Any suggestions how one should connect these with the NeoHE 430

• 2 x Samsung SP2504C SATA
• BenQ DW1650, DVD-RW
• Antec TriCool fan

I have tried several combinations, but did not find any that do work. Setting TriCool on high, did not help.

Motherboard is MSI K8NGM2-FID with integrated graphics and Athlon 64 X2 3800+ and 2x1GB DDR 400MHz. System works fine when I add some junk devices and TriCool is set on low.

Antec support reply "Try installing the cables to the power supply far away from each other. The reason why it works when adding more components is because the NeoHE requires a minimum load of 1A on all +12V rails. And by adding more components it meets the minimum requirement. Please let me know if my suggestion works or not." to this NeoHE problem.

One solution could be to build a new 4-pin +12V connector: I need to find what pins from 4-pin +12V connector to connect to NeoHEs 6-pin socket or find some ATX power supply 4-pin molex connector to +12V 4-pin connector CPU power adapter. With that one could transfer +12V load to different rail.

Well on my P150, I only needed to fill up the 1 amp requirement for the first and second 12v rail(im using the first and third power port on the PSU). My third rail is left unused. I think you actually only need to fill up the rails that you are using.

Your computer should have no problems fullfilling the requirement for the 2nd rail. The 2nd rail is shared with the system power (motherboard, cpu, ram, and agp/pci slots.) This is especially true since you have a dualcore computer.

Therefore you would need none or very little components to plug into the 2nd rail (which is i think the third and fourth plug). I have a dvdrw, hitachi HD, and fan controller hooked up to this 2nd rail(third plug).

My first rail is filled up with only a geforce6800, so if you have a 6600gt or faster card that needs power, it will make 1 amp easy.

So my suggestion is try plugging everything into the 2nd rail, since it is the rail that requires the least ampage from your drives/fans. Your vidcard should have its own rail if it is the kind that requires power (used the first rail on the first plug).

At least they're no longer spouting the "this power supply is too advanced for your motherboard" line.

Is it not possible (although incovenient) to keep the junk devices connected all the time?

The NeoHE review assumed that split between the +12V rails is between sockets 2 and 3 and MB connector is in own +12V rail, as manual do say about PCI-E "NOTE: For Neo HE 500 and Neo HE 550 only. When using dual graphic card systems (i.e. SLI), we recommend that the PCI connectors be attached as follows: one PCI connector to one of the first two 6-pin sockets and the second PCI connector to one of the next three sockets to the right.".


I did notice that it's not needed to use 1st rail, so "minimum load of 1A on all +12V rails" is not true with my NeoHE. Maybe it is actually "minimum load of 1A on a +12V rail that has some load". I have been using sockets 3 to 5: 2 x Samsung SP2504C at the socket 3, BenQ DW1650 and TriCool at the socked 4, some junk dvd and floppy at the socket 5. Without the junk dvd and floppy at the socket 5, PC will not power on.

I hope someone can verify how +12V rails are really set.

Edit: I have no PCI-E or PCI display adapter, using the integrated GeForce 6150. Perhaps Antec can donate me a ASUS EN7800GT TOP Silent, I am sure that will give enough load to fix "minimum load of 1A on all +12V rails" bug.

Found this at the Overclockers online: "The modular panel is also labeled. The first 12V rail is on the 24-pin main power and 4-pin auxiliary power connectors. The other two 12V rails are on the modular panel we see in the above photo. The first two modular connections on the left are the third 12V rail and the last three are on the second 12V rail. It may actually be the first three and then the last two..." [Picture]
Looking those photos, it's possible that rails are actually set:


Time to tinker again!

Edit: No luck! 2xSP2504C, BenQ DW1650 and TriCool fan do not create enough load to allow NeoHE power on, I am pritty sure of that now. It seems that 2xSP2504C, floppy drive, old creative 16x CD (rated 0.5A/5V, 1.5A/12V I think that max) and TriCool do create enough load and PC powers on. Shame, I must have picked componets that really do use little power at the startup. I wish I had a clamp meter to make current measurements. Anyone with a clamp meter, NeoHE and perhaps MSI K8NGM2-FID, mind do me a favor: measure minimal +12V current that do allow NeoHE to power on.

Getting grazy. NeoHE worked fine with
Athlon 64 X2 3800+
MSI K8NGM2-FID
2 x 1GB DDR 400MHz
2 x Samsung SP2504C
BenQ DW1650

with a spare cd- and a floppydrive. The PC did power on with the TriCool fan set on low, tested that several times. Now after the PC was turned off for a day, it won't power on, unless I turn TriCool on high.

