Group Buy for full ATX Linear PSU from Teradak

[Ben-M]

Ted: Jesus @ Sonore has a pico type audiophile ATX adapter on his site. It is to accompany their Plex PSs. I have no knowledge beyond that.

 

The audiophile Pico ATX DC-DC switcher they have on their site is the one that HD-Plex makes themselves. I mentioned it up in post#6.

 

I've heard people talk of it a few times, but unfortunately I've yet to read a review or anything by an actual owner. It looks interesting and given its specific amps I'm really considering picking one up, figuring out how to hack it, and using it to power my Synology DS-1513+. I've compared the specs of the 2 PSUs for rails and amps, and they're almost identical, but the DS-1513+ SMPS is made by Delta Electronics and is definitely going to be a dependable and high quality unit. Hmmm.

[_JL_]

Though you can do just what Hans posted about, I got the reply from Teradak and you're in luck.

 

The internal cable lengths are all 50cm.

 

a sidenote: I have watched a few videos about case modding, but I never searched for it specifically. I just searched "case modding" on YouTube like Hans said, and man, there really is a whole sub-culture for it. You guys should check it out, there are some tutorials on it and best practices, might help us out for the back-plate work :-D

 

Hi Ben-M,

 

That's perfect!

 

Btw, I just got a Teradak 12V/15A LPS to bridge me over until I get a true LPS for my FC10. The build quality is reasonable and the actual product looks exactly the same as the one listed in Taobao/hifiss. I quickly put together my FC10 built and it works fine using the Teradak.

 

The only thing is the Teradak is quite smelly, perhaps because it's newly manufactured. I'm now putting it in the open with the top cover removed in the hope that the odor will dissipate in a couple days.

 

As to performance the unit runs only slightly warm to the touch but then my PC is not high powered. The FC10 chassis barely get warm at all. I tried to measure the LPS's output with the PC connected and running. The residual noise fluctuates and peaks at about 100mV using my Fluke meter at AC range. I'm not sure if this is the best way to measure it as the connected nano DC-ATX could also feed noise back to the DC line.

 

Jack

[Lowlands]

Hans,

thanks. Yes, my controlpc is a smaller Atom-based CAPS V3 Lagoon and I have it powered by a smaller Hynes Sr3-12. Question: will my Asus P8H77-I allow me to bypass the PicoPSu (was a 12V but replaced with 19V PicoPSU and dialed up Hynes SR7 to 19V) and go direct to these specific power connectors on my mobo? What do I look for in my specs/diagram? ... .

 

 

Ted,

 

Sorry, was out for a few days...

 

If you're asking if the Teradak can replace the PICO PSU, my understanding is 'yes'. The teradak to my knowledge is ATX compliant, so it should run any ATX standard mobo (provided the draw is within the power limitations of the PSU). I recollect this was confirmed by Michael from Teradak to Ben-M (pls. chime in Ben..)

 

If you're asking if your Asus P8H77-I allows for a dumb multi-rail into it's ATX socket.. the answer is 'I don't know'. It's a trial & error thing. A big 'test enthousiast' I know of is Nige (nige2000).

A 'how-to' (by nige) & list of tested mobo's is here: AUDIO PC: Direct power to motherboard 24 and 4pin (picoless)

 

Your Asus P8H77-I is not on the list.... Don't know if anyone has ever tried feeding it dumb linear. You might want to ask...

 

The P8H77-I does have a 12V ATX 4-pin for the CPU. Are you supplying that with a separate rail, or is that coming of the wide-PICO? My reading tells me that many find putting a separate & clean 12V on the CPU will reap some benefits (most likely X-talk contamination not happening, similar to pulling the SSD off the 5V rail) . Also, I understand that CPU rail to be NOT subject to power-on sequencing (can be 'always on', will not draw any current until boot). Plenty folks are running with two cheap linear 12V bench supplies (13,8V turned down to 12V, Maplin, Voltcraft), one on PICO, one on CPU. So, if you are now running a PH singe rail into (wide input) PICO, you might want to run the other PH rail turned to 12V (made available due to a Teradak arriving :-) ) into the 12V CPU of your control PC....?

