::poof::

Magic blue smoke escaped my clear PC last night. Obvious lesson learned here:

400 watts is NOT enough to push a 3 gigahertz P4, a buncha peripherals, lights, and an ATI Radeon X850 Pro video card.

One minute I was chatting with guildies in Ironforge in WoW, POP!, next minute I was staring at a blank screen. Mike had a power supply diagnostic tool--yep, it was DoA.

Luckily:

• I had an XConnect 500 watt power supply sitting around that I picked up cheap from Fry's--it was slated for my next computer build (the dual-core Athlon).


• The XConnect is an exceptionally attractive power supply! It is windowed and lit. ;P


• Nothing else was burned out by the old power supply blowing--I would have cried if it turned out I blew the CPU, mobo, expensive light-up RAM, or the brand-new video card

I had my misgivings about the old power supply. It was clear, but didn't seem well made. When I first got it and was using it to test some older motherboards I had on a shelf, it used to light up, but when I installed it into my clear PC, it no longer lit up. At the time, I was wondering if I was going senile, because I could have sworn that it used to light up. Well, now I have a nice, robust, name-brand power supply in the clear box. And I advise all of you--go with a name you know. :)