Enough Power?

[Schmekelhoff]

I'm planning on building a system with these specs:

Enlight EN-72370X3 300W Case
AMD Thunderbird 1.4GHz
EPOX EP-8K7A Motherboard
512 MB PC2100DDR-RAM
IBM 40GB 7200RPM HD
Plextor 16/10/40 CD-RW
Toshiba DVD-ROM
ATI Radeon 64MB DDR VIVO
Turtle Beach Santa Cruz
Floppy Drive
3COM 10/100 NIC

Will a 300W PS be enough to carry this system now and into upgrades in the future? How exactly do you figure the required power? Does a larger PS bring any other advantages?

Thanks!

 

[TunaBoo]

Only reason (for any sane person) you need a larger than 250 wat PSU is for the CPU. I would recommend a 350 watt enermax, but 300 watt SHOULD work. Most people cant OC to 1.6 or 1.7 without a 450 Watt PSU. If you want to OC and air or h20 cool go 450 watt. If you want to OC and pelt cool go 550 watt and a 450 watt or so.

If you barely have enough power, your system may be a little unstable. I bet you COULD run off a 250 watt with no probs (if its a good 250) but it would be better to go for a 350 or so.

 

[Scouzer]

300W will be just fine unless your doing massive OCing like Tuna mentioned.

 

[snidy]

I would go with 400, just to make sure for future upgrades

 

[Scouzer]

The amount of power consumed is going down if anything, so that is not an issue.

 

[zoom8112]

i agree, i would get a 400w + powersupply

think about it, the powersupply is going to stay w/ your system far longer than any of the other components inside

so you would want one that can handle future upgrades

also, a small ps can hinder performance, such as hd's and such

i'm an avid reader of the maxpc forums and one member did notice a drop in perf in his 75 gpx hd due to a weak ps

he also stated that one reason that so many 75gpx's have been failing is because many people skimp on their ps and dont even realize what its doing to their system

think about it

 

[Pr0Hawk]

I got about the same system as you but I got a 1.2 ghz athlon. 300 is fine for me. But like they mentioned, a 400 is safer idea.

 

[TunaBoo]

<<

he also stated that one reason that so many 75gpx's have been failing is because many people skimp on their ps and dont even realize what its doing to their system

think about it >>



I am sorry but I really really don't belive that. HD's run off of 5V and 12V lines. ANy decent power supply will put out plenty of power on those lines (maybe not for a 6 disks 15K SCSI array, but for us, yes).

The reason (I think) that so many people's 75's died is they did not cool them properly. YES some would have died no matter what, but bad cooling does not help a HOT (for IDE ) drive.