Do I need a 400W PS?

[CityRoamer]

I am building a new system and am wondering if I need a 400W PS or can live with a 330W PS. Will upgrading speed up any computer processes, will I notice the difference? For the components I have, will I need to upgrade?

My soon to be system:
Abit KG7 (No Raid)
AMD Athlon XP1700
512MB DDR PC2100 Crucial (2 DIMMS)
Gainward Geforce2 Ti 450
19" Monitor
Altec Lansing AVS500 5pc Speakers
Sound Blaster Live 5.1
Maxtor 60GB 7200RPM
TDK 24x10x40 CD-RW
Toshiba 16X DVD-ROM

 

[Gunslinger08]

You should be good with the 330 watt one.. I'm assuming it's a name brand PSU though, approved by AMD?

 

[AkumaBao]

I agree with JS. You could even get away with a good 300Watt.

 

[S0me1X]

I am running a similiar setup, (with 1.33 ghz tbird instead of your xp1700), on a measly 250w power supply.

 

[chizow]

The only time you *need* a new PSU is if your system won't boot up. If your system is running fine with a lighter PSU, upgrading to a higher rated one will not speed up your system per se. If you wish to overclock or add more components, your PSU will affect your results. If your PSU isn't up to the task it may make your system instable if you try to OC, or it may not boot at all. If you add more drives, fans, components etc, it may push your PSU over the edge and cause problems. Also, poor PSUs can have a negative effect on the life span of your components. Power spikes and poor quality supply can accelerate component failure.

Chiz

 

[Jen]

all you need is a good powersupply..........not all powersupply's are that good even those rated at 400 watts



Jen

 

[MrChicken]

I guess this depends on how you want to load your ps, a good quality 300 watt should work. A 350 would do the same job and still give you some head room for future upgrades, and 400 should leave you set for a long time.

My preference is to overbuild, as an example: I would rather have a 400 watt supply pushing say 250 watts than a 300 watt pushing the same 250 watts. Sure the 300 is rated for it and can do it, but it doesnt do it as easily and a couple years (months maybe) down the road when the supply isnt as good as it was when new, you might start seeing strange crashes and lockups.

I like the Antec supplies, and the sweet spot money wise appears to be the 350 watt from them, it should be more than enough for most systems. Being the guy that I am, I went for the 400 anyway.

You dont mention what case you are going to use, and as you are going to need some serious cooling with that setup, I also suggest you get a case that lets you put many fans in it. By using more slower fans rather than just a couple of fast fans, you get the same or better cooling and it will be much quieter. So look for a case with a good supply, and a good cooling setup. Again, I like Antec and I the SX 8x0 and 10x0 series are great cases, but there are many other quality case makers out there.