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Reviews For: Astron SS-30/M

Category: Power Supplies

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Review Summary For : Astron SS-30/M
Reviews: 98MSRP: 120 to $160
Description:
30 Amp Switching Power Supply (SS-30M with meters) (SS-30 no meters)
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.astroncorp.com/switching-desktop
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
00984
N6IHC Rating: 2008-09-03
DEAD AFTER 2 MONTHS Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I used mine very occasionally to run a dual band mobile in receive mode...about a quarter amp draw. A few days ago it started putting out 14.5v and then it would drop to 3v. Turning the supply off and on would cause it to return to 14.5v (high, in my opinion) for a short while...then it would drop again to 3v.

I boxed it up and sent to Astron for service yesterday. We'll see how they do on their warranty service...but at this point I'm wishing I had purchased a "traditional" power supply from Astron.

I guess the nice thing about this light weight switching supply is that it only cost $7 to ship back for service.

Guess I'll have to go back to my 1979 radio shack supply for a few weeks until Astron returns this one.

Chris Boyer
kc6uqg
KC9MLL Rating: 2008-06-01
Works Great! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I bought my Astron SS-30M before I read the reviews. A friend of mine has one, and I was impressed with how it worked, Looked and sounded.

I have mine hooked to a Kenwood TS-2000
So far, I haven't ran into any bugs.
Runs quiet and no RF bleed or noise.

I am very pleased! GOOD JOB ASTRON!
W7TUS Rating: 2008-04-11
Not Good for communications equipment Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
Somewhere between reading all the great reviews and the time I ordered the Astron SS-30, Astron must have changed the design of their power supply. It's awful! It has very loud RF noise every 46KHZ on most of the lower freq. bands. Don't buy it! I'm really lucky that Hamcity.com is such a great company and let me return it.
WX0B Rating: 2008-04-04
RF NOISE Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I see all these glowing reports and got to wonder why mine is so full of broadband switching noise.
Here's the story. I took a product we make to a certified FCC testing lab, put it in a 10m chamber and hooked up my 35M supply to give it 12VDC and we did an initial scan. Guess what: broad band noise from 30-300+ MHz. (FCC doesn't require emmissive testing below 30MHz) But we checked below 30MHz anyway and it was full of noise, way over the 30uV/meter allowable between 30 and 100MHz. We took a sniffer and found that the emissions were from the Astron supply. Fortunately I also brought along a linear supply, we put that in place of the Astron and bingo everything is passing. So the moral of the story is this. Make yourself a coax loop probe and plug it into your radio, or spectrum analyzer if you have one and probe your Astron supply or any switch mode supply you are using. Open the filters up and listen for broadband noise and birdies. You may be suprised at what you find.
Now I agree that my new Astron supply may be defective, but these switch mode supply guys are switching the gates as fast as they can to try to up the efficiency of the devices in them. They need to slow them down and kill some noise. How this supply will pass FCC and CE emmissions is amazing to me. They must have had a good one, and then changed the design to save a penny or two. Sure they are reliable, and are light weight, but do you really know how much noise they are adding to your TRX? Mine is no longer driving any radios.
K9EX Rating: 2008-02-04
Latest Design Very Poor Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
This review is for the very latest SS-30M that is being imported by Astron and does not apply to the non-metered version, the SS-30 (which is briefly discussed at the end of this review)...

The truth is, I wanted to love this little power supply. After 12 years of faithful service, my Astron RS-35 became "voltage challenged" so I began my search for a new power supply.

The SS-30M seemed to fit the bill and proportedly, had no RF or noise issues. So, I took the plunge and quickly discovered several design flaws and one fatal flaw. And I went through two SS-30M units before settling on the SS-30 (without meters).

First, design-wise, understand that if you are moving from one of Astron's traditional linear supplies, you will need to spend an additional $60 to $125 for a DC distribution panel if you purchase an Astron switching power supply. (Your dealer won't tell you this, so I will!)

Why?

Because Astron uses two very small set screw terminals for the rear power connectors versus the large threaded bolts used in their traditional linear supplies. These small set screw terminals can accommodate about one pair of 12 gauge wires - that's it - no more.

The result? You can realistically make just one power connection to this power supply.

The solution? You must spend an additional $60 to $125 for a 12 VDC distribution gadget (from RigRunner, MFJ, etc.), assuming you want to use this supply to power more than one radio or accessory in your shack.

This is just plain bizarre and a real step backwards in convenience for most users.

The next design flaw involves the small screws used in the power connectors. On both units I briefly owned, one of the set screws on each unit was so tight, that it was very obvious that it had never been used. I'm talking "break the head off the screw tight." And indeed, that did occur.

Clearly no Q/A testing is going on at Astron with the latest version of the SS-30M.

Next we have the meters. Previous versions of this product had unlit meters. The latest version of this product has lit meters, but they are flawed in several respects.

First, the meters are now indeed lit, but the intensity (brightness level) actually changes from subtle to bright the moment something draws current from the supply (i.e, the moment you turn on your radio or accessory).

