# Old PSU, worried about voltages.



## TheQiw (Jan 15, 2012)

So i have a PSU from 2007, its a 600w corsair one. Recently i've had some general problems with my pc and i've done a pretty major checkup, so i noticed that my voltages are way off from what they are supposed to be. I'm wondering how concerned i should be of this and what the dangers are, can it destroy my other hardware etc?

Voltages report as following :

EcVa (Expected Value)
AcVa (Actual Value

EcVa -- AcVa

+3,3v -- 3,36v
+5v -- 4,49v
+12v -- 12,22v
-12v -- (Fluctuates between -0,18v to -4,5v)
-5v -- 4,05v


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## gcavan (Aug 13, 2009)

First of all, where and how are you measuring these voltages? And under what conditions?
Hardware monitor applications such as HWMonitor and Speedfan, though accurate in many instances are not infallible and will often give anomalous readings. If you have not yet done so, confirm the levels with a multimeter.

That said, the +3.3V and +12V levels are well within allowed tolerance of the ATX specification (+/- 5%) The +5V level is at the lower limit of tolerance, so if accurate, may indicate a problem. ATX 2.0 spec (24 pin main connector) does not include -5 volt and -12 volt is seldom used today.


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## Tyree (May 10, 2009)

Any PSU that old is subject to problems. Check the Voltages in the Bios and see if they are the same as whatever you're using to check them now.
PC Specs?
Pre- Built Brand & Model Number
Custom Built- Brand & Model of Mobo-CPU-RAM-Graphics-PSU.


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## TheQiw (Jan 15, 2012)

@gcavan measured both with HWMonitor, SpeedFan, AMD Overdrive and in bios. Allthough voltages are somewhat different they are still pretty off from the "specs". Bios reports simmilar voltages to the ones i posted already.

Overdrive gives me :

Min Max Average
VIN0	1.22 1.22 1.216	
VIN1	1.50 1.50 1.504	
VIN2	3.36 3.36 3.360	
VIN3	4.93 4.93 4.933	
VIN4	12.29 12.29 12.288	
VIN5	-13.68 -13.50 -13.601	
VIN6	-5.10 -5.10 -5.100	
VIN7	4.05 4.05 4.050	

Unfortunatley i do not have access to a multimeter at this point. These voltages are idle voltages, i tested last night with voltages under load and they fluctuated a lot more. But without a multimeter i have no clue how accurate these readings are.

@Tyree

Yes voltages are about the same in bios.

Motherboard : 890FXA UD5 (Gigabyte)
Ram : Corsair 16 Gig ddr3 1333 mhz
CPU : AMD 1090T BE @ 4ghz
PSU : Corsair 600w (It's an old model, having a bit of trouble finding specs for it)


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## gcavan (Aug 13, 2009)

In the above:
VIN0 and VIN1 are most likely memory voltage and/or CPU Vcore.
Assuming VIN2, VIN3, and VIN4 correspond to +3.3V, +5V, and +12V respectively, all three are well within ATX2.0 specification. Under load, these will often 'droop' slightly, but as long as they stay within +/-5% of typical, they are fine.
I would ignore VIN 5, VIN6 and VIN7

For the most accurate voltage readings, access system BIOS >> PC Health (see Chapter 2 of your motherboard manual).

By the way, are you experiencing any unexplained issues such as application failures, driver errors, or random crashes?


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## Tyree (May 10, 2009)

TheQiw said:


> Recently i've had some general problems with my pc


Please describe those general problems. That may offer us some insight to assist you.


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## TheQiw (Jan 15, 2012)

So, i'm playing and streaming a lot of starcraft 2, and what happend is that almost overnight i went from having really good performance in the game to getting fps as low as 15 - 20 with the absolute lowest settings.


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## Tyree (May 10, 2009)

Brand & Model of the GPU?
Again, any 5 yr. old PSU is subject to problems.
Try removing two of the 4 RAM sticks and see if there is any improvement.


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## TheQiw (Jan 15, 2012)

MSI Radeon R6950 Twin Frozr III PE/OC 2GB

Nope no improvements.


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## TheQiw (Jan 15, 2012)

Oh and gcavan, i've had some system instability for a while, it's pretty random and i've not been able to recreate it. Like once every 2 months i get a random bluescreen, like bad pool header, or some driver issue.


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## Tyree (May 10, 2009)

I would still be concerned with the 5 yr. old 600W PSU using a GPU that should have 650W.


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## TheQiw (Jan 15, 2012)

Hmm i see, well i'll be investing in a new PSU by the looks of it, what wattage would you recomend? 850 or go up to 1k?


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## Tyree (May 10, 2009)

For your GPU, 650W is fine and 750W will cover about any GPU put there.


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