My computer is not working. I suspect that 2 fan heaters on the same multiplug board has damaged the power supply or worse. What can I expect please.

 

More likely to have damaged the multiway adapter.

 

sometimes when the PC power supply is tripped, it has to be unplugged from the outlet to reset, disconnect power cable from the back of the power supply, wait about 1 minute, plug it back in to see if it reset itself....

 

Please do not make multiple posts regarding the same problem.

 

Thanks for your first reply. As for your second about multiple, posts I misinterpreted the multiple options option.

About the question of the power supply; No, all the other appliances carry on working fine. Since the computer plug is first on the 4 plug socket extention and the power flows through that plug I assumed that 3000w from a fan heater further down the plug extention would cause a lesser rated appliance to blow; like the power supply on the computer which I would think, as a gateway into the computer, is the weakest link to protect the rest of the computer.

 

We don't know where you live.

In the States, homes generally have 120VAC 60Hz outlets. Most residential outlets have circuit breakers that are rated for 15 Amperes. This means that an appliance that needs greater than 120V x 15A = 1,800 Watts cannot be used, as it would exceed the 15A limit.

Heaters are usually purely resistive, but when you add a fan to the mix, you have an "inrush" current surge when it first starts up. This can reduce the available voltage to other appliances connected to the same circuit.

If you try to operate a switching power supply on a reduced voltage, it'll put added strain on it. You've probably fried your computer's power supply.

 

Thanks for your reply. I live in the uk. There were two fan heaters on the 4 plug in line adaptor and the computer plug was the first,,, I made a mistake there because I thought that if the computer plug was the last plug and the fan heaters were the first two (which incidentally were thermerstatically controlled going off and on all the time) it would not affect the computer. But somehow I put the computer plug before the fan heaters on the circuit which I would think naturally would draw the 4000w ththrough the computer plug. Would that be correct? Since I do not use the computer every day and there was a time period of about 3 or four days of inactivity I would not be able to pinpoint that point in time where the computer actually stopped working. Perhaps you can provide some more specifics about the uk power ratings.

 

I have never been to the UK. It is my understanding that you have 220VAC 50Hz power there, but I do not know what the typical current rating is for an outlet. You would have to look in your breaker box/fusebox to see what the breaker/fuse ratings are for the circuits in your residence.

 

Although in my work as a service engineer I have seen lots of fan heaters plugged into multiway adapters this is generally contrary to UK wiring regulations.
As such All About Circuits cannot take responsibility for any advice on the subject.

In the UK fan heaters generally come in 1/2/3 KW varieties.
A UK socket outlet is rated at a little over 3KW total.
Very few trailing adapters are rated for this, most are in the 1 - 2 KW range.

So I stand by my original statement.

 

Thanks for your reply. I live in the uk. There were two fan heaters on the 4 plug in line adaptor and the computer plug was the first,,, I made a mistake there because I thought that if the computer plug was the last plug and the fan heaters were the first two (which incidentally were thermerstatically controlled going off and on all the time) it would not affect the computer. But somehow I put the computer plug before the fan heaters on the circuit which I would think naturally would draw the 4000w ththrough the computer plug. Would that be correct?

The draw off of a typical 4-way would not care what order the devices were plugged in. When you use a splitter, you are still using 1 circuit from the panel.

The 4 way is a parallel device, allowing you to plug in something in to the first and fourth outlets and nothing in between and they still work.

You seem to think the power will go through the first device then into the second then third then fourth, This is not the case. It is supplied to all of them at once.

So it does not draw the 4,000 watts through the computer plug but around it. If you unplug the computer, the heaters still get power. If it went through it, the heaters would go off, like a string of old holiday lights with one bulb taken out.