Help me to figure out my testing (Corsair RM850 X)

[Bill_Bright]

220V would make Americans respect the wall outlet more, lol.

110V still gets your attention. And just about every American home still has 220V outlets for their ovens and clothes dryers. I have an outlet in my garage put in for an arc welder. If I ever get an electric car, I'll be good to go!

 

[eidairaman1]

Yes is a schuko outlet for the power strip that have 6 schuko ports.

Unplug that port and set up your meter for VAC (~) and then touch the top and bottom earth tabs, you should not have voltage on them. Then take a lead and hold it on a earth tab and then touch the left hole with the other terminal and see if you have voltage there, if not then touch the right hole while keeping the other terminal on earth tab, if you have volts, move the earth terminal to left hole and keep the other terminal in right hole, you should have voltage. That's a polarity check.

110V still gets your attention. And just about every American home still has 220V outlets for their ovens and clothes dryers. I have an outlet in my garage put in for an arc welder. If I ever get an electric car, I'll be good to go!

It's 203-250VAC.

Ive melted leads by accidentally touching them together.

 

[Bill_Bright]

It's 203-250VAC.

And 110V is rarely exactly 110V. Or 115V or 117V.

 

[eidairaman1]

And 110V is rarely exactly 110V. Or 115V or 117V.

I know that, however if a plug is 240 then you have that +- percent.

Oh its 120VAC and 240 that are standard, on the main itself its 250. Ive replaced the main 250V breaker before lol

+- 5% is the range outside of that theres a problem

 

[Bill_Bright]

Still not understanding your point. If you have you a plug that is 120V, you still have that +- percent. In fact, the line voltage will vary several volts throughout the day. In summer months, power companies will even lower line voltages a few volts on hot days to [hopefully] prevent outages. Surges and spikes are always accompanied with sags (opposite of surges) and dips (opposite of spikes) and brownouts (long duration sags) are common too. It is rare to see any outlet, 110, 220, 440 or 880 that is exactly those voltages.

And I've wired entire homes. Installed whole facility UPS and whole facility backup diesel and natural gas generators. It all gets your attention if not paying attention.

 

[eidairaman1]

Still not understanding your point. If you have you a plug that is 120V, you still have that +- percent. In fact, the line voltage will vary several volts throughout the day. In summer months, power companies will even lower line voltages a few volts on hot days to [hopefully] prevent outages. Surges and spikes are always accompanied with sags (opposite of surges) and dips (opposite of spikes) and brownouts (long duration sags) are common too. It is rare to see any outlet, 110, 220, 440 or 880 that is exactly those voltages.

And I've wired entire homes. Installed whole facility UPS and whole facility backup diesel and natural gas generators. It all gets your attention if not paying attention.

True, i have a good basis of home wiring, its when we get into phasing that is different lol

 

[Grog6]

IIRC, the euro standards are either single phase like ours, or two legs of a three phase 220/380 setup.
There is no neutral, and you might not get a reading to ground.
Those clips at the top and bottom are ground, if there's a ground.

The single phase is setup so that if you touch either phase, even while standing barefoot on the ground, you don't get electrocuted; the secondary is isolated from ground.
You have to really screw up, and get both phases to kill yourself.
That's much safer than our setup.

I have no daily practical knowledge of this, however.
I worked with medical equipment and test equipment set up for European use, here in the US.
We used 110-220V isolation transformers for power.

 

[Bill_Bright]

its when we get into phasing that is different lol

Agreed!

The single phase is setup so that if you touch either phase, even while standing barefoot on the ground, you don't get electrocuted; the secondary is isolated from ground.

Of course this assumes everything is wired correctly and in proper repair. Probably not safe to make that assumption - especially with brand new wiring yet to be properly inspected, or in older facilities.

 

[Capitan Harlock]

Unplug that port and set up your meter for VAC (~) and then touch the top and bottom earth tabs, you should not have voltage on them. Then take a lead and hold it on a earth tab and then touch the left hole with the other terminal and see if you have voltage there, if not then touch the right hole while keeping the other terminal on earth tab, if you have volts, move the earth terminal to left hole and keep the other terminal in right hole, you should have voltage. That's a polarity check.



It's 203-250VAC.

Ive melted leads by accidentally touching them together.

The shuko outlet have like push buttons that don't allow current to go out if you don't push with a connector but i can use the power cord of the psu.
I get with the black on earth and the red on N 235v and if put the red on L i get 001 .
If i put the Black on N and red on L i get 235V .
I used a outlet tester too and i notice that if is faced correctly it gives me everything is fine but if i turn it upside down i get L/N Reverse .
Now is dark so tomorrow i'm gonna cut the power off the house and cheack if is normal that i get that reading on a schuko or not because i don't get the same on other outlets.
Just to double check i did it on the power strip too and i get the same result if the tester is upside down . Don't seems to be right .

