Woo! Load shedding, woo!

City Power changed the schedules here by us and really didn't think it through. If we are on stage 1 then we get load shedded. However at stage 2 we don't. So if after 8 the load schedule suddenly changes then we will lost power, otherwise not. I have no idea what to expect.
 
i think my pc's psu got damaged, managed to boot it after a few attempts, in normal use its fine but the moment i start to game it shuts down and all the powerphase lights on the mobo lights up ! im guessing its pushing out less power than it normally does :(
 
Dohc-WP said:
i think my pc's psu got damaged, managed to boot it after a few attempts, in normal use its fine but the moment i start to game it shuts down and all the powerphase lights on the mobo lights up ! im guessing its pushing out less power than it normally does :(
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Perhaps check to see if your gpu is properly connected?

Or else good bye power supply :(
 
Dohc-WP said:
i think my pc's psu got damaged, managed to boot it after a few attempts, in normal use its fine but the moment i start to game it shuts down and all the powerphase lights on the mobo lights up ! im guessing its pushing out less power than it normally does :(
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In my experience its the mobo that gets screwed by power issues not the PSU...as counter-intuitive as that sounds.
 
I am very paranoid, I physically unplug my PC every evening when I'm done. Its a slight hassle, but I wont take the risk of damaging something. Our Samsung BluRay player died the other day, not certain if its the load shedding, wast just over a year old.

Makes me angry everytime we get our power cut, just because of some dumb shit people in charge fucking up and we all have to suffer.

Hope you get it sorted soon, I wouldnt survive without my PC...
 
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VirtualForce said:
I am very paranoid, I physically unplug my PC every evening when I'm done. Its a slight hassle, but I wont take the risk of damaging something. Our Samsung BluRay player died the other day, not certain if its the load shedding, wast just over a year old.

Makes me angry everytime we get our power cut, just because of some dumb shit people in charge fucking up and we all have to suffer.
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Rather safe than sorry, I don't think damage can be caused while an appliance is switched off though. But with a PC, it's just extra safe to take that precaution.

I often wonder, when the power comes back on, are there any spikes higher than usual compared to switching something on via the plug on the wall? If so, then that can probably be the cause for appliances dying earlier.
 
HavocXphere said:
In my experience its the mobo that gets screwed by power issues not the PSU...as counter-intuitive as that sounds.
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Yip I've now had to assess 3 machines all with fried motherboards thanx to load shedding, including [MENTION=9789]DieGrootHammer[/MENTION].
What makes it even worse is that he was running a Z68 setup, those are eol..so obvious choice would be z77..oh wait those are eol as well...

Makes it so difficult to get it rma'd :mad:

HATE ESKOM!!!!!!!!!!!
 
blaaislaai said:
Rather safe than sorry, I don't think damage can be caused while an appliance is switched off though. But with a PC, it's just extra safe to take that precaution.

I often wonder, when the power comes back on, are there any spikes higher than usual compared to switching something on via the plug on the wall? If so, then that can probably be the cause for appliances dying earlier.
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Damage can definitely be caused when your devices are plugged in, but switched off.

I am going to give a basic-technical explanation for this now, so if you don't care then stop reading:
Electricity is distributed to your house via a base-station (you know, those large scary-looking electrical palaces that you see here there and everywhere). There is a lot of cabling and wiring between your house and a base-station, there is even more between that base-station and all the other houses and businesses that are provided power from it. A lot of cabling and wiring creates a giant inductor (you might know these from school as the twisty pieces of wire in a circuit that create a magnetic field i.e. not the resistor and not the capacitor). When you apply a large change in voltage to an inductor, such as turning on a 240V supply (as they do when they restore power during load-shedding) then the large inductor requires energy to create its magnetic field initially. It does this by drawing a large amount of current in a short space of time. Current from this spike (which is typically larger than the spikes from just turning devices on) can then be fed through to all your sensitive devices such as Motherboards, Playstations and Xbones, thereby damaging or destroying them.

TL;DR: Unplug your sensitive electronics during load-shedding, they can break if you don't.
 
[MENTION=9032]StaggerLee[/MENTION]

Makes perfectly sense, however when we are at work and loadshedding happens at home, you're kinda screwed.

We don't want to unplug the fridge, for example, food becoming bad and all that.

Can one claim from insurance if appliances die due to loadshedding?
 
Electricity went off for around 3 mins before turning on again. Just thankful my PC didn't take a punishing hit.
 
blaaislaai said:
[MENTION=9032]StaggerLee[/MENTION]

Makes perfectly sense, however when we are at work and loadshedding happens at home, you're kinda screwed.

We don't want to unplug the fridge, for example, food becoming bad and all that.

Can one claim from insurance if appliances die due to loadshedding?
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Ja, definitely. I wouldn't recommend unplugging your fridge. You can buy surge protectors for devices like your fridge, washing machine etc. but get the full, single plug surge protectors (they look like big red boxes) not the multiplugs. The multiplug devices don't work very well, usually because they are overloaded. Ellies makes the good ones and the less effective multiplug versions. Go for the bigger, more effective ones, it's worth it. The big ones are much more expensive however. Also, Ellies gives you a two year guarantee up to R20k if your device breaks through the surge protector.

You could also get one for your PC if you don't want to unplug it everyday. I unplug mine everyday because I am afraid of lightning :P I was struck earlier this year and it has made me super-paranoid.

As for insurance, you probably can claim. I think the difficulty comes in proving that the breakage is due to load-shedding because it usually happens over multiple on/off cycles and the insurance company can easily get away with saying it's age-effect or a manufacturing fault.
 
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