500w psu Cable and Case HOT

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sadbsod

Honorable
Jan 23, 2014
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I bought and installed a cheap 500w PSU (Lepa N500) into my Dell XPS 400. I'm not running anything majorly macho on Win XP Media SP3

1x Stock Motherboard Intel i945P with Pentium D 2.80Ghz
1x EVGA GeForce GTS 450 video card
1x 2TB Hard Disk 5400rpm?(Hitachi GST Deskstar 5K3000 HDS5C3020ALA632)
1x DVD rw drive (hl-dt-st dvd+-rw gsa-h21n)
1x 120mm cooling fan (case fan)
3x Sticks DDR2 RAM 266mhz, 3Gb total
4x USB peripherals (Kb, Mouse, Webcam, WiFi)

The power cord is very warm to the touch. The PSU casing is also hot, hotter than it should be IMO. Could something be wrong?

Additional info:
I have the computer + monitor + desk speakers + cell phone charger + Desk Lamp on the same surge protection strip. Also, the strip is itself connected to a 30 ft extension cord that I had to loop about 8 times to fit by my desk. The room it's in is usually 75-85 degrees. I haven't turned the computer off in a couple of days.
 
Solution
M
Hi

If you have tied the mains or extension cable into a loop it will heat up and in extreme case melt & catch fire
It depend on how small the loop is and how close the wires in the loop are.

Un coil the cable or have it shortened or replaced and see if it makes any difference

Extension cables which come on a cable real should have a thermal cut out to prevent damage when run coiled up.

The PSU is propably very low efficiency
500W requires about 2A in Europe (230V) and 4 A in US (115V) but that ignores heat generated by low efficiency cheap PSU.

You can buy devices which measure power consumed examples below...
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zink1701

zink1701

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Sep 14, 2012
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A lot of low cost power supply's run warm (the one you have is not a bad one but its not great either). They use cheaper components and the power wires are barely enough to carry the current that the PSU outputs so there is more resistance on the wire which generates more heat and wasted power. Make sure your cable management in your case is good and install a second case fan for better air flow, that should reduce temps in your machine.
 
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M

mbarnes86

Splendid
Sep 16, 2010
3,839
7
26,965
Hi

If you have tied the mains or extension cable into a loop it will heat up and in extreme case melt & catch fire
It depend on how small the loop is and how close the wires in the loop are.

Un coil the cable or have it shortened or replaced and see if it makes any difference

Extension cables which come on a cable real should have a thermal cut out to prevent damage when run coiled up.

The PSU is propably very low efficiency
500W requires about 2A in Europe (230V) and 4 A in US (115V) but that ignores heat generated by low efficiency cheap PSU.

You can buy devices which measure power consumed examples below

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=socket+power+meter&tag=googhydr-21&index=aps&hvadid=25850579216&hvpos=1t2&hvexid=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=14721452411662799836&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=b&hvdev=c&ref=pd_sl_llhj07ive_b

regards

Mike Barnes
 
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Solution
jb6684

jb6684

Distinguished
Feb 20, 2011
1,554
1
20,460
Might be obvious, but, check to see that the fan in the power supply is running 100% of the time.....

If the power supply is mount top of the case, it will run hotter as it gathers and exhausts heat from the rest of the components....

A power cable will run hot if the socket you plug it into is "loose" (when sockets are old, they wear and a loose contact has higher resistance and will therefore get Hotter...)

And, has been posted that's a very in efficient supply, so, it generates more heat than other supplies....
 
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