Come on man, dump that buggy pile of crud. Pick up a cheap Tagan or FSP and mod it with a quiet fan. You know it makes sense....

I second jaganath. If you dont wanna mod, pick up a nexus 4090.

True. It's a pitty, as NeoHE is a nice and quited PSU - when it behaves.

I'm a newcomer to building my own system from scratch and just spent most of the night trying to get it powered on. I read about the NE430 AFTER I ordered it from newegg. Now I'm trying to get my Abit KN8 SLi motherboard to power up and it won't. I get the lights on the motherboard to indicate it is getting power, but no fans start. Did I hit the problem in this thread or is it something else? Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

For my experience it's a miss or hit, to have a NeoHE that works OK. You been hit by "minimum 1A for +12V rail bug", don't take that 1A literally. What you can do is to add more load for PSU.

1. Antec Neo HE PSU Users Poll
2. Turn TriCool Fan on high speed. (kills quiet setup).
3. Add some more devices (DVD, CD or floppy drive, worked for me)
4. Add a display adapter that has a separate power connection (Most likelly easiest way to add plenty of load to +12V rails).
5. RMA and hope that next NeoHE works better or return it to the store and buy a Seasonic or some other PSU from the recommended PSU list.


Almost forgot: Welcome to the Silent PC Review.

I’m putting together a new computer and I think Antecs P150 case looks like the perfect case for it. Naturally I have reservations about the stability of the NeoHE 430, especially with the components I have at the moment:

* Asus A8N-VM CSM (Integrated graphics) with an AMD Athlon 64 3200+ and 2x512 MB Kingston ram
* 2x 250 GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.9 SATA II – Rated at 7.2 watts => 0,6 Amp each in idle mode.
* Nec DVD ND-4570 – Rated to draw 20 mAmp from the 12V line and 0,4 Amp from the 5V line in idle mode.
* Sony Floppy drive – Rated at... Who knows, but probably not that many mAmps.

The motherboard will probably draw more than 1 amp at all times from its 12V rail. The two SATA drives should manage to keep one more 12V rail open for business. The DVD and floppy probably won’t do much to add to the load on that 12V rail, but maybe every bit counts. So the big question is: Will the NeoHE 430 work with one 12V rail completely unused? Because there is no way I can draw one more amp from the PS with what I got.

Is there a load balancing issue as well? I’m thinking about the shutdowns when a lot of power is required for gaming or so, but still not more than the PS should be able to deliver. This probably won’t be an issue in the computer I’m building though.

That is so close to the configuration with what I do have the power on problem (Athlon 64 X2 3800+, MSI K8NGM2-FID, 2x1GB DDR 400MHz, 2xSamsung SP2504C and BenQ DW1650). I would hesitate to recommend you to try it. Anyhow it does not seem (at least with two NeoHE I have tried) to matter if there is one unused +12V rail or one rail with load below 1A if other +12V rails that are in use do have enough load... Unfortunately I don't have a clamp meter to find out what is the minimum load needed. Definetly it's someting else than "minimum load of 1A on all +12V rails" what Antec states. Most likely NeoHE will not power on with your configuration, regardless if there is unused rail or not. Can't wait to hear of you, if you find it working.

I was able to get my computer working last night. I powered the additional 12V connector on the motherboard as well as splitting the rails and using both connections to power the graphics card.

Computer:

Antec P180 case
Thermalright XP120
AMD 64 +3500
Antec HE 430
Seagate Barracuda 7200.9 ST3808110AS 80 GB
MITSUMI Black 1.44MB 3.5" Internal Floppy Drive
G.SKILL 1GB DDR 400
eVGA 256-P2-N386-AX Geforce 6800GS
3 case fans - Antec Tricools - using one as the CPU cooling fan
Generic CD-ROM drive

Now I just need to quiet the noisy graphics card

Thanks’...
I'm actually really hesitant about it myself, but the case looks like it will be sooo nice and quiet. I probably won't be able to keep myself from buying one.


I'm not quiet sure what you mean. All used +12V rails surely requires at least 1 amp!? As I understand it (from reading through posts in this forum), leaving the load on one +12V rail below 1 amp will make the PS fail or exhibit strange behaviors.

What I intend to try is to load up two +12V rails and make sure they are guaranteed to use more than 1 amp each... at all times! This may not be as simple as it sounds. Single components can probably use even less than the specified average idle current momentarily. From the sound of it in these forums, the NeoHE 430 seems sensitive to say the least. So these small changes may be enough to make it act strange if the current draw is on the limit already. (As should be the case if adding “dead equipment” actually helps. An unused CD probably doesn’t draw all that much current.)

