Question:Two power supplies in one machine ?? ??(3 answers) ?? ???Closed 7 years ago. ?
I have an old Pentium-M based Shuttle PC that is great as a backup NAS solution at home, where I prefer low power consumption over speed.
It only has two SATA ports. ?However it has a PCI slot and I have a 4-port PCI card.
So my plan is this:
- Put the Pentium-M, PCI card, etc. into a case and let it use its native power supply (which is an external brick)
- Install a second 450W power supply in the case and use it to power 4 SATA disks. ?Their SATA connectors would then plug into the PCI SATA card.
To be clear…the second 450W would not be plugged into the Pentium-M’s motherboard ?Only the HDD power (and maybe some fans).
However…would the second 450W power supply actually spin up? ?If I power it on, would it supply power to the hard drives, or does it need to be plugged into a motherboard to actually provide juice?
Answer: With the 450W power supply not connected to the motherboard, you’ll need another way to switch it on.
You’ll need to create a short between the PS_ON and Gnd pins on the power supply connector that normally attaches to the motherboard. ?Here is a guide. ?Hopefully your power supply has a switch on the back, then you just need to short the two pins on the connector, wrap it up with several layers of electrical tape, and use the switch on the back of the power supply.
Note, as already mentioned make sure the hard drives are powered on before you power on the PC.