Hello, I'm Konrad.

[Ampera]

Hello I am Konrad (TwoOfFive)


I am a Thirteen year old engineering and computer enthusiast. I love the EEVBlog videos, so I decided to join the forum.
I am not that experienced in electronics, and most of what I know is from the EEVBlog and my dad, but I still have a large
interest in technology and I have designed and built a few projects.

A few things I have going on (as in if I'm bored one day I work on them)

A sonic networking device, although this is only in the conceptual stages.

A handheld games console based off the raspberry Pi. (75% sourced and designed I have made  the most progress on this one)

A network streaming service for videos and such (My dad asked for it)

A network controlled thermostat based off the raspberry Pi (My dad asked for this one too)

And lastly I am gathering every episode and movie of Star Trek and putting it on a 2TB Hard Drive.

I also love video games (Skyrim, Half Life series, Anything from valve really.)

Hi!

[Yago]

Welcome to EEVBlog.
Projects are a great way to learn and you get the satisfaction of what you made being useful too.

Valve have made some of the best games I have played, they had me at the Doom reboot, spooky games hit the world with that title.
Never played Skyrim, my son has... but I have still to play BioShock so that qualifies me as a luddite.

Star Trek... nothing with ever beat ole Tiberius himself!
Must admit to liking the JJ Abrahms films, but all that politically-correct faf of TNG was not for me.
Play the music and do the judo dance.. da da dahh dahh dahh da da dahh

[lutkeveld]

Welcome Konrad, you're making me feel old ;p. Good job on starting so early, wish you all the luck with your projects 

[Ampera]

Valve made a doom reboot? Are you referring to half life, or is there one I never heard of.

[elgonzo]

I hope there is still some place on your 2TB HDD for Star Wreck 
Oh, and... Welcome!

[elgonzo]

Valve made a doom reboot? Are you referring to half life, or is there one I never heard of.

Half Life 3 confirmed!

[Yago]

Doom 3 was Valve wasn't it?

I call it reboot, I started with Doom on a 386!
Then Doom2, which is pretty much the same story as Doom3.
So I looked at Doom3 as a reboot...my age addled mind though

[Phaedrus]

Nah, Doom 3 was still made by iD software and published by Activision. Valve hasn't had anything to do with Doom, but the goldsrc engine (predecessor to the modern Source engine) was based on the Quake engine.

[Yago]

Ahh, told you my brain was addled!

Cheers Phaedrus.

[Ampera]

Speaking of doom I am working on finding a way to completely mod doom to the point of it being a new game. Sorta like SRB2.

BTW Here are my computer specs for anyone interested (As in my primary gaming computer, I have eight I think.)

CPU: AMD A10 6800K Quad Core APU (8000 Series Radeon Graphics Intergrated)
RAM: 16 GB of DDR3 GIEL memory.
GPU: EVGA GeForce GTX 970 (4 GB GDDR5 1664 CUDA Cores)
Hard Drives: HGST Hitachi 7.2k 2TB Enterprise Grade HDD
Samsung 850 EVO 500GB Sata3 SSD
Seagate 500GB HDD (For backups)
PSU: Some 700 watt awesome one (4 12V Rails, enough connectors to electrocute a horse)
And I totally forgot the case  but it's awesome.

[Phaedrus]

Speaking of doom I am working on finding a way to completely mod doom to the point of it being a new game. Sorta like SRB2.

BTW Here are my computer specs for anyone interested (As in my primary gaming computer, I have eight I think.)

CPU: AMD A10 6800K Quad Core APU (8000 Series Radeon Graphics Intergrated)
RAM: 16 GB of DDR3 GIEL memory.
GPU: EVGA GeForce GTX 970 (4 GB GDDR5 1664 CUDA Cores)
Hard Drives: HGST Hitachi 7.2k 2TB Enterprise Grade HDD
Samsung 850 EVO 500GB Sata3 SSD
Seagate 500GB HDD (For backups)
PSU: Some 700 watt awesome one (4 12V Rails, enough connectors to electrocute a horse)
And I totally forgot the case  but it's awesome.

Nice rig man. PCMasterRace, etc. I actually work for Cooler Master, I'm the guy who tests and analyzes their PSUs to make sure they're safe, reliable, and perform well vs. the competition (which is why we've discontinued a lot of old units in the last two years and our new units are winning awards again). If you can give me the brand and model # of your PSU I can let you know its quality/performance and if you should be saving up for a new one or not. The PSU is the heart of your PC.

