windows XP x64 Professional
Windows Vista 32-bit / Windows Vista 64-bit
Directx9c
Directx10


POWER SUPPLY ADVISORY

NVIDIA MINIMUM POWER SUPPLY REQUIREMENTS

Minimum 550W or greater system power supply (with a 12V current rating of 40A)
Two 6-pin PCI Express supplementary power connectors
XFX RECOMMENDED POWER SUPPLY REQUIREMENTS

Non-SLI: 630Watt or greater
SLI: 680Watt or greater
*** Minimum system power requirement based on a PC configured with an Intel Core i7 3.2GHz processor
Click to expand...
 
If it's crashing when you're just sitting in your BIOS then it's either the motherboard has a short somewhere or the PSU is toast.
 
Iceman {Ky} said:
My question is, has it crashed anytime the video card hasnt kicked in?
Click to expand...

yea, which is why I booted into the Bios and just let it set there. Took awhile, but it did crash.

Course, sitting at Bios, not much power is being used.

O, and more than once, it's actually shut back down while simply booting up (posting)
 
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Iceman {Ky} said:
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/262152-31-heat-power-computer-shuts-help-loss

This guy has a similar problem, I think what they are getting to is that your psu could be overheating... Have you checked your Power supply heat levels while its under load and using the graphics card?
Click to expand...

I'm thinking something along those lines...I've had the side off the case for a few days now, so i can better look at things (like making sure the video card fan is running, and making sure nothing is super hot to the touch)

I thought about running memtest, specially since about a month ago, i dropped in another 2 RAM chips (so now have 8G total). I should do that, but have not had the time to just let it run for a few hours.

One of the reasons I thought maybe it's the memory, is because a lot of times it crashes when I launch an application. It could be something as simple as launching a pdf to kicking off CoD. However, it does not always crash when I do that. And sometimes I can play CoD for 10 minutes before it shuts down.

I'm going to pick up a new power supply today. If that's not it, I can always just return it.
 
If you suspect your PSU, any local computer shop can test it for free for you and tell you if your voltages are bad. If so you know the culprit, and get a new one. It sucks buying a new PSU and your old one was just fine.
 
I bet all money on PSU, just trying to figure out if it is still saveable. I would do what punisher said and take it somewhere to get it tested, you may get in luck and find out it is not dead.
 
You can also test it yourself if you own a $10 PSU tester or a multimeter ;). Both are very good investments, especially if you deal with computer issues frequently.
 
ya i'd get it tested, if its bad then send it back cause it must still be under warranty right...if its only 4 months old itself
better than buying a new psu, returning it if its fine or if you can get yours replaced, having to pay restocking fees or what have you...blah blah
 
From what I've read, I dont know if you have taken care of the problem or not but this is my advice. If you running your BIOS and the computer is shutting off, then your PSU is definitely dead. What happens is that the computer running alone sucks more power than the PSU can provide henceforth shutting it off. Obviously if this happens in BIOS then your video card is not the problem seeing as you run virtually no video in your BIOS.

From here you have a couple of options.

1. You can invest a 120 in a new PSU, seeing as you run 850 watts, you probably have a pretty hefty gaming computer. You may need to see if 850 is acceptable for what you run, you may need a higher wattage PSU.

2. You may need to see if the PSU is over heating. If this is your problem, then this can be caused by a few different things. If you have more air coming into your computer then venting out, your going to over heat. Same with not enough air coming in than going out. You need to have an equal flow of air going from the intake vent to the exhaust in the rear. Another problem of over heating is from a dirty computer, If your tower sits on the floor, definitely check for a dirt and fuzz inside the case. Also make sure the PSU is not plugged with dust.

3. Have the PSU tested to see if its working correctly. As others have said, you can easily have this done at any computer repair shop or if you are comfortable you can do it yourself. BE CAREFUL THOUGH. NO ONE repairs / takes apart PSU's. For the reason being the following. If you are running a PSU, hours after having it off, the capacitors still have enough power to kill you INSTANTLY. Do not take it apart, do not try to repair it. Buy a new PSU if it is faulty.

If you have any more questions concerning your PSU, please feel free to ask. Im currently A+ Certified and I've gone to school for this stuff. I can definitely help out.

-Agent2106
 
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