Dual separated power supply...

James Argo

James Argo

Fancy Rock N' Roll
One of my PC for experiment (not my main DAW) :

- PIII 677, 256SDRAM, ASUS mobo, one floppy disk.
- dual HDD 7200RPM 40 GB
- dual CD RW 24x12x48 & 48x24x48
- PCI modem,
- PCI Lan card
- SoundBlaster Live!
- AGP 32 nVidia N64 pro
But it has only 230Watt power supply. Sometime it wont detect one of the drive (HDD or CDRW) due to power insufficient. And durring operation, sometime the CD failure to read. Sometime it's okay if I pull off some of them and not using them.
So, I suspect lack of power supplied.

I have unused 200Watt power supply somewhere in my garage. Can I use it along with the one presents on my PC ? I will put :

PC's power supply : Mother board only.

External power supply : HDDs and CDRWs

The only dissadvantage of it was I must letting the side case opened for the external power supply cables, and put dual switch to turn 'em on. But I'm all okay with it :) Is there anybody has any experience doing this before ? Was it okay to have dual separated power supply ?

Thank you...

;)
Jaymz
 
jake-owa said:
I don't see why not. Wouldn't it be easier to just get a new 300 watt supply?
Click to expand...

Yeah I think so :) But why should I buy some if I can make a good use of what I already have :)

Havoc, thanks for the link, buddy :) That was excelent.
I decided to try it out, and so far, everything runs okay... Hope it won't cause any problem :)

;)
Jaymz
 
I had been looking at the same idea, I have a dual amd with a couple 10k scsi disks to feed. But I went the large psu road because with the case open the noise was a bit tooo high. It is not exactly noiseless even closed.
 
The only problem you will have to look into is how to turn the power supplies on and off at the same time... the power suppliy get's that signal from the Motherboard (through the power switch)... I know you can get computers with dual or even more power supplies, but they are specific built... but there should be some sort of way you could get it to work.

Saying all that.. I think you would just be better off getting another power supply... why add another component to break down ;-)... plus you don't want the old power supply to fry your motherboard if it doesn't work... trust me, when it happened to me I wasn't a 'happy chappy'.. working on my wedding song 2 weeks before my wedding!!!

Porter
 
I did exactly what you're describing while I was saving up for a new Enermax p.s. Works like a charm, but I only considered it to be a temporary solution.


Twist
 
jake-owa : You too :D

Havoc: yes, it's a bit noisy, but it's not my main DAW anyway :D so little noise will keep me awake :D

Porter: Yes, I have to need two switches. And I got them. To turn on the PC,

PSU HDD & CDR --> PSU Mobo

To turn it off ,

PSU Mobo --> PSU HDD & CDR.

twist : I agree with that :) I tend to get new one latter along with brand new case :) So, it's just temporary solution.

;)
Jaymz
 
No, you do not need 2 switches if you use ATX supplies !! Read the link I posted earlier carefuly. If you wire the psu's together, then 1 power switch connected to the mobo as standard will do the work.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top