Is there anything special about the 12v led light power supplies? Can they be used to power other 12v items? (In particualr auxilluary power to a computer graphics card)


150 W for £10 Like this on ebay 281816675316

They are described as "regulated" power supplies so should be fined.
Cheaper ones are "switch mode" and are electrically noisy which can cause interference.

150 W seems a huge amount for a graphics card?

I use a couple of these in my 3D printers - they are stable and generally give close to the advertised power. I do not know how smooth the output is, i.e. ripple and noise, and how this may affect computers (my printer controllers cope all right though). It wouldn't be too difficult to add a few capacitors to the output to get rid of any unwanted ripple/noise.

You will have to be careful with the packaging, as the mains power connectors are very exposed - one of mine lives in a metal box, and the other is within the metal framework of its printer. Both the box and the metal-framed printer have protective earths.

Afterthought - I forgot to mention that the ones with built-in cooling fans can be very noisy (audio noise, not electrical noise). In their designed roles this didn't matter, but may be annoying next to your home PC. My wife usually shuts the door when I'm running a printer!


[Edited on 27/8/16 by David Jenkins]

Why would you need auxiliary power for a graphics card? Isn't your psu up to powering it?

2nd card. I think psu is at its limit so would be relatively cheap way to sort* it, and no, i cant get bigger W psu since its bespoke.

* = computer freezes after maybe 30 mins, cards sit side by side so on one card there is 10 mm air gap for fan compared to fan being in free air on other card so it gets quite hot, 90 C, it could be shutting down to temp so may not be psu wattage. Im working on that too, a fan with cowl to increase amount of air to the card fan.

, annoyingly moving cards further apart is not possible due to mboard power connector getting in the way.