-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Robert.Wultsch@asu.edu wrote: > Accepting that a cheap poer supply will only last 3 years (which I don't), I > don't think that the average person will get 3-6 times the value out of an > expensive psu. > They probably won't, but some will and I do. You may get 3-6 times as much damage out of a 'poorly built' one. (Actually some vs none.) You may also get flakey or occasional problems that are very hard to troubleshoot. I have been lucky and only had one cheap power supply completely fail, but it only took about 8 months. It depends, I guess, on what you are building and how your budget is. I have bought cheap (and poorly built) cases and just used the supply that came with it. I have also recently bought a couple Antec True 380s. They weigh TWICE as much as the 'Fry's Special(tm) 300W. They were tested by Tom's Hardware http://www6.tomshardware.com/howto/20021021/powersupplies-15.html and shown to produce what their ratings say they can without catching on fire or destroying themselves trying.(to catch on fire) They have variable speed fans (two per supply) so they are quiet, move a lot of air, and can power up to 3 case fans variable speed also. There is a small fan connector that can be plugged into the motherboard and supply a fan rotation pulse thereby allowing you to monitor the speed of a power supply fan using lm_sensors etc.. These went into our workstations. They are run 24x7 and each have multiple HDs, lots of ram and fast (room-heating) processors. They have CDRWs and DVDROMS. One has a zip and the other a tape drive. They both have power hungry video cards.I expect these supplies to run for at least 20,000 hours before needing attention. I suspect they will run for > 50,000 hours. Most cheap, poorly built power supplies survive this long, in light duty. Most power supplies can't meet the ratings that they have on their labels, but it doesn't matter most of the time. The output needs to get pretty far off spec. or noisy before you will know something's amiss -- unless you test for it. Most machines have a single HD, a cdrom that gets occasional use and one processor. A Toy(tm) power supply can meet the short and long term power needs of this typical box. It won't have the cleaner output, the thermal control or the load regulation of a better supply. (I have verified this using test equipment.) Listen carefully to a computer with a marginal supply and you can sometimes hear the fan(s) speed up and slow down slightly. (They will usually speed up slightly as the CPU load goes up.) Cheap supplies have little if any dedicated regulation for the 12V rail. Your CPU starts drawing current at 5v or 3.3v and the switching supply cranks up its' pulse-width to try to hold the high current, CPU rail close to spec.. This makes the 12V rail rise a little bit. The feedback loop that provides the regulation isn't watching the 12V rail, and without a dedicated regulator for the rail it couldn't do anything about it anyway. But this is good enough most of the time. My crappy Winder's box at work does this (Dell Optiplex GS-1). At least Dell rated the toy for what it is (150W IIRC). I have friends boxes that do this. The labels on their supplies say '300W'. Different people will have different opinions of what a 'moderate' amount to spend on a supply is. To me, spending $50 to get a 300W version of the 380s we have is cost effective and moderate. I would spend a little more to run a pair of Athlon's or PIIIs, multiple drives and a bunch of case fans.... I would spend $58 to get an Antec case with a 'mid-range' (still Antec, just not as fancy) 300W supply to build a basic, single CPU machine. (Normal workstation, small server or cluster node) I don't have access to any significantly less expensive supplies that would work the same. I don't have the time to look too hard for them either. I don't see why people will sometimes pay more than $200 for a 'gaming' power supply tho. A True 380 will run a pair of Athlon's -- no sweat. I hate to see people spend $30 - $50 or more for a piece of crap supply from Fly's when it is really a $15 or $20 value. The more boxes I build and maintain, the more I am willing to spend a little extra to get better quality. Ten power supplies running will produce failures more often than one or two running will. - -- KevinO A "few" is an indefinitely small number that conveys a qualitative sense of a quantity, but not quantitative fact. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.0.6 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iD8DBQE+lS3YjBS1mMJB+bQRAmLsAJ44IZRcNaD2AP/PrVSIk7VIZyu94QCgrcmM PmETgek221d4DjjI/h7yPdc= =twim -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----