 

NB. The secondary 12V rail (there are 2 with same # amps) on the Teradak is meant to separately power the CPU for that same reason. The loom has a CPU 4pin for that.

 

Also, the wide-PICO is likely to not give the performance of the 12V-PICO, when fed with good 12V linear. The 12V PICO does not touch the 12V (it 'forwards' it, likely with less pollution than a wide PICO). However if your PH needs to turn the rest into heat.. it might be getting a bit hot..

 

Just my thought, 2cts. etc etc..

[Ben-M]

I just got this link from Teradak because I was asking them about the specific back-plate dimensions about ATX, mATX, and SFX.

 

These are what they can get from their supplier with professional CNC cutting and mounting holes drilled.

SilverStone Technology Co., Ltd.

 

Just to give you guys a better idea :-)

[Ben-M]

Interestingly I received the new FC10 Mk.II version which omitted the optical drive slot, changed to a vertical HDD mounting frame, and a new sub-panel for the DC power inlet. This inlet sub-panel is interesting as it is now a standard dimension for a 1U SMPS PS to be installed inside the chassis.

 

Now that the new FC10 inlet sub-panel is 1U standard size if Teradak can build the subpanel according to that dimension it will be perfect!

 

And Jack, though your size isn't in the 3 sizes that Teradak will order from their supplier, the dimensions you'll need and hole locations are listed in the above link under "Flex ATX" PSU.

 

If you're willing to let Teradak themselves cut down your back-plate with their power tools, then we can use those exterior dimensions. Or you could provide this info to a machine shop and let them do all the work. Anyway, thought it might be helpful somehow :-)

 

Since we're in a fairly similar boat, I'll be some how making use of them as well :-D

[Ben-M]

Ted,

 

Sorry, was out for a few days...

 

If you're asking if the Teradak can replace the PICO PSU, my understanding is 'yes'. The teradak to my knowledge is ATX compliant, so it should run any ATX standard mobo (provided the draw is within the power limitations of the PSU). I recollect this was confirmed by Michael from Teradak to Ben-M (pls. chime in Ben..)

 

Yup, I outlined it in the opening post of the Group Buy too. I asked him about it a few times just to be clear and he confirmed these power-on with the proper ATX sequence. Haha, that was more than half the reasoning I got interested in these LPSs :-D

[Marcell]

Hi Ben-M,

 

 

Please count me in, I need one ATX-350 and I live in South East Asia.

[Ben-M]

Hi Ben-M,

 

 

Please count me in, I need one ATX-350 and I live in South East Asia.

 

Hey Marcell. Welcome to the Group Buy, happy to have you. Just make sure to PM me with all the details and I'll get you down on the list.

[Marcell]

Thanks for adding me Ben-M,

 

 

Just want to share my 2cents with you and others who want to order. General rules of thumb is that you are only recommended to put load 80 percent of total max power. Which means:

 

ATX 350 --> 280

ATX 275 --> 220

ATX 210 --> 168

 

Not really recommended to go over that. Well, I maybe wrong but personally i am not very convenient to go over 80 percent.

[_JL_]

I just got this link from Teradak because I was asking them about the specific back-plate dimensions about ATX, mATX, and SFX.

 

These are what they can get from their supplier with professional CNC cutting and mounting holes drilled.

SilverStone Technology Co., Ltd.

 

Just to give you guys a better idea :-)

 

Hi Ben-M,

 

I think the Flex ATX form factor is the one used in the new FC10 chassis. If Teradak can do that it will be a perfect fit.

 

Jack

[Marcell]

Hi Ben-M

 

 

I hate to make things more complicated but how about putting an options for the length of wire?

 

For external cable (PSU to backplate) if I am not mistaken it is 1 Meter? Well that's enough for me. But for internal wires (backplate to HD/Motherboard/GPU) I need at least 90 cm.