[lutkeveld]

I'm the guy who tests and analyzes their PSUs to make sure they're safe, reliable, and perform well vs. the competition

The real question here is: can they electrocute a horse?

[Phaedrus]

I'm the guy who tests and analyzes their PSUs to make sure they're safe, reliable, and perform well vs. the competition

The real question here is: can they electrocute a horse?

No, but they can jumpstart a car. 

[Yago]

Speaking of doom I am working on finding a way to completely mod doom to the point of it being a new game. Sorta like SRB2.

BTW Here are my computer specs for anyone interested (As in my primary gaming computer, I have eight I think.)

CPU: AMD A10 6800K Quad Core APU (8000 Series Radeon Graphics Intergrated)
RAM: 16 GB of DDR3 GIEL memory.
GPU: EVGA GeForce GTX 970 (4 GB GDDR5 1664 CUDA Cores)
Hard Drives: HGST Hitachi 7.2k 2TB Enterprise Grade HDD
Samsung 850 EVO 500GB Sata3 SSD
Seagate 500GB HDD (For backups)
PSU: Some 700 watt awesome one (4 12V Rails, enough connectors to electrocute a horse)
And I totally forgot the case  but it's awesome.

Nice rig man. PCMasterRace, etc. I actually work for Cooler Master, I'm the guy who tests and analyzes their PSUs to make sure they're safe, reliable, and perform well vs. the competition (which is why we've discontinued a lot of old units in the last two years and our new units are winning awards again). If you can give me the brand and model # of your PSU I can let you know its quality/performance and if you should be saving up for a new one or not. The PSU is the heart of your PC.

Nice PC indeed.

Good to know Phaedrus, and a kind offer too, thanks.
Will have a look at my PSU and post back tomorrow, can't remember now.
Hope it's not bad news!

Edit, it's an Antec 1200... *runs for cover*

[Phaedrus]

Which one? Antec's made a few 1200s. Most all of them are pretty decent. I ran an Antec High Current Pro 1200W for a while (it was a PVT sample I got after CES from a friend who worked in their marketing department).

Don't worry, this isn't a company account, I'm not going to shit on our competitors without fair reason, nor put lipstick on a pig re: our own products. Though if it's a CoolerMaster PSU vs. a roughly equivalent competitor's unit, don't fault me for picking a side.

[Yago]

Which one? Antec's made a few 1200s. Most all of them are pretty decent. I ran an Antec High Current Pro 1200W for a while (it was a PVT sample I got after CES from a friend who worked in their marketing department).

Don't worry, this isn't a company account, I'm not going to shit on our competitors without fair reason, nor put lipstick on a pig re: our own products. Though if it's a CoolerMaster PSU vs. a roughly equivalent competitor's unit, don't fault me for picking a side.

Not at all, thought I would have egg on my face!
Need to take the side of the PC to find out more, that would be tomorrow, it's getting late here in blighty.

I seem to recall it has red racing stripes! (ohh lordy, not a good sign:P)

[Phaedrus]

Ah, the red racing stripes is the True Power Quattro, or TPC-1200. They're pretty decent units, made by Enhance. Solid design, Japanese capacitors, reasonable performance. Efficiency is a bit lacking by modern standards and the fan is a bit noisy, but electrically you have nothing to worry about.

I will say, I did see one weird failure from a TPC-1200. While I was at EVGA we had a unit called the SR-2 1200W, which was literally just an Antec TPC-1200 with a few extra cables and the EVGA logo on the side. For whatever reason we sourced the unit from Antec, who sourced the unit from Enhance. Don't know why we didn't buy direct from the OEM, kind of dumb. Anyway, we had one of these units on the test bench with a load of 1A @3.3V with all other rails open circuit. Suddenly it went *BANG* and huge streamers of confetti shot out the back, and the whole lab smelled like death. When we opened it up the two bulk storage caps had both exploded.

Turns out that the optocoupler for the main feedback loop had randomly failed, which caused primary voltage to go >500V and blow up the 400V rated caps. It was a random failure, so not something you should worry about really, but it is an interesting story I like to tell. :p

[Yago]

Haha, sounds great, especially the party poppers

Cheers for the insight on my PSU, I was hoping it was(is) a keeper, had so many go pop over the years it get more than tedious.

