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Thread: Electrical Woes..or just going crazy?!

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    Junior Member Astrotoy7's Avatar
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    Default Electrical Woes..or just going crazy?!

    Hello. I build htpc systems in my spare time and have done so for a few years now. The rigs I build are from ground up or xpc barebones, so I can be satisfied there is decent quality kit under the hood

    Ive had a query about one rig recently, which was built about 18mo ago. I actually built this for a friend, and whilst initially suspecting the htpc itself, Im starting to think there may be something amiss at my friends house!

    symptom:
    1) pc wont stay on more than 5-10 mins, or continually restarts. Ie initially did this one room only, but was discovered to do this in any room/outlet in the house...

    so >> pc comes back to my place, gets put through paces. Memtest, HD tests, context specific tests, recording tv, encoding etc... all done for 48 hours straight >> no problem at all.

    pc goes back to friends house. Exactly the same problem. It either boots up for 5 mins, or just keeps restarting...

    so>> pc comes back to my place again. Threw every system and functional test I could.... simply no probs... it purrs like a kitten at my place. Temps are great too...

    My friend and I are stumped. Im leaning towards something at his house being not quite right. This is the *second pc* he's had played up similarly in recent months, and another bit of related equipment (ext hard drive) packed it in recently too, although replacing the HD enclosure fixed that.

    Where would be the best place to start looking or best person to call?? Is there anything specifically that could cause something like this. nb. other standard household appliances seem to be working OK.

    any suggestions greatly appreciated

    cheers
    astro
    Astro's Shuttle XPC Barebone Cohort!
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    just stabbing in the dark, but have u checked the voltage at the the outlet at your friends house. my guess is that its borderline too low and keeps crossing the line between too low and just enough. most appliances will handle significant voltage drops and household voltage does fluctuate a little normally, but if the house power is borderline then those standard fluctuations could be taking it above and below the line. Just a guess but worth a shot.

    Hope it helps a little

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    Senior Member cwispy's Avatar
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    I would check the mains voltage at his place to start with.
    What would you do if your server was stolen or failed beyond repair?
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    Quote Originally Posted by cwispy View Post
    I would check the mains voltage at his place to start with.
    Yeah get your hands on one of those flash meters that can record the voltage
    over 24 hours,that's where i would be starting
    When you do things right, people won't be sure that you have done anything at all

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    Senior Member BCNZ's Avatar
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    Definitely take a look at the mains. Years ago when I was servicing microwave ovens, I had a client call me to say her oven was really slow to heat food. Suspecting a tired magnetron, I armed myself with a replacement and headed out to the house.
    It was early evening and the light in the kitchen was on. I looked up at it and wondered why it looked so dim!
    I grabbed my meter and poked the probes into the wall socket.

    179 volts!

    Checked a few other sockets around the house - same results.

    Not bad considering it was supposed to be 230!

    I suggested to the customer that she call the power company.

    A quick check with a meter will show you the voltage and if you have a frequency function on your meter you can see that it is within spec.

    If your voltage seems normal then there's a chance there is a lot of noise on the line, or the voltage is sagging due to something in the area causing heavy loading or a faulty power transformer/connection supplying the area.

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    Senior Member Moof's Avatar
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    Try running it through a UPS.

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    Nah you are all wrong, call a preist for an exorcism.

    Yeah does sound like voltage games.

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    Quote Originally Posted by global88 View Post
    Nah you are all wrong, call a preist for an exorcism.
    guys here in new-car-sell it the same , we had heaps of philips sets go "bung" (new zealund accent) ages ago, they got us to put a data logger on the mains for a week.. it went from 190-275 all when they either switched off/on the arc furnaces here..

    i imagine it would be the same in the gong (wollogong)
    When I explained to the guy what avatar I wanted, that wasn't what I meant!

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    Senior Member BCNZ's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by iwacelect View Post
    we had heaps of philips sets go "bung" (new zealund accent)

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    Junior Member Astrotoy7's Avatar
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    thanks for the replies chaps. My friend apparently did have an electrician out who tested and foudn 240V at mains.... I told him the electrician was a lazy prick for taking his $160 and not being thorough to recommend >>

    *measuring changes when that pc is actually plugged in
    *suggesting/implementing a sustained monitoring trial... as mentioned above

    What's sad is that the poor chap paid great money for a great htpc/gaming rig that wont even work at his house... and these supposed professionals dont have the gumption to want to find out what is going wrong

    cheers
    astro
    Astro's Shuttle XPC Barebone Cohort!
    *Proud former AMCC Defector*


    Historia est vitae magistra

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    Senior Member BCNZ's Avatar
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    There are plenty of people who will come and take your money, but it's harder to find someone who actually knows what they are doing and will assist you to locate a problem.

    $160 is daylight theft to tell someone what their mains voltage is.

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    Junior Member Astrotoy7's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Studio1 View Post
    $160 is daylight theft to tell someone what their mains voltage is.
    absolutely. I think Im going to have to be present when the next mug comes in.

    if any one has any personal recommendations for someone in melbourne, I'd be quite pleased to forward their details If theyre good enough for you chaps, they must know what theyre doing...!

    mtfbwya
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    Junior Member eastlake's Avatar
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    The UPS idea may be a good solution, as it will not allow the fluctuations of the mains to reach the HTPC.
    Common sense isn't !!!

