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Oh, hi guys. I have a Corsair CX500M. It is itself an RMA replacement for a power supply that doesn't exist anymore (a Corsair HX500 or something) and thusly not in warranty anymore. It has a case of the coil whines when it's under even the slightest inkling of a load - and I've eliminated all the other sources I can eliminate; booted from onboard graphics with the GPU pulled, down to just my boot SSD plugged in to power, and then load down the CPU a little bit - generally, firing up a virtual machine and use it for email/internet/remote desktop is enough to get it going. Whine.

Is there a cure? My office is quiet enough most of the time that I hear it and it bugs me like nuts, and since I work from home that means I'm with it all day. So it's gotta go. Is the only solution replacing the power supply?

Related note: Haven't had to buy a power supply in a long time. I'm looking at a Seasonic S12II 520 as the replacement, and it has just the . Since Seasonic makes a lot of OEM PSUs that are very well loved, I figured I might as well go straight to the source. Is that a reasonable selection for $60? The review on johnnyguru is absolutely glowing, but that review is like 4 years old. Just want to make sure advances in PSU tech haven't gotten to where this is a middle-of-the-road selection. Modular version isn't much more, if it's the same quality I might jump on that.

Some more electronically minded people will have to weigh in, but as far as I know you can just find the offending component and hot glue it down.

Hot glue on the whiny coil once you locate it. BE CAREFUL!!!

That's kind of a scary thought. How do I know what's whining unless I run it with the cover off? How do I prevent myself from taking a jolt? Maybe this is over my head.

I'm gonna get myself killed all the way to death. Maybe replacing and not thinking twice about it is the better bet.

derFunkenstein wrote:

That's kind of a scary thought. How do I know what's whining unless I run it with the cover off?

Wooden stick, pencil, etc. Hold it against anything you think is buzzing. Not the fan.

derFunkenstein wrote:

How do I prevent myself from taking a jolt? Maybe this is over my head.

You need an erectrician for the best advice on this bit. But "not touching anything with your fingers" is usually a good rule of thumb.

morphine wrote:

You need an erectrician for the best advice on this bit. But "not touching anything with your fingers" is usually a good rule of thumb.

Stick with an unsharpened pencil and use the eraser end to poke around for the offending coil.

If you do stick a finger in, only one at a time and keep your feet off the floor. You're essentially a bird on a power line.

If you use a pencil watch out for the metal collar on the eraser end. Although you should be safe since the wood is non-conductive, it could still short out stuff if you touch the metal part to any live circuits. Really would be better to use something made entirely of plastic or wood. Basically, you're looking for a coil that causes the whine to change or stop when you press on it gently.

TBH if you've never worked around high voltages before I would advise against this particular little adventure...

My electronics friend says that it could be its loose and then hot glue might fix it. Or it could be the driver of the oscillator that is going. I forgot to ask him consequence if oscillator driver fails. Probably not good down the line.

I'm gonna get myself killed all the way to death. Maybe replacing and not thinking twice about it is the better bet.

TBH if you've never worked around high voltages before I would advise against this particular little adventure...

People have been killed opening up PSUs for repairs and spare parts. DON'T DO IT! Buy another PSU.

whm1974 wrote:

People have been killed opening up PSUs for repairs and spare parts. DON'T DO IT! Buy another PSU.

too easy... aren't you even a little bit adventurous?;)

just be carefull... it's not that hard to not get electrocuted

Usually the internet is up for whatever as long as it's entertaining, so I'm a bit alarmed that so many of you are advising against it. Since I'm only a little adventurous, I think I'll pass.

So what's everyone think of the S12II or M12II?

derFunkenstein wrote:

Usually the internet is up for whatever as long as it's entertaining, so I'm a bit alarmed that so many of you are advising against it. Since I'm only a little adventurous, I think I'll pass.

So what's everyone think of the S12II or M12II?

I'll take it off your hands...
I have a glue gun that uses 5/8" sticks.
Hot glue and ducktape in hand, I can fix anything!

I have a friend who's an electrician. I might give it to him to play with and then hang onto it as a spare.

In all honesty it's not that big of a deal as long as you make sure you use something completely non-conductive like plastic and practice caution when poking around inside the power supply. The slightest pressure on the misbehaving component will change it's tone so it should be pretty easy to figure out which one is doing it.