 

People may laugh at me for using full-tower case such as Corsair 780T but where I live, the average temperature is around 34-37 Celsius at noon through out a year. I am dealing with a lot of heats, I need to put them inside a full-tower case with low-rpm fans (my choice) or a med-tower case but with high rpm fans (very noisy). Casing like STREACOM is a very beautiful case but I am out of luck from using it

 

So how about putting an options for internal wires like 50 cm, 70 cm or 90 cm?

[Ben-M]

Hi Ben-M

 

 

I hate to make things more complicated but how about putting an options for the length of wire?

...

for internal wires (backplate to HD/Motherboard/GPU) I need at least 90 cm.

...

So how about putting an options for internal wires like 50 cm, 70 cm or 90 cm?

 

Hi Marcell,

 

I can understand the heat issues, living in a place that's hot like that would require a full size case for sure. Though I'm not saying you're wrong, 90cm wires are very, very long. Standard wires from an SMPS ATX loom are 50-60cm, even for full size towers. You should be fine?

 

Unfortunately when I was discussing the internal wiring with Michael he told me that 50cm was the only length, so there won't be any other options.

 

However, if you read up a few posts Hans commented on a similar post about wire lengths by _JL_. I agree with him; if you need extra lengths just buy some standard extenders from eBay. It'll be cheaper than getting Teradak to do it and you'll get the length you want.

 

Anyway, sorry. that will be your best option here because there won't be multiple lengths for internal wiring :-(

[Marcell]

Hi Marcell,

 

I can understand the heat issues, living in a place that's hot like that would require a full size case for sure. Though I'm not saying you're wrong, 90cm wires are very, very long. Standard wires from an SMPS ATX loom are 50-60cm, even for full size towers. You should be fine?

 

Unfortunately when I was discussing the internal wiring with Michael he told me that 50cm was the only length, so there won't be any other options.

 

However, if you read up a few posts Hans commented on a similar post about wire lengths by _JL_. I agree with him; if you need extra lengths just buy some standard extenders from eBay. It'll be cheaper than getting Teradak to do it and you'll get the length you want.

 

Anyway, sorry. that will be your best option here because there won't be multiple lengths for internal wiring :-(

 

Yes, 90 cm is extremely long and long cable is generally always bad in audio world. I wanted to manage my cable neatly inside my case and not having them "flying around" inside. Depends on the position inside a case, normally i'll be using ATX PSU which have a length of approximately 15 cm. With Teradak PSU, I am using internal wires from backplate which I already lost advantages of 15 cm compare to normal ATX PSU. So if before I need 60 cm, with Teradak PSU I would need 60 cm + 15 cm.

 

 

Well I guess Teradak design this PSU with people using cases like STREACOM in their mind. Can't really blame them, I am the one who is on the other minor side

 

Anyway, I'll manage the other way around by using extenders Thanks

 

Other question, do you mind to share why you use Xeon processor instead of using i5 / i7? Does Xeon make things better, I mean produce better sounds with lower jitter?

[tranz]

Perhaps what they can do is pluggable cables such as in some ATX 's like Seasonic 520W fanless for example. This way you only plug in those cables you need and you can swap them for longer ones if need be. I have always benefited from that design.

 

Cheers

[tailspn]

Hi

 

A basic Electronics 101 note; noise exists from a source (in this case a power supply) from insufficient filtering, but also is a result of current changes from the load isolated by the connecting wiring not absorbed by that filtering, or supply regulation.

 

The wire connecting the power source filtering/regulation from the source to load is not a simple piece of copper with some resistance, but instead a complex network of resistance, series inductance, and parallel capacitance. Of these, inductive reactance (a resistance 90 degrees displaced from the voltage drop across it) is by far the leading culprit.

 

Power supply lines should be as short as possible, otherwise the expensive advantages of a linear well regulated well filtered power supply are diminished.

[4est]

You bring up a good point, especially considering these are square waves banging at M-GHz.

Hi

 

A basic Electronics 101 note; noise exists from a source (in this case a power supply) from insufficient filtering, but also is a result of current changes from the load isolated by the connecting wiring not absorbed by that filtering, or supply regulation.

