7.4 crashes at initializing hardware(dsi) SOLVED!

[x9blade]

i now get this crash everytime i start pt's since upgrading to 7.4

[x9blade]

i have now gone on my 5th day of running with none of my usual problems. in case any have remembered, i've had problems since the first day i installed my HD cards, i have a tyan quad,original spec. ocz psu
i was never able to turn on my machine and open protools without a string of errors,reboots,freezes,blue screens,black screens,digital clock losing connection. once i got through this booting process,protools, would then run fine the rest of the day. in the last month my problems continually got worse and sometimes would take up to 3 hours just to get protools up and running.in the end i was getting stuck at the initializing hardware(dsi)even called digi tech a few times in the past for help but,we couldn't come up with anything

time to take drastic measures....with the help of matt p ,i purchased a new power supply,i was having feelings of power problems.installed it 5 days ago and my machine is running awesome. no errors reboots etc,etc this thing just rocks.

looks pretty certain that a faulty PSU was the cause of my problems


p.s. shan and matt, thanks for all of the help in this past few months

[Bob Nagy]

If possible, can you post the ratings of both your old and new power supplies ? The max current per voltage, and max total wattage, and the max wattage of +3 and +5 combined (this latter is different form the total max value).

It's possible that your old supply was not "bad", but just didn't have enough power for the full system. Knowing the above may help people in the future avoid purchasing a supply that's not big enough.

[x9blade]

actually thinking, we all used the same parts for the original tyan quad (for the most part) my buddy flowdenny from the duc has almost the identical computer with the same power supply.at one point he had HD cards in his machine and it ran fine with none of the problems that i had.
we were using the original spec ocz powerstream 520w psu.
after installing a pc power and cooling silencer 750w eps 12v psu, my problems went away
p.s. flowdenny's first power supply(ocz) that he recieved was faulty,he had to return for a new one

[Bob Nagy]

That 520W OCZ power supply seems to no longer be in production.
Looking at the OCZ website, I cannot find info on the combined max power to +3 and +5.

Looking at Newegg, there is a 500W OCZ. It's max power to +3 and +5 is 152W.
It also provides 30A of +3 and 30A of +5.
30A at +5 is 150W.
30A at +3.3 is 100W.
Thus, you cannot pull a full load on +3 and +5 at the same time. Doing so requires 250W, and this supply only can provide 152W.

There's also a 600W OCZ on Newegg.
36A at +3, 30A at +5, and 155W total on +3 and +5.
Again same limitation.

The PC Power and Cooling 750W supply has :
30A at +5, 24A at +3, and 170W max at +3 and +5 combined.
Note that this is less amperage at +3 than the 500W supply above. And the same at +5, nothing more.
In a supply of this type, you're getting a lot of +12 (this one has 60A), and no more (actually less) at +3 and +5. And the price is much higher ($169). This is double the price of a 500W supply. And if +3 and +5 are the concern, it's no better than the 500W supply. Just because it has more total watts, it's doesn't necessarily have more power where you may need it.

As I noted in the best components thread, I chose a supply by X-Clio for my quad system.
Stablepower 500W.
30A at +3, 30A at +5,and 210W combined on +3 and +5.
Still can't pull a full load on both +3 and +5, but a lot closer than the 152W or 155W max of the OCZ supplies, and even beats the 170W max of the "bigger" 750W supply, and at less than half the price. Newegg price, $70. Working for a Q6600 on an Asus MB with HD3.

My conclusions :
1) High wattage supplies are not the answer for systems that need lots of +3 and/or +5.
2) Combined wattage of +3 and +5 is important, and very few supplies deliver a lot in this area.
3) PT TDM cards (I think) need a decent amount of +3 and/or +5, and so do certain MB's.
4) High current at +12 is mostly for video cards, and not necessarily applicable to a PT system.