Found a replacement power supply (Corsair TX650M)

[Kevin Cozens]

On 13-02-13 05:41 PM, Lennart Sorensen wrote:
> I have had good luck only buying what hardwaresecrets.com has given an
> award in a review.
>
> Going by brand, series or anything else doesn't work since they don't
> make them themselves and different sizes in a given series can be
> totally different.

Buying something recommended, or given an award, by a site you feel you 
can trust is a good strategy. My research confirms that the name on the 
box seldom reflects who actually made the supply. I found a good web 
page that lists the names of manufacturers of various supplies. For 
future reference by others who may need a supply in the future, the URL is:

     http://whirlpool.net.au/wiki/psu_manufacturers

> About all you can be sure of is that if it has no name at all, it is a
> piece of junk. :)

Definitely true. A lot of the names on the supplies mean nothing to me 
as I don't have any first hand experience with those manufacturers. In 
the end I settled on the TX650M (modular version of the TX650). It meant 
paying a bit more than I wanted and a switch of manufacturer from 
Seasonic to Channel Well. I wasn't comfortable going with the CX600M 
after seeing how one CX600 died.

The supply arrived about three days ago. Modular was definitely the way 
to go as I wouldn't have had room in the mid-size tower box for the full 
set of cables that are typically found on higher wattage supplies. I 
didn't need any of the modular cables but I did use two peripheral to 
SATA adapters from the old supply.

It took me about between 1.5 and 2 hours to take out the old supply, 
give the box a thorough cleaning to remove dust and cobwebs, put in the 
new supply and run the wires and connect everything back up. I had to 
fight with the power connection for the top DVD, the last connection I 
had to make. Once that was sorted out, I closed up the box, crossed my 
fingers and hit the power switch. The machine started up right away. It 
all looks good so far. I may write up a more detailed set of comments 
and review for my website later. What I didn't think to do during all 
this was to take before, during, and after pictures of the whole process.
--
The Toronto Linux Users Group.      Meetings: http://gtalug.org/
TLUG requests: Linux topics, No HTML, wrap text below 80 columns
How to UNSUBSCRIBE: http://gtalug.org/wiki/Mailing_lists