 

The wire connecting the power source filtering/regulation from the source to load is not a simple piece of copper with some resistance, but instead a complex network of resistance, series inductance, and parallel capacitance. Of these, inductive reactance (a resistance 90 degrees displaced from the voltage drop across it) is by far the leading culprit.

 

Power supply lines should be as short as possible, otherwise the expensive advantages of a linear well regulated well filtered power supply are diminished.

[sgr]

I have some questions before I order.

PC 1. One PC full Atx Built into Silverstone GD 08 case with i4770 with Fanless cooler, 16gig of RAM, 2 SSD Cards for dual boot windows 8.1 and Server 2012 with AO and jPlay, PP USB, and Ethernet card powered with with Seasonic Platinum Fanless PSU 520. 8tb of Music files are stored on 2012 based Server.

 

So which of the ATX PSUs should I purchase? How and where will this plug into to power the PC? Could I just use the Seasonic for Mobo and RAM while purchasing small linear PSUs for usb card and solid state drives? In the future I'm wanting to use this as the control pc in a Dual boot system.

 

I'm thinking of switching everything above into a fanless case. Will the new Streacom FC 10 pro accommodate the Seasonic PSU above?

 

PC 2. This will be the Audio PC. I'm thinking of the mini Zuma or one of the other builds in this thread. I'm thinking of the Streacom FC 10 for the case, using the PP USB or Sotm,

16 gb ram, etc. The builds at Quiet PC sound interesting too. Of course it would use an i7 as well.

 

So which PSU would be best for this build? I'm not sure about the plate which attaches to the case where the power is attached to either. Can someone explain this?

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

 

 

Which PSU would be best for this build?

[Marcell]

Hi sgr, I will answer some of your questions

 

I think these Teradak PSU's are a replacement for your seasonic PSU and not to be used together, although you can do that which I do not recommend that.

 

If you are not sure, you can always buy in ebay a cheap "power meter" or "watt meter" to measure total power consumption for your PC. Then your can stress out your PC by running something like futuremark, cinnebench or other heavy applications to see max watt that it use.

 

My hunch tells me that your PC1 and PC2 will only be using less than 200 watt. Which means it can do well with ATX 210, although you might want to buy an extra power by choosing ATX 270.

 

 

 

I have some questions before I order.

PC 1. One PC full Atx Built into Silverstone GD 08 case with i4770 with Fanless cooler, 16gig of RAM, 2 SSD Cards for dual boot windows 8.1 and Server 2012 with AO and jPlay, PP USB, and Ethernet card powered with with Seasonic Platinum Fanless PSU 520. 8tb of Music files are stored on 2012 based Server.

 

So which of the ATX PSUs should I purchase? How and where will this plug into to power the PC? Could I just use the Seasonic for Mobo and RAM while purchasing small linear PSUs for usb card and solid state drives? In the future I'm wanting to use this as the control pc in a Dual boot system.

 

I'm thinking of switching everything above into a fanless case. Will the new Streacom FC 10 pro accommodate the Seasonic PSU above?

 

PC 2. This will be the Audio PC. I'm thinking of the mini Zuma or one of the other builds in this thread. I'm thinking of the Streacom FC 10 for the case, using the PP USB or Sotm,

16 gb ram, etc. The builds at Quiet PC sound interesting too. Of course it would use an i7 as well.

 

So which PSU would be best for this build? I'm not sure about the plate which attaches to the case where the power is attached to either. Can someone explain this?

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

 

 

Which PSU would be best for this build?

[tuyen]

Expressing interest in one 350w unit. Hopefully I can raise enough money before cut off date to be able to commit and be part of this awesome group buy.

 

I'm assuming the 350w unit is plenty to power a standard Asus P6T6 WS Revolution mobo, i7 930 cpu, 2x 120mm noctua fans, 1x ppa studio usb v2 card, 2 sata harddrives, wireless card, basic pcie video card and built in 7" touchscreen (built into the thermaltake dh-102 case). Or can someone sense a problem with this combo?

