Is 14 volts to high for PSU 12 output ?

[Bill Schaible]

I put in a new, less-noisy PSU - an ASPIRE AS420W model. It is a 'bulk' PSU
and there is very little info for it on the internet. The A7V266 BIOS says
the 12 volt power is 13.4 volts. ASUS Probe says it's 14.1 volts. I
believe there was very close agreement between BIOS and Probe for the old
PSU that I replaced with the ASPIRE. I have no idea why the two values are
so different now. But more important, the value was within 5% for the old
PSU. I am concerned that the higher voltage from the ASPIRE will cause
stress on something and cause a hardware failure. But maybe the high
voltage is Ok - I don't know. Maybe it's supposed to be this way, so if the
PC creates a higher load on the 12v output the voltage goes down but stays
within acceptable range. The load condition where I get the 13.4 and 14.1
readings consists of 2 hard drives and 3 expansion cards and CPU load less
than 5%. I can take this PSU back to the store and get an exchange. But
maybe the high voltage is Ok. I would appreciate hearing what anyone here
thinks about the high voltage readings and why there is such a difference
between the values reported by BIOS and Probe.

 

[DaveW]

You risk burning out some of your computer components with that
over-voltage. Return it.