Is this what I need for the Hub power supply?

[hbomb341]

I would think so since the 12V only uses a dfferent input.  For the price it really makes sense to order them anyway just in case.

That's my option also.

Harrison

[fbinthesouth]

I agree to buy the 12v board as well. For four bucks a piece it gives you flexibility.
RW

[rm357]

I don't know if RJ put anything in place to prevent the current from one supply from feeding back through the other, but in general it is never a good idea to hook together the outputs of two voltage regulators. Buy the parts if you like, but I would not install them and use the PC power supply.

It might be OK, but there is a good chance you will let the magic smoke out...

[tbone321]

I don't believe that it's a board.  I believe that it is a few components and according to RJ, they can be installed even if you are using a PC supply although in that case they are not serving any purpose.

[Trepidati0n]

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[CaptKirk]

That is not what kit 3 is for.  If you are using a computer power suplly, kit 3 is not needed and you can and should plug in the drive connectors as well.  That is what the jacks are there for.  Kit three is used if you are going to connect the hub to a 12V only supply to supply the also needed 5V

My bad- I thought kit 3 WAS the extra drive connectors, but I understand better now that it is a 5v/3.3v capability so you can use a 12v only ps.  My advice of using the 20 pin atx AND disk power is correct.  Kirk.

[RJ]

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Just make sure the amount of nodes is low enough for this one to handle. It is not near the power as the other posted one.

RJ

[RJ]

I don't believe that it's a board.  I believe that it is a few components and according to RJ, they can be installed even if you are using a PC supply although in that case they are not serving any purpose.

It is a Power connector to feed the 12v into the pcb and the parts for a 3.3 volt and 5 volt regulator circuits to power the electronics on the pcb for the amps and DMX out.

You have no need to have it if you are using a computer power supply. Only if you are using a 12 volt only power supply.

RJ

[n1ist]

I'd be careful about running a board with the kit3 regulators on an ATX supply as I don't see any isolation, and you will be tying the on-board regulators in parallel with the ATX supply.
/mike

[Trepidati0n]

I'd be careful about running a board with the kit3 regulators on an ATX supply as I don't see any isolation, and you will be tying the on-board regulators in parallel with the ATX supply.
/mike

Not sure I understand your concern.  No matter what, all lower lever voltages rails are isolated via the transformer.  Whether the lower voltages come off a seperate winding on the flyback transformer or a linear regulator off 12V...the end result is the same since they share the same ground on the secondary side.

[Corey872]

Oh, I just ran across your posting saying you want 800 nodes. My little calculator says that would run about 284.8 watts, which when we add in the draw of the board of itself, it's probably getting to be too little headroom for a 300 watt power supply.

Which is to say that for 800 nodes, I'd want a 400-watt supply, if it were mine to do.

Also, if I were using a freebie from Craigslist in my show, I'd have a spare or two lying around just in case the freebie took a swan dive.*

\dmc

Also take note when looking at wattage...if you see a power supply rated at "XXX" watts, that is probably the total wattage across all the rails.  What is mostly driving the smart strings is the 12V rails only. (at least as I understand it now)

The original PS was rated "300 watts", but the 12V rail was rated at 15 amps (12V x 15A = 180 watts) - so it's substantially undersized for the 288 watts worth of nodes.  Even a "400 watt" supply may not have enough juice on the 12V rail to do the job.

[n1ist]

I obviously haven't seen the schematics for any of this, but from viewing the pixelnet hub picture in the wiki, it looks like there's  no isolation diodes or jumpers between the outputs of the optional 5 and 3.3v regulators and the ATX connector.
Therefore, if you have the regulators loaded (as for the 12V only option) and plug in an ATX supply instead, you will have the ATX rails and the regulator outputs tied together, and the regulators don't like to sink current.

It's possible that I'm wrong here; we should wait for RJ to chime in.
/mike

[dmaccole]

The original PS was rated "300 watts", but the 12V rail was rated at 15 amps (12V x 15A = 180 watts) - so it's substantially undersized for the 288 watts worth of nodes.  Even a "400 watt" supply may not have enough juice on the 12V rail to do the job.

Corey:

My bad -- you're absolutely right.

Sizing will need to be done based on all the +12v ratings, plus headroom, basically discounting the 3v and 5v ratings.

\dmc

[OneHotRT59]

Use a good Power Supply.
Newegg constantly has specials and rebates on Antec and OCZ power supplies in the 500+ wattage arena. 
Plan on spending at least $50.
You can get alot of good power between $50 and $100.
Read the reviews.  They are honest reviews at their site.

Randy

[RJ]

I obviously haven't seen the schematics for any of this, but from viewing the pixelnet hub picture in the wiki, it looks like there's  no isolation diodes or jumpers between the outputs of the optional 5 and 3.3v regulators and the ATX connector.
Therefore, if you have the regulators loaded (as for the 12V only option) and plug in an ATX supply instead, you will have the ATX rails and the regulator outputs tied together, and the regulators don't like to sink current.

It's possible that I'm wrong here; we should wait for RJ to chime in.
/mike

You are correct.

 I never thought much about it since the intent was to have a place to add the optional parts if you did not want to use a ATX supply.

Then the other night someone said there is no reason I can not have the optional on there in case right and I without thinking about it replied no.

Thanks for pointing it out.  I will post to make sure everyone does not do it and put a warning in the manual.

RJ