fierarul wrote:Hello, […]
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Hello,
Perhaps it's a silly question but I've never been much of a hardware guy...
My 90s Cyrix PC has two problems:
1. the CPU fan is not spinning. If I manually help it it wobbles a bit then stops. So, I'm thinking of buying any 50mm fan I can find. I can get online 'Fractal Design Silent Series R3 50mm' which seems to be the right dimensions (50mm) and 12V. Of course, I would have to screw it to the existing CPU heatsink and it would hopefully fit.
Fractal Design makes good quality, quiet parts. If it fits, it's an excellent choice.
2. the power supply is so dusty I can't stand it. Would any modern power supply that has molex connectors do? I have this motherboard if it matters http://stason.org/TULARC/pc/motherboards/A/A- … m-ATC-1030.html and I'm thinking of just getting the cheapest PSU I can find. All the new PSUs seem to have a high wattage (500W) but I don't think it should matter.
Here you have two potential problems:
- this is a board with AT (M8+M9) power connector. Any new PSU will be ATX. That's a different standard, so requires an adapter cable.
- AT PSUs have a 'hard' power switch - the on/off switch directly interrupts the 230V power going into the PSU. ATX PSUs use a 'soft' power switch, which sends a 5V signal (from the +5VSB standby line) to the PSU to switch it on. In other words, you need a different switch and wiring to go with it if you use an ATX SPU.
For those reasons alone it might be better to look for a second-hand (or NOS) AT PSU - or just take apart the one you have now (after discharging it to avoid risk of shock) and clean out the dust and replace the noisy, worn-out fan with a new quiet one.
Anything else to keep in mind?
Don't (ever!) go for the cheapest PSU you can find. Low quality PSUs claim all kinds of specs but cannot deliver and are a danger to your components, both in terms of unstable voltages and risk of sudden failure. If you can't afford a new good quality PSU, go for a second hand good one, not a new crappy one. Ideally you want to look up reviews of the exact PSU model you are considering, but failing that there are two good rule-of-thumb ways to determine PSU quality:
1) brand name. Some brands almost always make competent to good stuff. Everyone has their favorites, but you can't go wrong with things like Seasonic. I personally like FSP, although not everyone does. You'll find that a lot of 'enthousiast' PSUs (i.e. Asus, Corsair, Thermaltake etc) are just rebranded Seasonic or FSP models. BeQuiet is also pretty decent at a good price and generally is fairly quiet too.
2) weight. A good PSU has good quality components and they are heavy. If you compare say a Seasonic PSU with given specs (say 350W) and a Q-Tec PSU claiming the exact same specs, you'll find the Seasonic weighs about three times as much. Now with Seasonic you know you have good PSU and with Q-Tec you know it's crap, but if you have an unknown brand/model, just lift it up. If it's really heavy for its weight, it's probably good. If it feels so light it could be filled with air it probably is so you know it's bad. Note: some cheap crap vendors have cottoned on to this and have actually put blocks of concrete into PSUs. If you don't know the brand name, look inside the PSU to see what's making it heavy. A good one is crammed with components and does not have any concrete blocks inside (duh). A bad one looks like it has very small components - and might have building materials that don't belong in a PSU.
But as I said, ATX in an AT system is not easy. I'd recommend trying to find a second-hand AT PSU first. And you really don't need more than 200W (hell, 120W is probably more than enough). Anything over that is plain inefficient.
One other discussion you sometimes see about old vs new PSUs is the amount of power drawn from the 5V vs the 12V lines. That is relevant with high-end (dual) P3 and Athlon systems, but completely beside the point with a So7 system, that draws so little power that any decent PSU can handle it.
