HELP! Corsair Ax1500i Failure (and small explosion)

Associate
Joined
21 Mar 2009
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A few years ago I built a gaming PC based around:

Lian-Li V2120 HPTX Tower
Corsair AX1500i Digital
Asus Rampage IV Black Edition
Intel Core i7 4930K Ivybridge-E

AquaComputer Cuplex Kryos XT
Corsair Vengeance Pro Red 32GB Quad Channel
3 x EVGA NVIDIA GeForce GTX Titan Black 6GB Hydro Copper
AquaComputer Aquaero 6XT
Koolance RP-452X2 Dual 5.25 inch Bay Reservoir Revision 2.0
2 x AquaComputer D5 Pump with USB & Aquabus Interface
4 x Koolance ENC-360 (3 x 120mm) Radiator Enclosure
2 x Koolance HX-360XC (3 x 120mm) Radiator
9 x Corsair SP120 High Static Pressure​

For the past 6 months I have had intermittent problems during boot-up, with the PC failing to complete even the early stages of the BIOS process before switching itself off. After many weekends checking every MB slot and cable connection, swapping out cables such as the main 24 pin ATX, and testing various components on a separate test rig, I believe the problem must be down to the MB or PSU.

The AX1500i’s self test either lights green after pressing the ‘test’ button or sometimes fails to light at all. Perhaps more interestingly, it fails test using two different types of PSU tester (ThermalTake Dr Power II and a unit branded YBLNTEK which looks much like a Lindy unit from Amazon) for its ‘Power Good’ signal timing, which consistently exceeds 500Ms, but the PSU self-test LED shows green during power-up?

Unfortunately, I am disabled (due to a spine injury) and worsening mobility and manual dexterity now means that PC building and testing takes me 10-15 times longer than before my accident (I am not exaggerating) and my Wife is most unhappy that the kitchen table has been my ‘work bench’ for many weeks with seemingly little progress.

In the interim, I have been using my slightly older Water-cooled PC which has a similar spec MB, CPU, memory, etc, but uses a pair of water-cooled Asus AMD Radeon HD7990-6GD5. However, the Corsair AX1500i fitted to this PC ‘exploded’ last week 5 minutes after switch-on! There is no evidence of any coolant leakage (I also have Koolance leakage detection units fitted) or external MB/component shorting, just a very loud bang and lots of smoke venting from the PSU and a blown 13Amp fuse on the surge protected Belkin distribution socket..

I have not started investigating this problem fully yet as this PC is housed in a very large Supermicro SC801 case and is far too heavy to move downstairs (from my study) and working ‘on the floor’ is both painful and slow (I am also expecting the worse and suspect a new MB, CPU, Memory, etc. will be needed unless the PSU was able to contain its fault?

Any comments on the significance of a 'late' POWER GOOD signal with respect to a fairly modern MB, i.e. is an extra few hundred milli-seconds really a problem or is this a throw-back to earlier server demands?, or ideas would be most welcome............



Regards,

Martin
 
Last edited:
Soldato
Joined
7 May 2006
Posts
3,191
Location
Fort William
On the plus side the psu will still be under warranty I guess?

Very good chance that it will be just the psu that has died and not taken anything with it...they design them that way
 
Man of Honour
Joined
26 May 2012
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16,177
Take pictures of everything. If the psu has taken out other components, then occasionally corsair may reimburse the cost of the other dead components iirc
 
Soldato
Joined
6 Jun 2008
Posts
11,616
Location
Finland
Big special effects hint that it was mains voltage side which took inspiration from Michael Bay.
Low voltage output side isn't as good for creating movie effects.
So chances are above 50% that PC is okay.
 
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