Power Supply Worry

[Trajan]

I'll be upgrading several parts in my computer next week. I'm putting in a Q6600, 780i motherboard, 2GB DDR2 800 RAM, and a 8800 GTS 512MB. My worry is that I have an Antec 500 watt PSU dual 12V. Will it be enough to provide what is needed to properly power all these parts?

I know that more power is always better but I already spent close to $1000 for all this stuff and I'm pretty much cleaned out for now, until at least the next couple of months.

[Doono]

Without the model number I can't tell you because I don't know the strength of those 12v rails in amps, but in all honesty if your only using one graphics card then you proably will be fine, sli would be a different matter though. Still post the psu's name.

[Trajan]

The +12V rails are 18A each. Yeah, I don't plan to go SLI anytime soon.

[Doono]

yer that should be plenty of juice, is this 8800GTS one of those new ones? If it is it should use less power than the old ones anyway.

Edit: it's a 512MB model, it's the new one.

[Trajan]

Thanks Doono for help, +rep to you.

[Metellus]

I have a very similar question, I also have a 500W supply which is 12v, 18amps each. However I am thinking of upgrading to two 8600GT cards with SLI. Is 500W enough for that?

[Doono]

yer thats plenty as long as you arn't using a lot of hard drives.

How much will you be paying for these cards? Im going to assume you already own one, because i would seriously consider selling one and buying a Radeon 3850, even two 8600GT's are only about 80% of the power of a single Radeon 3850

[Metellus]

yer thats plenty as long as you arn't using a lot of hard drives.

How much will you be paying for these cards? Im going to assume you already own one, because i would seriously consider selling one and buying a Radeon 3850, even two 8600GT's are only about 80% of the power of a single Radeon 3850

Thanks for the advice, you're the second person on TWC to advise me to go for the Radeon 3850. In fact since posting this I've decided against getting the two 8600s and am buying a single 3870 instead!

[nightwar]

http://www.extreme.outervision.com/index.jsp

[spartan_phalanx]

Just to give an idea... I run a 640MB 8800GTS with an E6600 @ 3.0GHz on a Gigabyte G33 motherboard and two 750GB WD harddrives and according to my readings my peak boot-time power consumption comes to 210W, and while watching TV idles @ 175W.

So your supply should be more than adequate. Again as others have said it's amps on the 12V rails and the efficiency that play the biggest parts.

[jimmy spong]

500 w is enough for everything

[Trajan]

Hmmm, I've been getting the opposite at the EVGA and XFX forums. They say that I might experience problems with the 500watt with my soon to be new setup. They said that it might be ok, if I don't overclock, but I should get a more powerful one ASAP.

It seems like PC upgrading is a never ending situation and a very costly one at bat. Once I upgrade my PSU, what's next, a new DVD drive? Anyways, a 750 watt should be more than enough. I have my eyes on the Thermaltake toughpower W0117RU and will try to get it next week, if not this week.

[jimmy spong]

Hmmm, I've been getting the opposite at the EVGA and XFX forums. They say that I might experience problems with the 500watt with my soon to be new setup. They said that it might be ok, if I don't overclock, but I should get a more powerful one ASAP.

It seems like PC upgrading is a never ending situation and a very costly one at bat. Once I upgrade my PSU, what's next, a new DVD drive? Anyways, a 750 watt should be more than enough. I have my eyes on the Thermaltake toughpower W0117RU and will try to get it next week, if not this week.

well might be if they live in africa but...

[Spiff]

Yeah 500 should be plenty, though it depends on the quality of the make really. My flatmate has a good 500W PSU and has overclocked his processor (same one as yours) by 65% or so - though admittedly he has a good water cooling solution as well. So go for a well known brand and you should be fine.

With regard to the video card, make sure you get one of the newer GTS cards, or failing that a GT - the old GTS cards are still available but there's no reason to buy one when the new GT range is essentially the same price but performs much better.

[Doono]

you will be fine with 500 watts, and I would avoid thermaltake psu's, stick with better brands, tagen, enermax, antec, ocz/fsp. Alot of thermaltake psu's don't run stable at higher loads. But i dont see any reason why 500 watt won't be enough for your setup.

