dell power supply problem

I was given a dell computer. the power supply died and mine wouldnt fit inside. so I took it apart. and now I need a new motherboard. Their motherboard is proprietary. dell is gay. I dont like them.

Ever since their P4's came out a few years ago, Dell has only used two types of power supply, the way weird one and the normal ATX one. Generally speaking, anything this new that looks normal is normal, but Dell also has their mounting hole cut small so the power connector has to be exactly in the original location. Also, no room for switches. Common solutions are to find a power supply that matches by using photos (newegg has pictures of everything), or cut the hole larger in the Dell case near the power plug.

Back in their PIII days Dell used an ATX power supply that was wired differently, so that installing a non-Dell replacement would cause the replacement to blow up. Nice of them, glad that's over now.

As for the other guy's question, Dell still uses proprietary motherboards, but usually with standard power supplies.

I think of late, like in the last year or two, most of Dell's power supplies are standard ATX. But as Crashman said, you do need to do some checking first to make sure. If a standard ATX will work, you still may have to modify the back of the Dell case. I've done this numerous times for customers with Dells, as Dell's power supplies would have to improve greatly just to be bad. A Dremel seems to work very well for me.