Even worse, the now brighter meters flash back and forth from bright to subtle as you transmit on CW. Hard to believe, but true.

The ammeter is not even close to actual during real current loads, except perhaps at low amperage (i.e, receive current loads).

The volt meter on the two units I tried both read considerably higher (14.5 - 15) out of the box than the measured output of 13.89 VDC.

You may wonder: why doesn't Astron adjust the voltmeters before shipping, such as during Q/A testing? Well, that's assuming that Astron actually does Q/A testing on these units - they don't, or at least didn't with these two units.

Next up is the fan. The fan on this supply is very loud and is not easily tamed by headphones. Not a deal breaker for me, but it may be for you.

Now, the deal breaker for anyone. The final (and fatal) flaw involves the S9 RFI signal on the 40 meter band that is nicely spaced every 40 kHz up and down the band. Better yet, this S9 signal slowly drifts downward in frequency - the last straw to a clearly untested and very poorly designed product.

Obviously, I was not happy with my two SS-30M units and clearly, Astron has some major issues with the very latest (Feb, 2008) release of the SS-30M. But this story has a happy ending...

I appreciated the appearance and size of the SS-30M, so before completely ditching Astron for another Chinese product, the understanding dealer suggested that I try the non-metered version, the plain-Jane SS-30. This turned out to be excellent advice.

The SS-30, without meters, is indeed a fabulous power supply. It's extremely quiet, has absolutely no RF oscillations and in fact, has changed my mind about switching power supplies for use with HF radios. The fan even seems quieter than the metered version and the overall fit and finish is more in line with the Astron we all know and respect.

Perhaps Astron recently switched vendors/factories in China? Hard to say, but there's no excuse for poor design with no Q/A. No excuse at all, Astron.
KJ5ES Rating: 2007-08-29
Great Power Supply Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Great Power Supply! Works just like it should. Voltage was dead on out of the box and has simply sat on the shelf and done its job for a year now. I use it to power an FT-897D and assorted lights/battery chargers. No problems. Frankly I am suprised to see this (or any Astron) with a rating less than 5.

On the down side, I have to say that meter lights seem too obvious to have been left out...but they were. I added 12VDC Grain-of-Wheat bulbs to it and it looks great. As a side note, if you are thinking of doing this mod, go for it! I drilled two small holes on the top of the meters and laid the bulb over the hole. The light shines down on the meters as intended BUT it also lights up the inside of the case and leaks that beautiful golden light out the vent holes giving it a very "old time" look. Probably the best "visual" mod I have ever done.

Bottom line...GREAT SUPPLY.
N1RSR Rating: 2007-07-31
OK but nothing spectacular Time Owned: more than 12 months.

It does what it's supposed to do, but not so elegantly.

The connectors on the back are terrible. Not much of an issue if you are only hooking up one radio or something, but the setup stinks for trying to hook up multiple devices. Eventually I broke one of the posts and had to redo the whole thing, using a pair of binding posts from radio shack and a hot glue gun.

The other docked point is for the fan- instead of having a rational scheme like a continually variable fan, it just turns itself on and off as needed. Not a huge nit but you'd figure they could have designed the circuit a little bit better.

Verdict- Not a bad supply but if I was going to do it all over again I would have just picked up an RS-35M, for the sake of getting normal power posts and not having to deal with fans and minor RFI. (I had minor RFI issues with this thing initially, but only with an indoor antenna. )

If you don't need the weight savings skip this
and get an RS-35M/A.

-Mike






KB0LPI Rating: 2007-07-25
Does the job well, but meters are wacked Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
I use this PS with my IC-718 at full power and SCAF-1. No shutdowns, no RFI, does the job it's intended to do and does it well. It did actually shut down once on a hot sunny day in direct sunlight. Throwing a white towel over it fixed that problem.
It's a 4 not a 5 because the Volt meter was .5 V off out of the box, (I adjusted and fixed) and the Ammeter readings were about 25% of actual.
W4TME Rating: 2007-05-10
Excellent Switching P/S Time Owned: more than 12 months.
This power supply ROCKS! No RFI and puts out a solid 25 amps continuous full duty cycle. Great for portable use or permanently in a shack.

N6PE - why such a low review? The fan is easily modified for "silent running". One 100 ohm resistor and 10 seconds of spare time to solder it across the thermistor contacts. TA DA!

Yep, the meters are not lit, but so what. Doesn't everyone have a light in their shack? :-) BTW, there is an easy mod for meter lighting too

-Tim
N6PE Rating: 2007-05-09
You wanna buy it? Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
Received with voltage out over 15 volts and meters out of calibration, OK after adjusting.

No lights in meters.

My fan is louder than my Alpha 78, other people don't seem to have that problem. Asked Astron if they had an upgrade, no response.

Had to rig extra power connectors to feed HF and 2 M radio off the beast.

No smoke leaks yet or RFI problems, but the 78 is off line.