 

Thanks for opening up such a great opportunity Ben-M

[rurika]

Hi, Ben-M

I'm interest the 210w unit but still can't decide to get it just one or two unit. (I'm using dual jplay setup) (So right now just 1 unit for me)

How long for the DC power cable ? (between Teradak PSU -> back-plate)

I may need a longer cable (about 1.5 meters or 2 meters) any addition cost if I want a long cable?

 

Still have no idea about back-plate size but I use HD-PLEX H10.S chassis. HDPLEX H10.S Fanless Computer Case - HDPLEX INC

 

The shipping address will be to USA.

[rurika]

Hi, Ben-M

I forgot to ask a question about the dimension of the LPSU. How big is it ? (I want to make sure this big guy can sit on the shelf)

[mordo]

Hi,

I'm new on this forum (although I follow you for a long time);

I recently set up a new server with music on board:

cpu intel i7 4790k

asus sabertooth tuf Z97 markII

kingston ssd v300

sink Bequiet rock 3

houses fractal design node605

I'm feeding the mobo and ssd with a picopsu 160xt, while the CPU is powered by the psu atx Seasonic fanless 520

has been so long since I'm trying to follow the trail linear supply for the whole pc.

Today I see quersto project and would like to participate.

In your opinion, having regard to the components of the PC, which of the two proposals teradak is right for me, the 275 0 350?

 

 

regards

lorenzo

[Ben-M]

Hey SGR, here's my take on this stuff.

 

My first question is "is this build that you listed a 'possible build' or are these the parts that you already own? As other users have mentioned during this thread, there's no real need for a powerful machine when dealing with a music PC because it won't remotely any of that power, and it's going to cost you a lot more money. Even if you're going to make one that does Active Room Correction, EQ, or PCM/DSD conversion, you probably don't need anything like an i7 4770. An i5 will do the trick, and users have reported that disabling hyperthreading sounds better anyway, which is the only difference between the i5 and i7...

 

Now, as for guessing about your usage...

 

I have some questions before I order.

PC 1. One PC full Atx Built into Silverstone GD 08 case with i4770 with Fanless cooler, 16gig of RAM, 2 SSD Cards for dual boot windows 8.1 and Server 2012 with AO and jPlay, PP USB, and Ethernet card powered with with Seasonic Platinum Fanless PSU 520. 8tb of Music files are stored on 2012 based Server.

 

So which of the ATX PSUs should I purchase?

I saw that another member suggested putting a Watt Meter between your outlet and computer to measure what it actually pulls and I think that's your best move. Although we can guess a little about it if you're only using these for playback and no DSP, there's unfortunately no way to really know what your actual usage is besides you measuring it :-/

 

How and where will this plug into to power the PC? Could I just use the Seasonic for Mobo and RAM while purchasing small linear PSUs for usb card and solid state drives? In the future I'm wanting to use this as the control pc in a Dual boot system.

For how to actually connect and use the Linear PSU; re-read this and the previous thread. I've explained it a lot and pretty clearly. I'll give a little explanation again. This is a direct replacement for your Seasonic ATX PSU. So once you get the Linear PSU from this Group Buy you can't use your Seasonic in the same computer anymore; not even to power only a portion of it.

 

You could put that Seasonic into a regular/gaming PC that you can use for regular stuff. The dedicated Dual-PC Jplay setup that you'll have won't be useful for anything but music playback, so at least you can use some of your old parts for putting into a normal PC.

 

I'm thinking of switching everything above into a fanless case. Will the new Streacom FC 10 pro accommodate the Seasonic PSU above?

No, it won't. Look up the dimensions of the Streacom or read the people's posts so far and you'll see the the FC10 will only accommodate an SFX(1U) sized PSU. The FC10 is too small for a normal(ATX) sized PSU to fit inside. Your Seasonic or the L-PSU from this Group Buy will have to sit outside of the FC10 chassis.

 

PC 2. This will be the Audio PC. I'm thinking of the mini Zuma or one of the other builds in this thread. I'm thinking of the Streacom FC 10 for the case, using the PP USB or Sotm, 16 gb ram, etc. The builds at Quiet PC sound interesting too. Of course it would use an i7 as well.

