[GTALUG] a quick question about power supplies?

[Karen Lewellen]

Hi,
Trying for context.


On Thu, 18 Jul 2024, Lennart Sorensen wrote:

> So for old spinning hard disks (not modern solid state drives), power
> consumption is usually in the 5 to 10 watts, but could be 15 watts for
> some of the older ones from 25 or 30 years ago.  Not sure which ones
h> you have in this machine.  But worst case call it 50 watts for 3 
drives.
>
> Pentium 3 processor at 1GHz is up to 35 watts.  A couple watts per stick
> of memory if I remember right and a bit for the chip set on the board.
>


This is most helpful thank you!

> It does not seem like that should overload most power supplies.  I think
> power supplies under 200 watt were pretty rare, although I am sure Dell
> would have tried to put a 180 or even 150 watt power supply in a machine
> to save a few dollars.
While I cannot be certain, I feel sure the boxed one I have is 300, perhaps 
higher.
Its odd what you say about memory, the machine I had to replace had a 
great deal more memory, then I believe is in this one, but this machine is 
far louder than any unit I have ever  owned.
At one point the computer was so warm that the time and date was changing 
every  2 minutes or so, jumping ahead.


  >
> If the fan has failed, that will definitely make the power supply
> unhappy and the heat could very wall make it less stable at managing
> the voltages too.
Thanks for that  extra wisdom as well.  Any serious danger with my cutting 
power as I have to due to the power button  factor?
It worries me slightly, at their best, those switches only kick in  with a 
power failure of some kind.

>
> Is the cd-rom internal or USB?
Its  internal, in fact the lose cables are floating around inside the case 
as well.
I do have a USB DVD / cd burner that would be a gift to have in place just 
now.  all of my statements, bank for example, come in an alternative 
format sent  on cd..and I cannot read them.


  You mentioned a DOS USB driver (looks neat,
> I had no idea someone had made that) so maybe the cd-rom was an external
> USB.
Yet another reason why I wish the driver was  properly installed. 
Panasonic created the DOS driver for  some of their own  equipment, with 
an engineer a few years back  finding it for me.
Some of the documentation is actually in Japanese.
Granted freedos has a couple of DOS USB drivers, I have a second one as 
well.
I am actually typing on a USB keyboard with that function turned on in the
bios, no driver required.
of! now that I think of it, are there USB to whatever keyboard adapters?
Cheers,
Karen




  >
> -- 
> Len Sorensen
>