[Ampera]

Well my PSU is brand new, and I picked it out specifically for my rig.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817148040

I like this little guy. Nice PSU.

[Ampera]

BTW anyone like my siggy?

[elgonzo]

Well my PSU is brand new, and I picked it out specifically for my rig.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817148040

I like this little guy. Nice PSU.

Oh my god. Do my eyes betray me, or does this PSU (made by YongYear, ahem) still feature a 110V/240V switch? I haven't seen such a thing on any quality PC PSU...
Really, just this switch alone makes me think that this PSU is an overpriced chinese cracker. I might be wrong, but that switch there is really jarring...

[Ampera]

I also have a few other rigs.

a pentium 4 based DELL Workstation I use for rom hacking and doom IWAD modding.

An AMD Pentium equivalent Geforce 2 Gaming rig for retro games.

An IMac G3 (Summer 2000 DV+ model, last ever made)

An IBM EServer 325 and 235 (235 with around 700 GB SCA-80 Hot Swap storage, other with IDE    )

[Phaedrus]

Well my PSU is brand new, and I picked it out specifically for my rig.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817148040

I like this little guy. Nice PSU.

I'm sorry to have to say it, but it kind of isn't. It's a decade-old design from YoungYear, a not-particularly respected OEM. It's also been overrated. It may claim four +12V rails (probably false) of 16+16+14+14 amps, but if you do the math you'll find that comes out to 720W, more than the wattage on the label. And there's no combined wattage listed for these rails (as there should be, considering they share a transformer tap, inductor, and rectifier). Based on what I can see of the layout and heatsinks I'm going to guess that the actual +12V output is in the range of 40A, and actual useful power output in the range of 500-600W. Assuming that ripple stays in spec, which it probably won't. You can also expect efficiency in the 70-80% range at best.

I really hate to see young players fall for these overrated power supplies. It's a reprehensible scam, but the only people exposing it are reviewers, and there aren't very many of them. And the ones that are out there focus on reviewing high-end units these days, which nets them more page views/ad revenue.

[Ampera]

I picked it out right from newegg. And it works perfectly fine. I ran 8 drives 120 Watt processor, and a high end graphics card. It didn't even flinch.

And maybe it is 720 watts, and they labled it to be conservative.


No clue, but no ads, no propaganda, I even have use another one of these to build my grandfather's machine. It was cheap and decent, so I gave it a try. It's still ticking to this day. Even still I am sticking with it, there was nothing really else for that wattage. Everything is either 1000 watt or 500.

[Phaedrus]

Unfortunately that's the type of post hoc reasoning that allows these scam artists to stay in business. I spent three years as a PSU reviewer and consumer advocate before entering the PSU industry in 2012. Predatory companies like Apevia, and the shit products that they sell, are just the sort of thing I got into this business to fight against. I can assure you, your PSU is not conservatively rated. And it works fine for now because that's what these PSUs are designed to do: work for now. They typically die explosively shortly after leaving warranty, or just slowly develop erratic behavior and fizzle out. And in the meantime the out-of-spec ripple and piss-poor surge protection are causing cumulative damage to your PC components. It's the computer part equivalent of the white van speaker scam, only a bare couple notches above non-functional, so they can get it on Newegg.

This isn't just me talking. Ask around on EEVBlog, or on JonnyGURU or Overclock.net

Here's a review of another Apevia power supply:
http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/Apevia-Turbolink-ATX-TL450W-BK-Power-Supply-Review/1212/9

I have half a mind to buy one of these to run through our load test, and post the results on the forums. It's a conflict of interest though, since we're technically competitors.

[Ampera]

 Even still. This is what I have. I have no money to get a new one. So until it craps out I got no choice

[elgonzo]

Even still. This is what I have. I have no money to get a new one. So until it craps out I got no choice

Think about it. If your cracker blows up and takes other components such as CPU, GPU, mobo, HDD with it into the grave, what will you do? If that happens, you will have to buy more than just a PSU to get a working PC again. Do you want to risk that?

Just a random pick (by no means a strong recommendation): A SeaSonic S12II 620 PSU goes for USD 65 at Newegg.
What would the cost be if you just replace the PSU now?
What would the cost be if you would need to replace a blown PSU and a fried hard disk? (let's cross fingers that the GTX970 remains unaffected)
Compare the numbers...

