2 PSU's explode in 24 hours

[iasgatg]

Hardware
Asus Rampage II Extreme
Intel i7 920 (Not overclocked)
Radeon 6950 (Flashed to 6970)
3x2GB Corsair 1333MHz DDR3 RAM
3x SATA HDD's
First PSU -> Corsair TX650.
Second PSU -> Corsair GS700

I've had my hardware for about two years now (apart from the grahpics card, which I got on release). Everything has bene running fine without a hitch when last evening, I started to smell burning plastic and I grew concerned. I turned my PC off, opened it up and started blasting any dust with pressuzied air from all the obvious places. Being something of a computer enthusiast, my PC is relevatly clean. Still concerned, I leave my PC off for about half an hour before turning it back on.

About thirty minutes later, my PC turns off. There was no pop or flash, just a faint crackle and thne off. Power button does nothing. Next day I pop over to PC World (Best of a bad situation) and get the GS700. I plug that in and everything is working fine.

About 5 hours later, a pop, case lights up from what I assume is a capacitor epcploding and the PC turns off. (The GS700 has a clear underside, so you can see all the insides).

I have no real way of testing what hardware is killing my PSU's. I tested the RAM and the 6950, at least, I left htem idling on another PC for a couple of hours and nothing exploded. However I have no way of testing the CPU or motherboard.

Anyone have any suggestions as to what it could be and why?

Thanks.

 

[iam2thecrowe]

well since it is running for 5 hrs and not exploding right away i would thing there is no direct short. It may just be entirely bad luck. It could be the motherboard but is unlikely. You should also check that there is nothing shorting out on your case from other components and/or the back of the motherboard. Id say return the psu and get another one. take all your components out of the case and run them up on a bench with bare minimum setup. leave it running for a good 24 hrs then start adding whatever other components you have testing after adding each one before finally mounting it all back in the case. Thats about all you can do. - another thing, maybe there is something wrong with the electrical system in your house. maybe the mains voltage is going out of spec.

 

[dirtmountain]

I'd put a bet on "dirty power" entering your house. Do you use a quality surge suppressor?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&IsNodeId=1&Description=surge%20suppressor&bop=And&Order=RATING&PageSize=20

A somewhat dated article on surge suppressors.
http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/Anatomy-of-Surge-Suppressors/483

 

[lowjack989]

Get a line conditioner...dirtmountain hit it on the head

 

[gamerk316]

I would get a surge protector or a UPS, ASAP. Could be something as simple as your wall socket getting ready to burn out [happens after 20 years or so; the ones in my house are going one after the other right now ].

 

[lowjack989]

line conditioner is whats needed....most surge protector only protect against surge where as line conditioners keep voltage constant so you neither have a droop or surge in incoming power they also keep the waves right

 

[iasgatg]

Update

Firstly my PC was connected to a UPS both times.

Next it blew out my graphics card (which I'll get to later), along with either my motherboard and/or CPU.

I bought a new processor and motherboard, pluged my GFX card into them and it wont boot. Odd, I'd tested the graphics card last night and it seemed fine.

So I yank a graphics card out from the secondary computer and plug it in, still wont boot. Concerning.

I take my original graphics card and plug it into the second computer. It wont boot. I replug in its graphics card, still wont boot.

What have I learnt? Lightning inside your case = Everything is screwed, put everything in the bin and start over.

What has it cost me? Two new PSU's. A new graphics card. Two new processors and three new motherboards. Yay.

Now I just have to carefully explain things to manufacturies over the course of a couple of weeks and hope to recover some of the losses.

 

[geekapproved]

Yeah Corsair is really taking a nosedive in quality.

They come out with this crap CX series and now GS series.

I'm really dissapointed in them and I'm sticking with Antec for my recommendations.

 

[iam2thecrowe]

Update

Firstly my PC was connected to a UPS both times.

Next it blew out my graphics card (which I'll get to later), along with either my motherboard and/or CPU.

I bought a new processor and motherboard, pluged my GFX card into them and it wont boot. Odd, I'd tested the graphics card last night and it seemed fine.

So I yank a graphics card out from the secondary computer and plug it in, still wont boot. Concerning.

I take my original graphics card and plug it into the second computer. It wont boot. I replug in its graphics card, still wont boot.

What have I learnt? Lightning inside your case = Everything is screwed, put everything in the bin and start over.

What has it cost me? Two new PSU's. A new graphics card. Two new processors and three new motherboards. Yay.

Now I just have to carefully explain things to manufacturies over the course of a couple of weeks and hope to recover some of the losses.

you have extremely bad luck! Maybe there is something wrong with your UPS? This is really the first example I have seen when a high quality psu takes out other components.

 

[iasgatg]

If there is something wrong with the UPS, the sticker on the front says they owe me £20,000

 

[jsc]

Yeah Corsair is really taking a nosedive in quality.

They come out with this crap CX series and now GS series.

The original 400CX was a great PSU. I own three, two bought immediately after I heard they were going to be replaced by the 430CX. I mean, I read about the 430CX coming here. Left here, checked newegg. They were out. Found two on amazon.

I'd buy a 650TXV2. They are built by Seasonic.

It seems that some models have dropped in quality. Buy Seasonic.

 

[dirtmountain]

You blew my "dirty power" theory out of the water. If you pinpoint what caused the problem, if it was 2 faulty power supplies or whatever, please let us know.

 

[iasgatg]

Well, what I think happened was as follows. (Bare in mind, this is only reasoned guess work).

My PSU went bad. This caused damage to my graphics card and/or another piece of hardware. The new PSU was connected. There was a short somewhere that overloaded the new PSU, blowing out capacitors, doing further damage to all hardware.

The faulty graphics card was then connected to different motherboards. The damage then killed the CPU's in both systems.

 

[lowjack989]

Now that some serious domino effect there..sorry bout your luck

 

[HEXiT]

a decent psu should have enough protection not to damage the rest of the system if it goes. i hope you take this in the spirit its ment...

you get what you pay for.