Desktop power supply let out the magic smoke. Doomed?

October 30, 2009 5:12 AM

My desktop power supply has emitted some blue sparks, and not at all in the nice Mario Kart sort of way. It's pretty clear there's an internal short- is it likely that this fried any of my other components, and are there any defensive measures I should take when replacing it?

It is a well-known fact that I emit a powerful hardware-destroying field, causing computers and electronic equipment to fail in all manner of unlikely ways. I just overhauled my desktop with a shiny new Lynnfield i7, and it had been running fine for a week. When I came home last night, I found half my room had no power. I unplugged everything, went downstairs, and reset the circuit breaker. When I plugged the computer back in, there were bright flashes from inside the Antec TruePower PSU, which now smells strongly of magic smoke.

It's clear that the PSU is shot, and I'm not touching it again- what are the odds that it took half the system with it? I have an old PSU that isn't sufficient to power the motherboard, lacking the 8-pin connector, but if I plug in the ATX connector alone the motherboard gets all its happy lights. This gives me some hope. Plus, if there's a short that means it can't emit massive component-baking waves of power behind it... right...?

More importantly, I don't know what brought on the short. It's most likely something terribly wrong in the PSU itself, but my friend who was nearby swears he saw something spark in the front of the case. Is it possible that something internal to a hard drive, etc. could have caused this? I can bring my drives back up one at a time when replacing the PSU, but is there anything I should test first to make sure I don't immediately toast another power supply?

Suggestions for removing electronic hardware-related curses are also welcome.

posted by DoubleMark to computers & internet (4 comments total)

It's definitely possible some components got fried, it's also possible you're fine aside from the power supply.

An electrical short would explain the breaker tripping, so I'd double check that none of the wires & connectors leading from the power supply are stripped or otherwise in electrical contact with anything they shouldn't. Likewise for stuff like a spare screw sitting on the motherboard shorting out some contacts.

Best case, there was some defect in the Antec power supply and it fried itself to death, leaving the rest of your system untouched. Worst case, some stuff got fried too (and it's possible that the damaged equipment can short a new power supply). You really won't be able to tell until you hook stuff up again.

Hope you bought the new gear from somewhere with a good return policy. Looks like at least some of the Antec TruePowers have a 5yr warranty so hopefully you can get a replacement from them.
posted by reptile at 5:32 AM on October 30

I should clarify that the PSU's not new- it's been holding up fine for a year, this is totally spontaneous.

I'm going to go pick up a replacement today; if Antec replaces the old one, hey, I'll at least have a spare. Thinking of going for a different brand, though.
posted by DoubleMark at 5:38 AM on October 30

Yeah I wouldn't sweat it. Most likely the PSU just died and replacing it will get you up and running with no problems.

The smell of burnt electrical components is great, right?
posted by bDiddy at 6:41 AM on October 30

If the motherboard still shows its happy lights (and doesn't have any visibly fried, scorched, or puffed-out components) then I'm guessing the fault was entirely on the "line" side of the power supply and everything else is fine.

It's possible, I suppose, that the problem involved the supply's 12v rail, which drives usually use but the motherboard itself usually doesn't, in which case your drives could be dead. I don't think this is likely though. The input and output halves of a computer supply are pretty well isolated from each other.
posted by hattifattener at 12:58 PM on October 30