Also, look around in the interwebs. You won't find any reviews about your PSU. Nada, zilch. How can you have any kind of confidence in this thing?

And just for keeping the spirits high 
Here is a review about Apevia's Warlock series. While it is not the same series as your PSU, it shines a not-so-pretty light on Apevia. From page 2:

I must confess that after the first few reviews I did with my revised hot box, which uses convective and forced air heating from the SunMoon, I tweaked it just a bit so it wouldn't quite get as hot anymore. It didn't matter for the Warlock Power. Again, it did well up until test four. And then it failed test five. Repeatedly. [...]

And the strange thing was, every time the unit did this, I was able to shut down and restart the unit in test four and it would work perfectly until I hit test five again. I tried four times to get the unit to complete test five, and it failed every single time. At no time did the protection circuitry step in and shut the unit down, which is inexcusable for me. Especially since exhaust temps went past 72 degrees the moment test five started. The unit brags about having overtemp protection, but I'll be darned if I ever saw it work. At any rate, overtemp protection is the least of my worries now, what with test CL1 giving me new records of suck on the 3.3V and 5V readings. Forget about overtemp, where's the overcurrent protection in all this?

Seriously, get yourself a decent PSU. 60..70 dollars should not break the bank. After all, you have proven to have enough financial prowess by buying a GTX 970, ehh

[Ampera]

I can't. No money. No means to get any. Not enough for anything better then what I got. I can't replace it, and I can't do anything about it.

I am sticking with it even still. I have trust in this power supply, and I have used it before with great results. I am so aware I could get a 'told you so' and 'in your face' about this, but I can't change it even still. Trust me if I could have bought a 1000 watt EVGA supply with modular connectors, and a diamond encrusted platinum aircraft carrier, I would, but I had 100 bucks at the time, and I needed a new PSU and a new case.

[elgonzo]

I can't. No money. No means to get any. Not enough for anything better then what I got. I can't replace it, and I can't do anything about it.

I am sticking with it even still. I have trust in this power supply, and I have used it before with great results. I am so aware I could get a 'told you so' and 'in your face' about this, but I can't change it even still. Trust me if I could have bought a 1000 watt EVGA supply with modular connectors, and a diamond encrusted platinum aircraft carrier, I would, but I had 100 bucks at the time, and I needed a new PSU and a new case.

Well, in that case i seriously suggest to remove the GTX970 from your PC. This should be the most expensive component (about 3x the value of the CPU or mobo, i guess). Keep regular backups on an external HDD (which you would do anyway, i guess).
This should (A) limit the possible (financial) damage in the worst case scenario while allowing you to work with that machine, and (B) reduce the load for the PSU and therefore keep the system safer. Yepp, sorry, no games except Minesweeper and Spider Solitaire.

Nobody is asking you to shell out 100 bucks. Decent models you can get for about USD 60...70 (Even with overclocking in mind, a decent 600W PSU should do.). It should be possible to save that kind of money for a proper PSU in a reasonable time frame.
If you eventually saved enough money to get a decent PSU, the GTX970 can be put back into the system.

In a PC there is only one component that has the potential to kill most, if not all other components in the system. It's the PSU.
If a CPU fails, only the CPU fails. If a HDD fails, only the HDD fails. If the GPU fails, only the GPU fails.
But if the PSU fails, other thing can fail as well.

Anyway, in the end it is your decision...

[Ampera]

I will keep note of strange events and act accordingly. Removal of the 970 isn't possible. It's the most expensive, but most important part of the whole rig and several things depend on it. the 8000 graphics aren't enough, and don't have the ability to work. As I said I have faith and trust in the PSU. I know it works fine despide Apevia being a bad company. I have had these before in other rigs and they worked perfectly fine.

Thanks for your suggestions, but they are impossible for me to do. Replacing or removing is out of the question. It's like removing the alternator and steering wheel from your day to day car. It just can't be done.

I have done tests on it, and everything checked out fine. The caps are good, and everything is proper. And if it does fail, I'll sent it in for a Mailbag, so maybe Dave (I hope that's his name) can check it out.

Also if this does fail I TECHNICALLY have a replacement PSU. The reason I say technically is because it's lower wattage, only has 4 molex and 4 sata (no video connectors) and only 2 rails. Barely enough to do anything with.

Meanwhile, hello!