As @Grog6 said , if you don't push in and if you touch the 2 clips as i got suggested i don't get anything .

 

[Grog6]

The phase reversal will not matter to the operation of the PSU; it's not connected internally in such a way that it matters.

It goes thru a bridge rectifier and charges the big cap the same way, regardless of which pin is phase.
If it didn't you'd hear a loud noise if it were backwards.

Seriously, if it mattered, the plug would only go in one way.

Our two pin plugs here have a fat blade for polarity, if it doesn't matter, they don't have the fat blade.

 

[Capitan Harlock]

The phase reversal will not matter to the operation of the PSU; it's not connected internally in such a way that it matters.

It goes thru a bridge rectifier and charges the big cap the same way, regardless of which pin is phase.
If it didn't you'd hear a loud noise if it were backwards.

Seriously, if it mattered, the plug would only go in one way.

Our two pin plugs here have a fat blade for polarity, if it doesn't matter, they don't have the fat blade.

I'm gonna check anyway the outlet just to be sure if maybe something is not right .

Corsair still didn't contact me and i can't even check because doesn't allow me to log in for check the ticket
They have messed up stuff when they did maintence.

 

[Grog6]

So, let's see if I got this right.
Italy is where you are.

They use a 2 or 3 pin inline plug, that's not a socket, but it has the long ends that trip a switch when inserted, and is effectively dead unless you put a plug in the outlet.
Is this correct?

You have a Korean type shuko socket type power strip plugged in, and are using it for your computer power.
Correct?

If these are correct, then the Italian power is a 220V power, with an earth ground for safety.
Typically, there's no connection to the earth ground to the phases; they "float with respect to ground".

The 220V should not have a polarity, it should work either way.
The ground is a safety, and is not "Neutral Bonded" as it is in the USA.

 

[Capitan Harlock]

So, let's see if I got this right.
Italy is where you are.

They use a 2 or 3 pin inline plug, that's not a socket, but it has the long ends that trip a switch when inserted, and is effectively dead unless you put a plug in the outlet.
Is this correct?

You have a Korean type shuko socket type power strip plugged in, and are using it for your computer power.
Correct?

If these are correct, then the Italian power is a 220V power, with an earth ground for safety.
Typically, there's no connection to the earth ground to the phases; they "float with respect to ground".

The 220V should not have a polarity, it should work either way.
The ground is a safety, and is not "Neutral Bonded" as it is in the USA.

Yes everything is right , what i get with the tester on the schuko only is that in one way i get everything all right .
If i use the tester upside down i get N/L reverse .
So i'm wondering if is all right or not because on the 1 outlet that you have shown i don't get any error if i plug in the tester in either ways.

 

[Grog6]

I wouldn't worry about it; IDK how it would know there's a reversal, really.

The italian plug goes in either way, so technically, it should show the opposite if you flip it over.

Regardless, there is no reason to worry about that polarity; It matters in the USA system, but not that one, due to the way our power is designed.

The monitor I repaired last night will work equally well with phase connected to either input wire, and it will work on 110-250V, with no changes.
The ground is connected to the chassis, as a safety; if a wire comes loose internally and touches the case, it's supposed to blow a fuse or turn off the outlet if it's GFI.
Almost everything globally is designed this way now; the internal switching power supply provides isolation from the AC power.

Short version (too late!): The input power is not related to your power supply problems.


Longer discussion on household power, for the curious.

All household power comes from an outdoor transformer, that drops power from a high voltage (7500V 60Hz here) to household voltage.

USA Household voltage is based on the old 1800s carbon filament light bulb voltage. It was 100VAC, 25Hz.
Transformers for 25Hz are huge, so we went to 60Hz early this century; the last 25Hz generators were at Niagara Falls, IDK if they're still there or not.
No, it's gone:
http://www.technology.niagarac.on.ca/people/mcsele/interest/rankine-generating-station/

So, modern 115VAC 60Hz is based on that. We have the Secondary transformer center-tapped, with the center tap connected to Earth Ground at the Meter box.
This gives two opposite 115V phases, or a 230V phase across both.
If you touch either phase wire while standing on the ground, you get 115V, and it can kill you.

European power is similar, but it's 220V 50Hz, and the transformer secondary is not center-tapped or grounded.
The advantage is you don't get shocked if you only get one wire.
And wires can be smaller, for higher powered stuff.

There's more complicated power for industrial stuff, but it's not in most houses; they won't run me 480 three phase to my house, even though it's on the pole outside, lol.
Lathes, Drill presses, Bandsaws, etc. that need 3 phase power are cheap on ebay.

