CPU 4-pin Extension caught fire.

[042nrogera3]

Last night I took a look at a rendering demo as I like doing 3d modelling. Everything seemed to be running fine until I suddenly saw smoke flowing out of my top case fans. I took a look and found that my 4-pin CPU extension had melted. nothing else has any sign of damage and should be running ok.

What do you think could've caused this. Is it just a shoddy cable or could it be related to another component?

 

[FinneousPJ]

What is your PSU? It's the cable or the PSU.

 

[042nrogera3]

My Specs

.HD 6870 Sapphire non-reference
.Gigabyte GA-M68MT-S2P Rev 3.0
.4GB DDR3 Ram 1333mhz
.Phenom II 960t 3GHz Stock
.XFX Core Edition pro550W PSU

 

[FinneousPJ]

I see. The PSU should be a quality unit so I'm guessing the cable was bad. Hopefully nothing's damaged?

 

[crisan_tiberiu]

Usualy those cabels are near the CPU cooler. If you cpu temps are high then if the cable touches the cooler the insulation might get damaged. After that there might be a chance that a short circuit between the cables create a higher temp and get smokin. I think u ware lucky that nothing else was damaged.

 

[042nrogera3]

I'm going to wait till monday as I've got a M5A990X coming. Everything looks fine I just hope my psu isn't the cause of this.

It was right underneath a 200mm fan and was tucked in the back of my case away from anything hot.

 

[Brett928S2]

Hi

Change the cable AND change the PSU ...this is basic electrical safety....you dont know WHICH caused it so you change BOTH...unless you really want to risk your house burning down with everyone in it.... and I am NOT JOKING....

All the best Brett

 

[hairystuff]

I wouldn't be so fast to blame the PSU, as the rest of the PSU cables are probably fine, and had the output from the 4pin connector overvolted badly enough to burn the cable the motherboard and other peripherals that use the 12v output would have also been toast, the 4pin extension cable was probably shoddy and thats why it failed (I have seen similar burns when people slack off on car audio installs, they run out of gauge 4 or 2 of cable by a couple of feet and use gauge 10 or higher which causes a fire in their cars during heavy bass sessions).

 

[13thmonkey]

its not an over voltage problem, its an over current problem. as this is an extension cable you have to ask yourself what guage is the wire, is it the same guage as the rest of the psu cable, if it is a thinner cable then it will carry less current before it reaches a set temp. Current creates heat not volts. As you were doing a long render you were pulling lots of current for a long time, the heat in the cable would build up, as the heat builds up the resistance increases, causing more heat.

it's got me thinking that I have a similar cable, that I must go and check.

 

[042nrogera3]

I have a feeling it could be the wire. It's odd how the wire burned and not the connector. I've just rebuilt my pc to check the components and it all seems to be ok. The actual psu wire is fine it was just the extension piece.

My HAF smells really bad now though

 

[Rebel_Pete]

Last night I took a look at a rendering demo as I like doing 3d modelling. Everything seemed to be running fine until I suddenly saw smoke flowing out of my top case fans. I took a look and found that my 4-pin CPU extension had melted. nothing else has any sign of damage and should be running ok.

What do you think could've caused this. Is it just a shoddy cable or could it be related to another component?

http://i1215.photobucket.com/albums/cc517/042nrogera3/IMAG0007.jpg

Same exact thing happened to me a few days ago. Same 4 pin extension piece. Except it happened the instant I turned on my computer for the very first time. I think it has to do with the fact that it's from China. I got it cheap on Ebay. Ordered a new one from USA, gonna test it out when it gets here.

 

[Tigurius]

We received some wire spools from china on checking the resistance measurements we got readings from 20 ohms to 4800 ohms on different spools of supposedly the same rated wire at a given length.

 

[redtailed]

Mild short in the cable/connector and 44A from that single rail PSU flows through those wires!

 

[13thmonkey]

you all know that this thread is originally 1 year old?

 

[Rebel_Pete]

Well hopefully when I message the good people of Hong Kong, they'll do something about their mistake. Especially if my CPU is fried!

Yes it's old, but it is the only one I could find that describes my problem perfectly.

 

[13thmonkey]

thats fine, its more the others.