Antec P150 is definetly a great case and NeoHE is really nice PSU, if it happens to work. Even with the dificulties I have had with NeoHE, I am still using with (with some junk devices to give enough load).



Sounds odd, but my experience is against that. After I did make sure that PC will power on (connected 2xSamsung SP2504C, BenQ DW1650, an old CD drive, a floppy drive and a TriCool Fan) using first two 6-pin slots left.

Then moved a floppy from second 6-pin slot trough all the rest three other 6-pin slots and PC still managed to power on. If I did not connect floppy, PC did not power on. Not sure if this can be repeated with any other NeoHE PSUs but this one that seems to have sort of power on problem, if not load enough at +12V rails. After that I did go trough all 6-pin slots and did find that there seems not to be any difference where to connect the load (like using 1st, 3rd, 5th 6-pin slots) if there is enough of it. Sorry if this is confusing and against what others have stated, this is just my experience.

After several emails going back and forth to Antec technical support they told me something that most of you probably already know. The extra 4 pin +12V power connector for the mother board takes power from different +12V rail than the main 24 pin connector. I’ve read posts that in hindsight said just that, but the penny didn’t drop until now.

So now I’m trying to find out how much power my socket 939 Athlon 64 3200+ will require in idle. Anybody who knows? I only found the maximum thermal power and it seems to be 67 watts, but is it reasonable to expect it to max out right at startup? Any possibility of delays before it starts drawing power, like with the hard drives?

Will the rest of the motherboard draw enough power from it’s +12V rail when the CPU is powered from another +12 rail?

AAAHHHHH... This drives me nuts... the NeoHE should really have a delay before it decides if enough power is drawn from the different rails. It would be even better if it didn’t require 1 full amp to guarantee consistent power on. I know MikeC tested it to actually be less than half of that for the individual PS(s) he’s got. (See http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewto ... ight=neohe) I just don’t like the game of wait and see. I’d prefer to know if the system setup should work right from the start. But I suppose I will know if my setup works soon enough. I ordered a P150 yesterday... it should arrive today. Will it be or what?!?!?

I read through this thread yet again and noticed something.

The picture notareal linked that shows the connections behind the modular panel of power outlets did not show which sockets is linked to which rail. But if you look at this picture [Picture2] you can se that +12V2 connects to the first 3 sockets and +12V3 connects to the two sockets closest to the MB connectors. My guess would be that the extra 4 pin power connector for the MB draws power from rail 3 because it only has two connectors for other components. I don’t know if this helps in any way, but it probably can’t hurt either.

My P150 case has arrived (A few days ago but I’ve been busy). The NeoHE430 actually powers my system on with the stock CPU cooler connected. But when I tried to disconnect the extremely noisy CPU fan before power on, the typical “split second power then no power” symptom occurred. So I guess I’m right at the lower limit of power consumption, at least on one rail. Turning the TriCool on high lets the system power on again. Is the CPU fan connector on the MB powered by the extra 4 pin 12V connector? That would be my only explanation as to why turning the TriCool on high would help when the CPU fan was disconnected (they would have to draw power from the same rail, rail 3 according to my guesses in my previous post). The good thing is that the PSU actually seems to work!

So what’s the secret you may ask?

....... In my case it seems to be that I only connected two cables to the PSU, one 2x SATA power cord and one regular 3x molex cord for DVD, TriCool fan and Floppy via adapter. I connected them to the two sockets closest to the MB connector, i.e. rail3 if my assumptions above are correct. That would leave rail2 completely unused and this seems to work. This is only preliminary results though. I’ve only just installed XP so I need to do some testing before I can conclude that the system is completely stable.

I desperately hope that an Arctic Cooling Freezer 64 pro will draw enough power to replace the stock CPU cooler and still get the system to power on. I’ll complete the installation of my system as soon as I can find the time.

By the way, my TriCool had a nasty clicking sound to it. I’ll have to replace it.

Here's a simple circuit I used to solve the power on problem of the NeoHE. Thanks to cmcquistion's Terminal Block controller and Falstad's Circuit Simulator.

Can't you ust put one resistor in there and fix everything? I'm no physics wiz so I really have no idea, but your circuit looks way too complex, honestly.

I'm in the process of building a system around the P150 myself. It's my very first build, I have never seen anybody build one before, and my background is in social sciences. I've been looking over this thread and have become somewhat worried at what will happen when I finish working on it tonight and try to turn it on.

