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Thread ID: 98443	2009-03-25 04:35:00	Can you run multiple computers off 1 power supply?	pantera989 (14533)	Press F1

Post ID	Timestamp	Content	User
759403	2009-03-25 19:16:00	Its the purple wire that will fire up the PSU when bridged to black. I've been starting PSU's for years by putting a wire between the green, and any ground (black) for filling up water cooling systems, it is also stated as green here en.wikipedia.org Infact ive never seen a purple wire on a PSU before.	pantera989 (14533)
759404	2009-03-25 20:02:00	You could also get around the "Powering up one PC at a time" issue by using something such as Wake on LAN? :) Technically speaking I dont see why it *shouldnt* be possible. I know that the likes of the Atom 230 boards we've been using draw ~35w, bearing in mind that HDD's (I use CF Adapters) draw power also, but if you've got 4-5 on a 500watt PSU it'd be an interesting exercise to say the least! :)	Chilling_Silence (9)
759405	2009-03-25 23:43:00	I've been starting PSU's for years by putting a wire between the green, and any ground (black) for filling up water cooling systems, it is also stated as green here en.wikipedia.org Infact ive never seen a purple wire on a PSU before. On a standard PSU with standard colour-coding the purple wire is the 5v standby line. Shorting this to ground would definitely "fire" the PSU up... If your PSU doesn't have a purple wire it's probably made by someone like Dell/HP (and may likely have a different pinout because those companies are oh-so-special) etc or it's just built by someone who thinks that having different colour-coding but a normal pinout is fun. :illogical	Agent_24 (57)
759406	2009-03-26 00:26:00	"or you want to use an ATX power supply to power other devices (such as hard drives), you can short the green wire to one of the black wires" Source: www.IBM.com As long as the PSU is powered from the mains, it is also providing your motherboard with a small amount of power from a connector known as the +5VSB (pin 9 of the motherboard connector, connected to a purple wire), or five volt standby. Even though your system is powered down, you are still drawing a small amount of current from this. The circuits that control the power switch are among the things using that power. When you press the power button, you momentarily close a set of contacts. The motherboard circuity reacts to that signal by sending a signal to the PSU. The signal is called the PS_ON# (pin 16 of the motherboard connector, connected to a green wire), and the setting of a LOW voltage (0V) on this connector tells your PSU to deliver full power to your system Source: http://case-mods.linear1.org/	pantera989 (14533)
759407	2009-03-26 01:34:00	You could also get around the "Powering up one PC at a time" issue by using something such as Wake on LAN? :) This won't work - WOL still switches the PSU on and off, so send a WOL command to one and they'd all come on. Oh and if you shut one down, either they'll all switch off, or the one you just shut down may reboot instead. Something else nobody seems to have mentioned yet is the fact that the output capacity of a PSU isn't all aggregated into one channel. While it may in fact be capable of delivering 500W of output, that output isn't going to be distributed evenly. Each output voltage and channel will receive a different proportion of that (e.g. maybe 10W standby line, 70W 3.3v lines etc). As a result, the number of systems you can simultaneously power off one PSU is limited to the number the 'weakest link' circuit is capable of driving. My guess is you won't have nearly enough capacity to do what you're wanting on the standby and 3.3v channels, but will have far too much on the 5v and 12v channels - particularly 12v.	Erayd (23)
759408	2009-03-26 01:51:00	Oops, last sentence of the above post should say "...particularly 5v."	Erayd (23)
759409	2009-03-26 03:39:00	Yeah I would have to be careful when buying the PSU and check its spec sheets to make sure there's enough power on the right Voltages	pantera989 (14533)
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