Interesting finding in PowerMac11,2 (PSU)

[netsrot39]

Hello,
I've recently aquired another PowerMac G5 (Late 2005) for cheap which unfortunately got damaged in shipping (the case that is). I'm currently transferring the hardware inside from the demolished case to another undamaged spare case which I happen to have. In the past I already bought 3 PowerMac G5s which were all late 2005 models (2x 2.3 GHz DC, 1x 2.0 GHz DC). I already disassembled every PowerMac G5 I own entirely for deep cleaning since the G5s tend to get really filthy inside over time. I rebuilt the 2x 2.3 GHz ones and kept the 2.0 GHz disassembled for spare parts (hence the spare case). Anyways, I've found something really interesting with my latest G5 purchase, namely a PSU that was unknown to me.

The PSU that was in my G5 was a Lite-On one as shown above and looks something like that inside:

A quite interesting find for me since all the previous G5s I disassembled came with AcBel power supply units:

They also have a different design on the inside:

I did some digging on the web and found out that those Lite-On power supply units supposedly only came in the PowerMac G5s Quad (again mine is a dual core 2.3 GHz). I checked the bottom of my demolished case and found out that that particular G5 was assembled in China (while the other 3 I have were assembled in Ireland). I wasn't even aware of the fact that there were G5s built in China and thought the G5 was an Ireland exclusive or something like that. Could it be that the G5s from China came with Lite-On power supplies or was it really supposed to be for the Quad only? I could also imagine they ran out of AcBel power supplies and used leftovers in order to keep assembling. I'd really appreciate it if someone has more insight into this since I'm kind of interested in the history of those machines.

To conclude my post, I'd like to point out that the two models of PSUs also behave differently:
the AcBel PSU clicks when plugged into and unplugged from an outlet
the Lite-On does neither of those things (and after first plugging it in I thought "damn, that Mac is toast" – not the case at all fortunately)

One more thing: The AcBel PSUs apparently fail more often according to this source. At least in my case all PSUs are still working without issues (knocking on wood) and I hope that will be the case for the foreseeable future.

What are your experiences regarding the PSUs of the late 2005 PowerMac G5?

 

[ervus]

That is interesting; thanks for sharing those pictures. The lite-on has an interesting foil wound transformer (or plain inductor?) that I've not seen before.

To answer your question I have just about zero experience with any G5 but I have acbel power supplies working in a few G4 towers. I've repaired several acbel MDD supplies (bad caps) but the older ones have all worked great for me. I even had one that was pretty crispy from a dead fan that still worked fine. I fixed the fan and it's still going right now.

 

[B S Magnet]

I checked the bottom of my demolished case and found out that that particular G5 was assembled in China (while the other 3 I have were assembled in Ireland). I wasn't even aware of the fact that there were G5s built in China and thought the G5 was an Ireland exclusive or something like that.

My G5 tower was manufactured in the U.S., probably California (but I still haven’t parsed where “G8” is located, plant-wise).

Given the impressive heft of G5 and classic Mac Pro towers (much like the iMac G3s and eMacs with their CRTs, some of which were even made in Czechia!), it was likely that the manufacturing of these towers was divvied between three factory-regions (the PRC for Asia and Oceania; Cork for Europe, the Middle East, and Africa; and the U.S., for the Americas), as ground and/or ocean container shipping would be an absolute necessity for moving product units that heavy and bulky, but in mass quantities.

Relatively fewer of these were probably air-shipped from factory, unlike the way iPhones, iPads, and laptops tend to be (especially so in advance of product launch time). Weight/bulk considerations may also be why, due to steady worldwide demand, Apple resumed assembling post-2010-era iMacs not just in the PRC and Cork, but also in California.

Similarly, albeit from a different procurement solution perspective, this may be why Apple chose to dramatically slow down the product cycle for the post-classic Mac Pro models, post-2012, with multi-year runs, as having them all assembled in one location (Austin, Texas, I believe) allows them to send them out at a steady rate, with all materials for assembly headed to one factory destination. Even so, there was a moment a few years ago when a certain screw, unique to the Mac Pro (can’t remember whether it was the trash can or the current cheese grater), was unavailable, holding up the entire assembly line until the screw supply could be replenished.

tl;dr: General components in G5s made in different locales likely had multiple vendors specific to region or demand — not unlike when Apple sourced from three different manufacturers to provide identical-spec LCDs in clamshell iBooks, to satisfy factory manufacturing demand and/or distribution considerations.