Edit: I had a look around and the recommended wattage is over 400Watt for the 8800GT and 30 ish amps on the 12v so your fine with that setup.

[Trajan]

What's the worse that could happen if power demand exceeds 500watts? Damage to my parts?

Besides the parts I've already listed in the first post, there's also going to be 2 hard drives (320GB & 200GB), 1 DVD ROM drive, 1 DVD/CD Burner drive, and a Creative X-FI XtremeMusic sound card. I might be forgetting something else, don't know ATM.

@Spiff

I have a EVGA 8800 GTS 512MB (G92) on it's way or whenever EVGA gets around to shipping my card. I'm using my old XFX 7900GT 256MB for now.

you will be fine with 500 watts, and I would avoid thermaltake psu's, stick with better brands, tagen, enermax, antec, ocz/fsp. Alot of thermaltake psu's don't run stable at higher loads.

I thought Thermaltake was a good brand. When I was looking around at Newegg for a good 750watt, the Thermaltake had the most and best reviews.

[Spiff]

Well im not exactly an authority on the issue but I imagine a variety of things could happen: the PSU could overheat and shut off, it could literally blow up (ie smoke coming out the back.. never good when that happens).

My friends PSU which came in an off-the-shelf computer just stopped working, it didnt damage any other components and just needed replacing. Similarly though a bad PSU could break your motherboard in a worst case scenario.


Basically its just probably not worth taking the risk of saving some money and going for an unknown brand, especially if you plan on overclocking. The rails on a bad PSU may not be able to provide a reliable amount of volts to your components even if the PSU is rated as having a high wattage, for example.

[Trajan]

So you wouldn't recommend Thermaltake too? Maybe I'll just stick with Antec.

Edit: What do you guys think of the Antec TruePower Quattro 850W?

[Spiff]

So you wouldn't recommend Thermaltake too? Maybe I'll just stick with Antec.

Edit: What do you guys think of the Antec TruePower Quattro 850W?

http://www.wikihow.com/Buy-a-Power-Supply

has a nice list of brands:

Top Quality (based upon electrical capabilities): PC Power & Cooling, Seasonic, Zippy, Silverstone, Enermax, Antec, Acbel, Akasa, AMS, Channel, Corsair, Etasis, Hiper, Mushkin, OCZ, NZXT, Scythe, Tagan, Thermaltake, Ultra, Zalman.

Low Quality (based upon RMA rate and intended application of value-line computers): A-TOP, Aerocool, APEX, Aspire, Asus, ATADC, Athena Power, ATRIX, BFG, Broadway, Coolmax, Deer, Delta, Diablotek, Dynapower, EagleTech, Enhance, Enlight, E-Power, FOXCONN, Futurepower, I-Star, InWin, JPAC, Just PC, Kingwin, Linkworld, Lite-On, Logisys, Masscool, MGE, MSI, NMEDIAPC, Norwood Micro, NorthQ, Powmax, Q-Tec, Raidmax, Rosewill, SFC, Sintek, Shuttle, Skyhawk, Spire, Star Micro, STARTECH, Sunbeam, TOPOWER, TTGI, Wintech, XClio, XION, YoungYear, Zebronics.

Disputed Brands (deemed to be of good quality, but needing referenced reviews or articles): CoolerMaster, HIPRO.

[Freddie]

I'll be upgrading several parts in my computer next week. I'm putting in a Q6600, 780i motherboard, 2GB DDR2 800 RAM, and a 8800 GTS 512MB. My worry is that I have an Antec 500 watt PSU dual 12V. Will it be enough to provide what is needed to properly power all these parts?

I know that more power is always better but I already spent close to $1000 for all this stuff and I'm pretty much cleaned out for now, until at least the next couple of months.

The process used to manufacture the Q6600 has been refined and tweaked by Intel, it's power output is as good as it gets for a processor of it's type. Try and find the SLACR 95W edition if you can it’s rated at just 95 watts. The 8800 GTS uses up to 220 watts under load, so you should have plenty of juice left in the tank to overclock you CPU. I’m not sure how many amps your going to need but 32 should be enough Antec is a good 2 tier PSU manufacturer.