Unfortunately, the "meatiest" post are plain greek to me. What does all this mean?

The PSU that comes with the P150 (Neo HE) has many problems, both in terms of compatibility with certain brands of motherboard, and with load-balancing (which even the cheapest generic PSU can do properly, but apparently Antec cannot).

It is unfortunate that you chose the P150 for your first build, becuase it is by no means assured that it will be a trouble-free build. In your position I would buy a Seasonic S12-430 power supply and throw the Neo HE in the bin. However, it may work fine with your components; there is no way of knowing except to build it and see if it works. Try not to worry too much; if anything does go wrong with the build, you know you can post on SPCR and there will be lots of people who will try to help resolve the problem.

If you can build a PC, this should be rather easy to make. I did build it using a terminal strip, no soldering needed. Just look how cmcquistion did build the terminal block controller.
Sure you can just add a resistor and live with a bit more ineffient "High-Efficiency" PSU.

I'm in the middle of writing a technical piece on the huge number of weird incompatibility problems between relatively new motherboards and relatively new high efficiency power supplies. It's certainly not limited to the NeoHE nor just Asus board. There are tons of affected combinations. But it won't be done for another day or two -- need last interviews with folks.

In the meanwhile, here are some tips:

1) Most of the problems are between high efficiency PSUs and fairly new motherboards, especially when only the integrated video is used.

2) Almost all high efficiency PSUs need 1A minimum on the 12V lines.

3) Many new motherboards deliberately incorporate a delay of up to a second before the CPU recevies power.

4) The combination of 2 & 3 means no boot.

5) Add a PCIe-vidcard that needs 6-pin AUX12V power, and in most cases, the problem will disappear. The graphics card draws its 12V power directly from the PSU, therefore exceeding the 1A minimum.

6) Adding hard drives does not always work, because they take time to spin up; by the time a drive is trying to pull the current from the 12V line, the PSU may already have got the signal to shutdown due to underload.

It's a crazy mix of stuff...

One way to get most misbehaving NeoHE PSUs to boot is to add a ~25 ohm 10~20W resistor across the yellow and a black terminal on any free 4-pin Molex output from the PSU. WARNING: Not responsible for shocks, shorts, or other damage. The resistor may get VERY hot. Don't do it unless you understand the risks AND how to do it!!

Once the system has booted, you can remove the resistor -- it adds about a 6W load to the 12V line (0.5A).

Uhhh...

No way to guarantee it. In general, this works.

Keep in mind that this phenomenon is not a result of non-compliance with the ATX12V spec. The spec calls for 1A min on each 12V line. The motherboard makers don't have any rule that demands they must have 1A current draw upon startup, either. So it's a kind of slip-between-the-cracks problem. I've seen it with many PSUs and many motherboards.

CORRECTION: re - non-compliance with the ATX12V spec
I am wrong about this. Intel's ATX12V v2.xx guide doesn't state that it is a requirement, it simply uses 1A as a typical minimum for the 12V lines in all the examples of PSU power distribution it outlines.

thanks for the replies.



sorry for my mis-expression, what I meant to ask was, what, in layman's terms, needs to be done. In other words, since it will be difficult for me to understand why it works, I might as well try to understand what makes it work (ie. a quick cooking recipe).

In any case, my NeoHE does not seem to present major problems. The s/n is 512*** and it has the "A3" label the antec rep in the other thread mentioned. System is A64 3200+ Venice, MSI K8NGM2-FID, 2*512 DDR400 Kingston ValueRam (CL3).

I am using two rails: on one, I've got the FDD + 2 HDD; on the other, case fan + DVDRW. Won't boot with fan on medium or low, though; the instructions that came with the P150 warned that this might happen. Perhaps adding another DVDRW (want a new and quieter one anyhow) will allow me to bring the fan down.

Haven't used it for very long amounts of time nor with varying levels of stress, so I'm not sure how reliable this info is. Will post in the NeoHE poll after I'm done with all the bios and xp tweaking and gone through a few stress tests.

Unfortunately (at least for me) it's not just a problem with the latest boards - my Neo HE 380 doesn't play nice with my Abit NF7 nForce2 based system. I'm RMAing it and getting a Seasonic S12 430 instead. It was OK at first, but reducing one of the fan voltages to 5v, removing a fan, removing any type of drive, or even changing the keyboard(!) is enough to stop the PC from starting. It's a shame because if it worked consistently it would be a great bit of kit - it's quiet, and the modular cabling is fantastic.