Seasonic X-400 Compatibility Issues?

[zds]

Hello,

I bought a brand new Seasonic X-400 few days ago for our home server but I'm having problems getting it work with the motherboard on the system. The motherboard used in the system is ASRock A780LM, that has been running fine on that system for more than a year now.

I cross-tested with other PSUs and motherboards and found that just this combination fails. The PSU works with the other two AM2 motherboards I tested (Asus M2A-VM and Asus M2A78-EM) and the motherboard in question works with other PSUs I tested (SeaSonic S12 II SS-330GB 330W, Nexus NX-4000 and age-old Antec TruePower 330W).

So, the question is: do I have a bad unit and should try to swap it for another one, or is this a feature of the whole series?

It will be PITA to get the retailer to swap the unit, because it works with *most* motherboards...

[quest_for_silence]

So, the question is: do I have a bad unit and should try to swap it for another one, or is this a feature of the whole series

AFAIK it should work flawlessly (even if it's not directly related, personally I've tested a X750 on a 785G and a 790GX withous any issue), there's not apparent reason that PSU shouldn't work with that 780G board.

At anyway, even your ASRock might be broken, so it's difficult to troubleshoot this issue: you may try to give back your unit, saying it doesn't light up your boards (but I wouldn't mention that it works with other boards); on the other hand, AFAIK it's not certain that - after a check - they may not return to you the very same unit.

Eventually, IME usually in such a case it's a board fault, and not a PSU one.

[zds]

Eventually, IME usually in such a case it's a board fault, and not a PSU one.

Yeah, especially considering the board cost 65€ and the PSU 157€ PSU, that would seem likely.. But the odd thing is that the same board works with three other PSUs, including one very cheap one and one from Seasonic itself.

[quest_for_silence]

But the odd thing is that the same board works with three other PSUs, including one very cheap one and one from Seasonic itself.

You may check the voltages of all the PSU on a same (working) motherboard (you may also use OCCT to stress all these PSUs on it), in order to assess if there's any apparent difference.

[ces]

RMA it and see if it just happens to be a bad PSU. If you can't determine any other cause, that's a good place to start. You don't need to go into detail about the motherboards it works with. It didn't work with your board. If it has incompatibilities, they should tell you, not vice versa.

[b_rubenstein]

So, the question is: do I have a bad unit and should try to swap it for another one, or is this a feature of the whole series?

I doubt any one can answer, because it's a Ouija Board question. There are voltage timing specifications at power up for PS's and MB's. So if one or both of your components are out, or on the edge, of specification the computer won't boot. Without doing extensive measurements of your parts people are just guessing.

This is not a new phenomenon with PS's and MB's, but it is less common than in the past.

[zds]

RMA it and see if it just happens to be a bad PSU. If you can't determine any other cause, that's a good place to start. You don't need to go into detail about the motherboards it works with. It didn't work with your board. If it has incompatibilities, they should tell you, not vice versa.

Thanks :-).

I did further testing and found that swapping motherboard helped only if I left hard drives (4 of them) and PCI network adapter unconnected; connecting all of those the other MB didn't post either. So with 3 motherboards one working, one not working and one almost working I decided it's the PSU that's to blame. Especially as the system that did not post at all works fine with three other PSUs.

So I RMAed it today, we'll see how it goes.