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    Junior Member Astrotoy7's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by eastlake View Post
    The UPS idea may be a good solution, as it will not allow the fluctuations of the mains to reach the HTPC.
    any particular type you'd recommend??

    cheers
    astro
    Astro's Shuttle XPC Barebone Cohort!
    *Proud former AMCC Defector*


    Historia est vitae magistra

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    there is plenty of ups around but unless u spend heaps you wont get 1 that will hold a pc up for any more than 15 min, much less 1 that has the wattage to support a gameing rig. the other thing is that if the power fluctuates that much and that often, the batteries wont last very long as they will be cycled too often. personally i have a 2200w ups with external batteries able to hold my server up for over 8 hours, but thats some serious gear, a bit of overkill for a game machine. what would have been a better idea is to instead of paying a sparkie $160 to measure your mains voltage once, spend $70 on a 1/2 decent multi meter. hook it up to the mains full time and when the pc fails, look at the voltage then. if its low then call the electricle supplier and tell them to fix the issue. it is an essential service and they must ensure you have it. you may want to check his neighbors and see if they experience the same problem. if so then the power company must fix it and if it isnt just your mates house then he wont get charged either. i cant believe how much the spakrie charged ya. i would have told him where to go

    in short, i would be looking at fixing the issue for free rather than spending money on a band aid solution like an UPS

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    There are some questions you can ask your friend about their problem.
    Are they blowing light bulbs during the night. This could be due to high voltage or using cheap 230V rated globes.
    Does the kettle or oven take longer to boil/heat up.?
    Are they noticing "dips" in their incandescent light bulbs?
    Is the problem just related to the PC?
    Is their maximum demand too high for their mains?

    The electrician should have gone through their switchboard and mains box to check ALL connections at the time of visit. As previously stated it could stem from the local supply authority. I used to be one of the operators that dealt with voltage complaints on behalf of our Supply Authority.

    Customers used to register complaints, and we would check the switchboard, mains box, overhead connections, Transformer and place a voltage/transient logger at the customer's premesis. This is an option your friend can register. Just make sure that you are not out of pocket.

    Their are numerous problems that can be associated with this dilemma. I would imagine that your local supply authority would be able to install a logger and pass on this information for piece of mind.

    It could be as simple as swapping you over to another phase.

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    Junior Member eastlake's Avatar
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    Astro,

    I couldn't recommend any particular brand, as it depends on the capacity you need and the dollars available. If it is just a matter of ironing out the lumpy mains then you can probably get away with a smaller UPS, if however the mains drops below the cutout voltage of the HTPC's power supply for longer periods, then you will need higher capacity. Do the math based on the PC's power consumption multiplied by the amount of time you want it to run without mains. This will give you a figure for the UPS capacity. Doing your homework may enable you to find a UPS that you could upgrade by adding more battery storage capacity at a later date if you need it.
    Common sense isn't !!!

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    Senior Member bss904's Avatar
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    I went through a similar problem about 3 years ago on behalf of one of my clients who had a ¾ million dollar medical machine that was being rendered unusable for a few hours at a time due to the ups shutting down and expiring its batteries, which in turn would not allow for any backup in the event of power outages during procedures.
    The first thing I did was to put a logging meter on site connected to laptop for a 24 hour period. I nailed the problem first go looking at the data logged. I found the supply had been hitting 262 volts. The supplied UPS’s specs showed it would shut down when the voltage hits 257 volts and then run on batteries until min battery voltage was reached (aprox 30 mins).
    I thought no problem, energy aust can come and rectify the over voltage problem. Wrong… it was still our problem according to EA.
    After investigation and further consultation with energy Australia, and viewing the Australian standards for supply voltage range (AS 60038 2000) the carriers supply voltage ranges are as follows:
    Upper limit 264 vac, Lower limit 216 vac, Nominal midrange is 240vac.
    This gives you the 10% allowable variation of 24vac up and down from the 240vac mid range voltage. What I measured 262 vac peak was 2vac under the allowable range so the problem is ours to solve. The UPS supplied with the machine shuts down at 257vac which means the supply voltage peaks 5vac over the UPS's upper threshold but 7vac under the allowable supply's upper limit.
    I solved the problem by installing a auto voltage regulator which sits between the wall socket and that the UPS plugs into.
    The regulator will hold the output to 240vac with a input supply voltage variation of 180 to 260 vac. Above 260 vac the output will increase at the same rate as the supply input voltage above 260 vac. So at 262 vac input it will output at 242 vac. We will still be 15 vac under the UPS's threshold for shutdown.
    All up it cost the client nearly 2k to solve this problem. A small amount compared to the cost of the machine and lost revenue and potential damage to the machine shutting down abruptly. The machine has not missed a single beat for nearly 3 years now.
    You will see that the EA were happy to buck pass, and the way I solved the problem was to purchase a reletively cheap logging meter and connect to my laptop. I hope this might be some help in solving your friends problem as possibly your machine is shutting down due to overvoltage.

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    In addition to the voltage checks already suggested, check for phase neutral reversal and carry out an earth loop impedance test. The installation may be running without an earth, or worse, a high impedance earth and nothing reboots a computer faster than neutral-earth spikes. Power diagnostics form a large part of my business activity and this sounds like earth issues or dirty power to me, so it is worth looking at.

    Cheers

    Billy

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    Junior Member Astrotoy7's Avatar
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    Thanks for all the responses chaps Very interesting reading. I'll pass it all on. The htpc I built has been proven to work flawlessly anywhere outside his house(my place and another 2 friends places), so Im thoroughly convinced its not the rig!

    Given all the info, I hope he makes the right decision and is a bit more diligent when next visited by a 'professional'

    astro
    Astro's Shuttle XPC Barebone Cohort!
    *Proud former AMCC Defector*


    Historia est vitae magistra

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