my NAS died a couple of days ago with zero sign of life.

Graham Sutherland / Polynomial

I was fumbling around a bit trying to plug stuff in 'cos it's pretty cramped back there, and when I look in with my phone light I notice that the new cable is actually plugged into the *exact same port* the old cable was. the port is fine.

plug the old cable back in and try it. doesn't work. plug the new cable in. it works.

what the actual fuck

Graham Sutherland / Polynomial

this is a straight IEC-IEC, no fuse, it's just regular copper wire. and I read 230VAC just fine over it. but the PSU won't power up with that cable.

Graham Sutherland / Polynomial

I've tested continuity and resistance. the cable is fine. L-L, N-N, G-G, no continuity between the lines, resistance reads good (within 10% of other IECs I have). it's been powering my NAS for *years* without issue. I get 230V on the output when I plug it in. but *neither* my old PSU or new PSU will power on when plugged into it.

I am *SO* confused

Graham Sutherland / Polynomial

the only thing I can think of is if the cable somehow thermal cycled in a weird way and the contacts are *only just* making contact so when plugged in it's showing 230V when unloaded but the contact resistance is high enough to tank the mains voltage as soon as it tries to power on? but then you'd think the PSU would hiccup rather than just not powering on (I guess maybe mains UVLO protection could prevent that or something? idk)

this is one of the weirdest failure cases I've ever had

Graham Sutherland / Polynomial

wiggling the connector around does nothing though. I see no fluctuation on the multimeter at all and, no matter how I apply pressure to either end, the old PSU (which works fine, so sadly I bought a new PSU for £120 for no reason) will not power on with this cable. extremely bizarre.

Graham Sutherland / Polynomial

wait it gets EVEN MORE CURSED

I grabbed a BS1363 (UK plug) to IEC cable. I plugged the problematic IEC-IEC cable into it. then I grabbed another known-good IEC-IEC and plugged it into that. so I have a chain of BS1363-IEC, IEC-IEC (bad), IEC-IEC (good).

I get 230V at the output.

I plug it into the old PSU.

it will not power on.

CABLE'S HAUNTED

Ryan Castellucci :nonbinary_flag:

@gsuberland You were around for the thread where I discovered that ghost voltages are a thing, right?

Graham Sutherland / Polynomial

@ryanc ????

Ryan Castellucci :nonbinary_flag:

@gsuberland There was a wire in my wall with something like 143V on it, yet when I grounded it with kynar wire the kynar wire survived.

Graham Sutherland / Polynomial

@ryanc oh right yeah you get weird floating shit in old house wires

Richard "mtfnpy" Harman

@ryanc @gsuberland that reminds me getting 9vAC on a 240vAC line for an air conditioner.

Me: "This is wrong. This is impossibly wrong. Time to replace this wire."

Ryan Castellucci :nonbinary_flag:

@gsuberland It's not even old, lolsob

John Timaeus

@ryanc

I had a 1920s house (US, so 110v standard) that would put 220 to the light over the stove if you turned on the garbage disposal while the microwave was running. Burned out a lot of incandescent bulbs. Made the first CFL I put in explode at the base.

There were also outlets with constant 110 between neutral and ground, 220 between live and ground.

I spent a lot on wire for that place.

@gsuberland

Ryan Castellucci :nonbinary_flag:

@johntimaeus @gsuberland I had the main house completely gutted. Previous owner DIY'd the workshop, and the garden office is a prefab thing that for some reason has wiring with nonstandard color.