Power Supply Size Issues and Lockup/Freeze Issues 1

[remre5]

Have DragonPlus MB with Athlon XP 1700 CPU, 512 RAM, 40 g HD, ATI Radeon 9200 Video (128 MB AGP), CD-RW, DVD reader, USB and PS2 keyboards, USB optical mouse, WACOM graphic pen/mouse, 19 inch ViewSonic PD709 monitor, 2 printers, USB 2.0 SimpleTech 120 G HD. Use DSL broadband on 2 computers with router.

Added a PCI USB 2.0 card to accommodate the SimpleTech drive.

Have had lockup problems since adding the USB card and USB drive. Couldn't write files to USB drive without a total freeze and playing simple games online (Yahoo) like Addiction Solitaire cause freeze after 2 or 3 games. Partly solved problem by removing Adaptec's control software for the USB card, then removing card from device manager with subsequent reboot. Can now write files to USB drive. Still freezes with online games and get error messages about problems with "Control Center." Can't tell what or whose Control Center.

The power supply on this computer is 250. Would a larger power supply be advisable? Any other suggestions?

I've usually gone with the K.I.S.S. principle, but sometimes necessary to upgrade and keep ahead of people I support. Mainly assist seniors and novice users. Sometimes do simple upgrades, install dial-up or broadband internet. Main support is handholding and instruction. Often tell people their 5 year old computer with no upgrades is obsolete and no surprise it often isn't well received!

Not a heavy gamer. Do some photo editing, desktop publishing, word processing, spreadsheets, heavy online use. Advanced user in Word and Excel, also use Corel Draw and minor graphics editing packages.

Can usually figure this stuff out myself, but some of the latest issues with USB, Fire Wire and in-depth WinXP give me a challenge. WinXP has been so smooth till this latest glitch.

 

[franklin97355]

Someone posted this site to figure out the size PS you need.

http://www.jscustompcs.com/power_supply/

 

[remre5]

Thanks greatly for the link to Power Supply Calculator. Looks like I need to find a larger power supply very soon. I'm sure it can't hurt to have a bit extra.

 

[remre5]

This is on same subject as previous question about freezes/lockups. Thought I had solved the problem of writing to the USB Simple Drive, but surprise, surprise it still happens. Called Simple Tech Support and was not surprised to be told the problem is with the operating system, not the drive. I guess they are right because the drive operates just fine on my older Pentium III computer. I have done the Windows Update thing, but it froze several times downloading updates. Obviously something is not working right. I had previously updated the driver for the Adaptec USB card and it is showing up properly in Device Manager, so that's not likely the problem.

One thing I noticed is that if I try to do a copy from hard drive and paste to USB that it bombs when it hits the ntuser.dat file. Always says it can't copy because it's in use. Did a backup with NTI Backup 3 on the Pentium III with the USB drive and it simply skipped the ntuser.dat files. Can't figure out why it won't do the same on the AMD. Especially when I can write the same files to a CD just fine!

My patience is getting quite sorely tried about now. Sure don't want to think about reformatting my C: drive when I can't get any kind of backup. I'll try a backup across the network from the Pentium III later tonight, but I doubt it will work any better that way.

Any more ideas?