PS advice...

[FreeLoader]

My 350 power supply just died last night.

I have a 300 in here right now, and its handling quite well.

Problem is, its not mine.

I need a new one, I was wondering if you guys/girls(haha, yea right..) had anything to say about this brand...

http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproduct.asp?description=17-148-008

Aspire 520W 12V Black Triple Fan Aluminum Power Supply, Model ATX-AS520W 12V - Retail

its 69 bucks, black(my case is black) 3 fans with led's, and the wires have sleeves, soemthing I've been looking for. Oh, and a fan speed control....basically, its an affordable god among power supplies.

So here's the question...whats the catch?

it has good reviews...it may not actually run at 520 watts but I obviously don't need that much anyway, so thats not really a big deal.

So does anyone have any dirt on it?

thanks for the help.

[Budfred]

Welcome to http://www.pcguide.com/ubb/pcgubb.gif

It looks good on paper (screen), but the fact that they don't indicate what the Amps are for each leg of power suggests that they may be embarassed by them. Even if it is rated at a 1000watts, it could still fall down on running your drives/components if the 12volt leg isn't powerful enough...

[BigBlue66]

You can't go wrong with an Antec TruePower 330 watt power supply.

Granted, it doesn't have any fancy lights in it, but it's damned dependable and you should be able to get it for about the same price.

If you want lighting, consider LED fans or cold cathodes in the rest of the case, if you don't have them already.

I agree with Budfred, I would shy away from the Aspire unless I knew what the voltage rails are like. I'm too lazy to go have a look, but you should see if you can find some specs on the unit before purchasing.

[FreeLoader]

Thanks for the advice guys...

I could get a true 450 from allied for 42 bucks if i want to go that route..but honestly...looks are important too...especially since I can run this bad boy on a no-name brand 300...

http://www.aspireusa.net/frame.htm

thats the manufacturers webpage on it...maybe that has what you're lookin for...I'm not really sure to be honest.

Seriously though, with 3 fans...no matter how bad it gets with heat added, it should stay cold enough not to cause any problems i would think...

at the same time, 70 bucks is damn cheap for such a "good" power supply.

btw, i have a blinking blue neon light and a 4 color fan on the side :)

[Budfred]

It isn't about cooling the thing, it is about having the power in the different legs to support your devices. I have seen 500watt supplies that can barely support a CPU and a couple of drives because their supposed power is on the wrong legs. Wattage doesn't really tell you much about a power supply...

Check out this info (http://firingsquad.gamers.com/guides/power_supply/default.asp) for detailed ideas about what to look for and this article (http://www6.tomshardware.com/howto/20021021/index.html) for some interesting tests and reviews....

[FreeLoader]

Welp, out of the pure stupidity that embodies me, it dropped another 5 bucks in price and I bought it.

64 bucks (shipping included) for a cool power supply, I hope I'm not getting screwed.

At least I can review it for you guys, right?

It should be here in about 5 days, let me know what you want me to look for to find out about the amps...

btw, I looked up the power supply, and I got no reviews, no where, nothin on how good OR bad it is...must be new.

[Budfred]

Power supplies generally don't get reviewed much, even though they are quite important. Did you look at the links I posted? The first one particularly will give you an idea of what to look for in the PS.

[FreeLoader]

Sorry, I read the second, but not the first.

I just remedied that.

According to the thing, I looked for the amps for the rails..and they're lookin pretty good to me.

The first batch of pics i sent has a pic of the side paper thing saying the ratings.

They're lookin pretty good to me(though its kinda blurred..)

+3.3v 36a
+5v 37a
+12v 35a

actually that's pretty damn good, even, please let me know if I'm totally wrong, because its actually lookin good at the moment.

[FreeLoader]

sry I never posted those pics....

<a href="http://www.newegg.com/app/Showimage.asp?image=17-148-008-01.JPG/17-148-008-03.JPG/17-148-008-04.JPG/17-148-008-02.JPG/17-148-008-06.JPG/17-148-008-05.JPG">Here ya go</a>

[Budfred]

If those are accurate, that should be pretty good and it may be a great price...:cool:

The other thing to notice when you get it is weight. Generally heavier is better when it comes to power supplies...

[FreeLoader]

shipping weight 4.5 pounds, and it says something about 8pcs per box

[FreeLoader]

Ok people's, I've had the P.S. for 3 days now.

It's definitly up to expectations, I'm seeing no problems.

It be niiiiceee...

Everything seems to perform slightly better then it did before, its really nice. Even the monitor is brighter...which I had been having some problems with a lil while back.

One thing, I made an attempt to oc in the bios...from 133 fsb to 164...didn't like that.

then i went to 160, didn't like that.

then i went to 155, same.

then i went to 150, same.

then i went straight down to 140, and it held.

Question...do you think its WORTH ocing to 140? i mean its 7 mhz...not exactly something to jump around about, and it lowers the life of the cpu in the process...

BTW, its at 133 right now...I wouldn't bother until I got some feedback.

Thx.

[FreeLoader]

P.S. I know I'm supposed to OC in the opposite order, but the bios naturally only goes up to 164, and I figured it wasn't huge jump in the first place, so I decided to be stupid...it won't happen again.

[BigBlue66]

About the only way you can overclock effectively by increasing the FSB is:

1) Own an unlocked processor

2) Own a motherboard that unlocks the processor automatically

3) Own a motherboard that locks the PCI/AGP bus to their original and rated speeds.

The best way to obtain a high FSB and have a stable system is to use a lower multiplier, which an unlocked or motherboard enabled unlocked processor, does for you.

If the processor is locked, raising the system FSB will increase the speed of the CPU along with raising the speeds of the PCI/AGP bus, or out of spec.

The fact that you can't raise the FSB past 140 without instability tells me that your processor is not unlocked, or it is and you don't know it, and you're not lowering the multiplier.

Running the FSB at 140 will get you a CPU speed increase of 7 Mhz x the default multiplier. It's just not worth it, because you're probably overclocking the PCI and AGP cards along with it.