Turn on power supply

[yogi55]

Hi All
I've been been working on building a media center to hold all my dvd's,cd's tapes,ect.ect.ect. would like to dramaitze some pieces of art also.would like to do this using LED's (12-20) but since they take 3.5 vdc to lite I thought of using old power supply(5yrs. old) from previous bult computer.only thing is getting power supply to kick on.Tried going from pin labeled pwr button to ground ,nothing.any hints would help.
thanks
yogi

[doctorhardware]

If it is an ATX power supply, you can turn it on by shorting the green wire and the black wire next to the green wire. The green wire is on the connector that goes to the motherboard. The motherboard is the one that sends the signal to the power supply to turn on. Remember that the led's will need a 1000 ohm dropping on each of the led's.

[Samson.Real5]

If it is an ATX power supply the motherboard is the one that sends the signal to the power supply to turn on. Remember different supply have a different volts so note that you check the power supply.

Gabriel

[doctorhardware]

Well since I build and also work for a major retailer working on computers. I know what I am talking about. The turn on signal from the motherboard grounds the green wire.

[browneye]

Well I went round and round with a couple power supplies and found some variants, units used in some HP's for example grounding pin 14 a white wire turned them on.

Dave

[doctorhardware]

That is due to HP making it so that you have to buy their replacement if the power supply fails. Dell does this also. They make a lot of money off of the replacements. It does not follow the ATX standard.