300W PSU, enough for ECS k7s5a + Duron 1.0??

[waqasusman]

I currently have a 300Watt PSU, I am considering to buy an ECS k7s5a (or PC Chips 830, similar specs) with a Duron 1.0 (Morgan).
Should 300W be enough for this setup?
The other stuff I'd be installing:
VisionTek Xtasy 5632 32MB DDR (GTS-V)
128MB DDR RAM
CDROM
CDRW
Maxtor 80GB 7200RPM

 

[Peter]

Where's FAQ-Man when you need him?

Total wattage doesn't matter much. What you want is lots of punch on the +5V and +3.3V lines. Many many high-total-wattage PSUs are ridiculously limited in that area. I've seen "300W" units that had a 110W combined 3.3V+5.5V limitation. You want 25 amperes on +5V, and ample headroom on said total, 170 watts or so.

The K7S5A and M830LR boards are absolutely identical btw.

regards, Peter

 

[Peter]

double post, sorry.

 

[waqasusman]

Thanks Peter!
Actually, PSU issues are mostly discussed for the Athlon XP's or TBirds (from what I have read, at least), I thought may be the Athlons need to drive more power out than the Durons.

The sticker on my current PSU says:
Input 230V ~ 3A

Output: 300W
+3.3v 15A
+5v 25A
+12v 10A
+5VSB 1.5A
-5V 0.5A
-12V 0.5A

Which PSU should I look for? (350W or 400W or other specs??)

I don't want to buy any expensive one, I won't overclock, but it should at least be enough for this Duron Setup (I think Durons need less power, right?).
Thank you again,
have a nice Day!

 

[Copperpipe]

waqasus,

It looks like your PSU might handle it and if I were you I'd give it a try. But no guarantees cuz the K7S5A is very picky about the adequacy and quality of the power supply.

I've got 2 K7S5A's with 1 ghz/266 FSB and 900 mhz Tbirds which work fine in Compusa (FMI) 300 W and Antec SX830 300 W cases....both working fine. They have 150 W and 160 W, respectively, TCO on 5V/3.3V rails, which is comparable to your PSU....both systems have CD burners, CDROM drive, 3.5" floppies, one with same video card as yours (other with Diamond Viper II), both with Diamond MX300 sound cards, and both with 384 MB PC-133 RAM running at Ultra/2T/6T/3T BIOS settings. I think your case with the 1 ghz Duron will probably be OK since it takes less power than my Tbirds.

I thought my 900 Tbird (in CompUSA case) was getting a little unstable after I overclocked it to 1008 so I upgraded the PSU to 400 W but the problem turned out to be a Windows problem and not the PSU.

 

[Peter]

waqasusman, mind the fine print. Underneath that amperage table, there might be a line saying "5V plus 3.3V combined load must not exceed xxx watts", and it's a high rating there that you're after.

regards, Peter

 

[waqasusman]

Thanks Copperpipe and Peter,
I'll try the older one, apparently it should work with the Duron 1.0 since, as you said, it draws less power than Athlons, but then the ECS boards are also picky....

I didn't find anything like

<< "5V plus 3.3V combined load must not exceed xxx watts >>

on the sticker on the PSU, can't find the booklet that came with it (I don't remember if there was any technical info on that booklet)

Thanks,
and btw my name is Waqas Usman.

 

[MIDIman]

Total wattage doesn't matter much. What you want is lots of punch on the +5V and +3.3V lines. Many many high-total-wattage PSUs are ridiculously limited in that area. I've seen "300W" units that had a 110W combined 3.3V+5.5V limitation. You want 25 amperes on +5V, and ample headroom on said total, 170 watts or so.

I have a 300w Antec PP-303X (not XP)...is this going to work with the latest XP CPUs (or even Durons for that matter), or was that the whole purpose of Antec releasing the "XP version?"

Box says +5 = 4.0A-30.0A, +3.3V = 3.0A-14.0A / +5 and +3.3 combined = 150W max.

Thanks guys.

 

[Peter]

150 watts is tight for an XP and a fast graphics card. With a Duron and a midrange card, you'll be fine. (See, that PSU, if you max out the +5V rail, allows ZERO load on the 3.3V line. Talk about marketing vs. reality.)

Folks please note, AGAIN, the ECS boards aren't "picky to PSUs".

It's rather that a PSU that, by the simplest rules of system design, is inadequate for the power demands of the devices behind it, will cause some sort of problem.

With the ECS boards, which typically don't have any overkill circuitry to buffer off poorly regulated voltage input (which is what you get from an overstressed PSU), you'll get unstable operation from an underpowered PSU right from the 1st minute.

Is that better or worse than a more tolerant board that lets that overstressed PSU go unnoticed until it dies, possibly taking some of your expensive equipment with it in its final breath?

At the risk of repeating myself: Do the math, and use an adequate PSU. Watch the fine print while shopping.

regards, Peter