Asus ROG STRIX 1200W Platinum ATX 3.1 Power Supply Coil Whine

[South_511]

Is anyone having coil whine on their Asus ROG STRIX 1200W Platinum ATX 3.1 Power Supply?

Recently installed and getting whine at idle states well as when moving the mouse it's making noise seems to be getting worse. Previously had a Asus ROG Strix 1000W PSU in it which made no noise at all, have another of this same PSU but 850W same thing no noise.

Replaced a NZXT C1200 ATX 3.1 with the Asus because of coil whine but it wasn't as bad as the Asus wondering if it is inherent to the 1200W designs as both should be Seasonic designs. Anyway has anyone gotten their PSU replaced for this reason? Purchased via Amazon so will have them send out a replacement and just switch the unit not have to re-wire the entire PC again.

Thanks

[Silent_Scone]

Hi @South_511 

Mouse movement is basically a load-transient trigger.

Coil" whine or inductor noise is a natural phenomenon.

1) Interaction between the PSU and graphics card can result in louder coil whine.

2) Coil whine is related to frequency and current.

3) Rapid changes in current demands (such as rapid load modulation when transitioning from low power state) is a major contributor to piezoelectric noise (some capacitor types are more prone to this).

4) As ripple frequency and other sources of power related noise can impact the level of coil whine, some combinations of psu and graphics cards may exhibit more noise than others. For a vendor, it is very difficult to account for all permutations because cost is a factor if you want to increase resilience to coil whine. There is only so much a vendor will or can do.

5) As current plays a part, the amount of audible whine will vary from system to system.

Take the side panel off and localise the source (PSU vs GPU vs CPU VRM). If it’s loud from normal seating distance and you’re within the return window, a retailer exchange is a reasonable A/B test, but it’s not automatically a “fault” in the reliability sense.

Some coil/inductor noise is within normal operation for PSUs, GPUs and motherboard VRMs. Whether it’s audible depends on resonance, load behaviour, and even your case acoustics, so “it makes a noise” alone doesn’t necessarily mean there is a problem. You could put that same unit into another system and it be completely silent.