 

[Capitan Harlock]

Welp , because i can't test how the psu behave when it does power up components i did a RMA ticket.
What makes me mad the most is that i got the problem because i turned off and on the power strip where the psu was connected while the pc wasn't powered on.

 

[Grog6]

I've had weird transient voltages make electronics act weird.

I've had a grounding problem in this house, where someone in the past put in three prong sockets, with no ground wire.
It made the PC in the Living room freak out occasionally, because it was the Ethernet hub that was providing grounding to my TV, PC, and all it was making things occasionally lock up.

Since the only ground was thru the ethernet port, weird stuff would happen, and I'd have to disconnect everything from the PC, and then reconnect it, and it would reboot and be fine until next time.
I found the wiring error, added a new wire, and haven't had the problem since.

If a chip gets in a weird state, only removing all power will let it reset; this also happens in spacecraft from cosmic rays, the only way to recover is to completely power down, and reboot.

 

[Capitan Harlock]

I've had weird transient voltages make electronics act weird.

I've had a grounding problem in this house, where someone in the past put in three prong sockets, with no ground wire.
It made the PC in the Living room freak out occasionally, because it was the Ethernet hub that was providing grounding to my TV, PC, and all it was making things occasionally lock up.

Since the only ground was thru the ethernet port, weird stuff would happen, and I'd have to disconnect everything from the PC, and then reconnect it, and it would reboot and be fine until next time.
I found the wiring error, added a new wire, and haven't had the problem since.

If a chip gets in a weird state, only removing all power will let it reset; this also happens in spacecraft from cosmic rays, the only way to recover is to completely power down, and reboot.

Well i indee taken the battery out of the motherboard but it didn't solve anything . I see it gets power because the led turn on (Asus p9x79) but the psu doesn't wanna switch on.
Something for sure got damaged and burned my cpu too. So if the psu is the cause only with RMA i will see.
When the other new motherboard arrive i'm use the PSU on this pc to use my main one.

 

[eidairaman1]

Powerstrips go bad too

 

[Capitan Harlock]

Powerstrips go bad too

Yeah that is true but the one i was using wasn't a cheap one . I got a brand new one for this other system recently because he wasn't getting power correctly.
Anyway all goes into the PSU that on my other pc didn't handle well the power off and on despite i got many times power surges and nothing happen.

 

[Capitan Harlock]

Update : I got contacted by Corsair for my RMA but with the week end in the way i don't know when i'm gonna get the details for shipping over the Psu and every component that got damaged as they asked.
While i wait the motherboard i ordered another PSU to use with the Xeon pc .
I got a Sharkoon WPM Gold Zero 650w 80+ Gold that should work very well from what i saw.
So when the motherboard arrive i'm gonna swap the Thermaltake into my main pc .
I bet is gonna take some time to get word back from Corsair after i will send over the psu.

 

[Capitan Harlock]

Update as 8 feb 2020 , i got contacted by Corsair and the psu was faulty . Their gonna send me a brand new psu same model and refund for the motherboard and cpu that got damaged .
Been so much time since the last update since they where slow with the holidays in the way.
Thanks to everyone for the advice and help .

 

[Bill_Bright]

I think it pretty pathetic it took Corsair 6 weeks to determine the PSU was faulty. Don't get me wrong - I am glad they finally did and are going to replace it. But still, surely they have a test bench with mock-ups already setup that would take even an apprentice technician in training 5 minutes to connect, test and see the PSU failed testing. Even if they had to send it back to Fremont, California from S. Korea by a slow boat to test it, that took way too long and IMO, reflects poorly on their customer service.

So are you going to have to wait another 6 weeks to get the replacements?

 

[eidairaman1]

I think it pretty pathetic it took Corsair 6 weeks to determine the PSU was faulty. Don't get me wrong - I am glad they finally did and are going to replace it. But still, surely they have a test bench with mock-ups already setup that would take even an apprentice technician in training 5 minutes to connect, test and see the PSU failed testing. Even if they had to send it back to Fremont, California from S. Korea by a slow boat to test it, that took way too long and IMO, reflects poorly on their customer service.

So are you going to have to wait another 6 weeks to get the replacements?

Interesting Enough jonnyguru works for them now

 

[Bill_Bright]

Yeah, I know. That's why he no longer does PSU reviews - it would be a clear conflict of interest and present, if nothing else, a clear "appearance" of bias.

That said, I don't know his duties there. They may have nothing to do with warranty repair turn-around times - especially when collateral damage occurred too.

 

[Capitan Harlock]

I don't know , hope is gonna be fast . It took so long because they didn't send me soon the prepaid delivery and other documents to send over the package. UPS took is time to pick it up but arrived there in 4 days from Italy.