How to salvage an electrically noisy WinPower PSU................

[LesD]

that was previously destined for the tip! 

Suffice to say I am in the process of building another machine, not that I really need one and she who knows best is convinced that I don't, has stated her disinterest in my hand-me-downs, which is superior to the one she uses but is happy enough for me to get on with the process, presumably as it keeps me out of trouble!

That said I want the Tagan PSU that I bought following the invaluable advice I received on this forum in my first ever thread on IDNEtters, which is here, in the new build (that is to be a Vista machine) but at the same time I wanted to keep this original machine (my XP Pro one) up and running at least for the period of the transition.

So before I extricated the Tagan PSU I modified the electrically noisy WinPower one by swapping its plain straight through input mains socket for a filtered one so that I could try it with a filter back in my XP Pro PC where it gave me so much grief earlier this year. I did intend to take before and after internal photographs but forgot the after ones. I did however buy two of the filtered input sockets and subsequently photographed the second one alongside the unfiltered one I took out. (See below)

I did this yesterday afternoon and I am pleased to say that with the modified WinPower PSU back in my XP Pro PC it will boot from cold, reboot and I have done this a number of times now at different times of the day and not once has it forced my ADSL line to drop out. Previously as my original thread tells it made the ADSL line drop virtually every time I switched the machine on! I am still using the Tagan screened mains lead between the 13 Amp wall socket and the PC but I doubt this a major influencing factor. Yesterday afternoon I took a look at my line noise margin and it was just as it has been during the day time with the Tagan PSU installed.

I have checked my Router Statistics again both this morning before work and again this evening and the WinPower PSU I added the filtered input mains socket to is working fine. At circa £4.50 filter, at the prices I have to pay, this filter has turned this unit from being a scrapper in my book into a perfectly usable power supply. I expect the cost at source to the manufacturer would be a few tens of pence and with it in service my PC is definitely running a couple of degrees C cooler than with the Tagan. Nothing overly significant in that just an observation.

A definite case of sparing the ha'peth of tar and spoiling the ship!   



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[merlin]

Les D so where do we get these filtered inputs , sounds interesting

[LesD]

Les D so where do we get these filtered inputs

Mine came from CPC but having just gone back to make sure the link was right I see the price has gone up noticeably in about three months! 

[Rik]

Nice to know, thanks, Les.

[LesD]

Nice to know, thanks, Les.

No problem Rik and for the sake of completeness here's a small update.

I found a main cable with an IEC (kettle) plug on one end and a continental two pin plug with the earth on a plate with a hole in on the other and printed along this cable among other things it said, "Shielded".

So I chopped the continental two pin plug off and fitted a proper British 13 Amp one but with a more appropriate 3 Amp fuse in it and making sure to connect the screen wire to the earth terminal along the the usual green/yellow one. This released my Screened/Shielded Tagan mains cable with the ferrite ring round it for use with the new build machine that may even get powered up tomorrow if things go to plan. I have the Tagan PSU installed in the new one and it is now equipped with its set of SATA power connectors instead of the VOLEX ones this older XP machine used.

That's another story because my reason for posting is that the XP machine that now has what used to be the electrically noisy WinPower PSU in it continues to work just fine and has had no adverse affects on my ADSL signal since I fitted the filter last weekend. This evening, having swapped out my Tagan mains cable for the lesser, albeit shielded, alternative cable all does still appear to be well. I have rebooted a couple of times and checked the router stats and so far so good. 

I am posting this information so that there is a record of what I perceive to be the success I have had by fitting an in-line mains filter to what was previously a pretty much unusable PSU from my perspective. This may provide information/ideas for anyone else who may find themselves with a similar issue in the future.

[Simon]

Thanks for the update, Les.