 

So which PSU would be best for this build?

If you under-volt and under-clock your CPU and RAM and don't use any fans, as most people here do and recommend, you could get away with the ATX 210. For a little extra headroom and piece of mind you could go with the ATX 275, but as Hans said before, neither PSU would be doing very much work.

 

I'm not sure about the plate which attaches to the case where the power is attached to either. Can someone explain this?

If you look at the back of a normal, ATX mid-tower PC, you can see how the PSU mounts on the back of the tower. When Teradak makes our Linear ATX PSUs they're going to make a bracket that holds a 16-pin DIN socket that screws into the same place that your normal PSU does. That's for a normal,ATX mid-tower. But...

 

Your Streacom FC10 will need a special back-plate to connect the DIN-socket on the back. You will have to cut this yourself or take the case to a machine shop and have them cut it. If you get a different case you will have different requirements.

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

 

Which PSU would be best for this build?

If you stick with the Intel i7s in both Control and Audio PCs, then I'd get the ATX 275 for peace of mind. If you under-volt, under-clock, and go fanless you should never have to worry about needing any more power.

 

Also, I know you may not know what direction you want to move in or if this Group Buy is even something you'd like to go with, but PLEASE read and re-read the posts before yours. I also provided a link to the old thread and showed that only the last 2.5 pages of posts are needed to get up to speed on this one.

 

Don't hesitate to ask questions, but please make sure you're reading everything else very closely as well.

 

So, let me know what else you need to know about your PCs.

[Ben-M]

Yes, 90 cm is extremely long and long cable is generally always bad in audio world. I wanted to manage my cable neatly inside my case and not having them "flying around" inside. Depends on the position inside a case, normally i'll be using ATX PSU which have a length of approximately 15 cm. With Teradak PSU, I am using internal wires from backplate which I already lost advantages of 15 cm compare to normal ATX PSU. So if before I need 60 cm, with Teradak PSU I would need 60 cm + 15 cm.

 

 

Well I guess Teradak design this PSU with people using cases like STREACOM in their mind. Can't really blame them, I am the one who is on the other minor side

 

Anyway, I'll manage the other way around by using extenders Thanks

Gotcha. Yeah, if you never crossed the mobo or really worked on cable routing, then you would need extra. I think going with the extenders like you are is best :-)

 

Other question, do you mind to share why you use Xeon processor instead of using i5 / i7? Does Xeon make things better, I mean produce better sounds with lower jitter?

The Xeon CPU can use ECC ram, which the i5 and i7 cannot. Over on the Jplay forum users have reported that going with ECC ram sounds best and I'd like to give it a shot, so that's the CPU that I need to get. As for jitter or other types of noise, I have no idea :-S

 

I really do wish I could go with the i5 because it's a quad-core, its got a good size cache, and it's cheaper than the Xeon I'm getting.

[Ben-M]

Definitely a good point, but a very hard one to combat. With our given product, or even another approach using multiple PSUs, it'd be tricky to deal with.

 

For our current Group Buy PSUs I also look at it like this, though. If both an SMPS ATX PSU and our Linear ATX PSU faces this problem, then although it would be great to get rid of, by first tackling 1 problem we could potentially get closer to better sound. At least in both cases it's a constant. Next would be to shorten those power supply lines, but for now I'd have to say we're looking at some type of incremental increase as opposed to a canceled out null.

 

Hi

 

A basic Electronics 101 note; noise exists from a source (in this case a power supply) from insufficient filtering, but also is a result of current changes from the load isolated by the connecting wiring not absorbed by that filtering, or supply regulation.

 

The wire connecting the power source filtering/regulation from the source to load is not a simple piece of copper with some resistance, but instead a complex network of resistance, series inductance, and parallel capacitance. Of these, inductive reactance (a resistance 90 degrees displaced from the voltage drop across it) is by far the leading culprit.

 

Power supply lines should be as short as possible, otherwise the expensive advantages of a linear well regulated well filtered power supply are diminished.