My main concern here is that since it whines only under load, he'll need to have it opened up *and* still connected to the system to find the source of the whine. Open PSU + open PC + wires dangling all over the place + poking around inside the PSU while everything is powered up just doesn't sound like a good idea for someone who hasn't opened up PSUs before.

I don't think I would do this myself unless I had a secondary system to use as a guinea pig!

Nothing a work bench and a c-clamp can't solve!

morphine wrote:

You need an erectrician for the best advice on this bit. But "not touching anything with your fingers" is usually a good rule of thumb.

Ok I just laughed my ass off at this!

just brew it! wrote:

My main concern here is that since it whines only under load, he'll need to have it opened up *and* still connected to the system to find the source of the whine. Open PSU + open PC + wires dangling all over the place + poking around inside the PSU while everything is powered up just doesn't sound like a good idea for someone who hasn't opened up PSUs before.

I don't think I would do this myself unless I had a secondary system to use as a guinea pig!

Yah, this is what's bugging me, too. At first I thought "oh no big deal I'll just open it up and hot glue this...this...which part is it again?"

I suppose you could just open it up and put some hot glue on anything that looks like a coil...

derFunkenstein wrote:

Yah, this is what's bugging me, too. At first I thought "oh no big deal I'll just open it up and hot glue this...this...which part is it again?"

Whereas I work in my home's circuit breaker panel with it live.

I'm just going to recommend a replacement.

southrncomfortjm wrote:

I'm just going to recommend a replacement.

so does anybody have an opinion on the Seasonic S12II or M12II? The prices seem right, and as I mentioned the johnnyguru review is glowing, but it's 4+ years old.

See if you can someone who reviewed that model online and posted pictures of the innards. Link it here and let some of us point out the coils that need to be hot glued.

Captain Ned wrote:

derFunkenstein wrote:

Yah, this is what's bugging me, too. At first I thought "oh no big deal I'll just open it up and hot glue this...this...which part is it again?"

Whereas I work in my home's circuit breaker panel with it live.

I heard that if you get zapped enough times, you build up immunity.

Captain Ned wrote:

derFunkenstein wrote:

Yah, this is what's bugging me, too. At first I thought "oh no big deal I'll just open it up and hot glue this...this...which part is it again?"

Whereas I work in my home's circuit breaker panel with it live.

Yeah, I've done that a couple of times too. But only to replace a single breaker that was making buzzing noises, nothing more involved than that. I should probably just redo the whole panel at this point, or I'll be replacing breakers one at a time for the foreseeable future as they act up.

derFunkenstein wrote:

southrncomfortjm wrote:

I'm just going to recommend a replacement.

so does anybody have an opinion on the Seasonic S12II or M12II? The prices seem right, and as I mentioned the johnnyguru review is glowing, but it's 4+ years old.

I haven't worked with either of those models extensively, but in my experience it's really hard to go wrong with a Seasonic PSU.

divide_by_zero wrote:

derFunkenstein wrote:

southrncomfortjm wrote:

I'm just going to recommend a replacement.

so does anybody have an opinion on the Seasonic S12II or M12II? The prices seem right, and as I mentioned the johnnyguru review is glowing, but it's 4+ years old.

I haven't worked with either of those models extensively, but in my experience it's really hard to go wrong with a Seasonic PSU.

My old desktop had a 520W S12II. Very quiet and cool running, although an i5 750 and 550ti wasn't exactly pushing it to the limit. One of these days I'll do something with it - it's in the closet at my parents' house right now.

Good enough for me. Just ordered an S12II 620W (I figure for $12 it's good to be prepared for the future, plus my system is kinda beefy with a 3570K at 4.5GHz and a GTX 970). Thanks guys.

morphine wrote:

Captain Ned wrote:

derFunkenstein wrote:

Yah, this is what's bugging me, too. At first I thought "oh no big deal I'll just open it up and hot glue this...this...which part is it again?"

Whereas I work in my home's circuit breaker panel with it live.

I heard that if you get zapped enough times, you build up immunity.

So you're saying all those times as a kid I shuffled my stockinged feet on the carpet and got shocked, I was practicing a kind of homeopathy?

UberGerbil wrote:

So you're saying all those times as a kid I shuffled my stockinged feet on the carpet and got shocked, I was practicing a kind of homeopathy?

Yes, and according to homeopathy, even those small amounts of current will give you immunity against larger ones