HTPC Power Supply

Texun

Platinum Member
Oct 21, 2001
2,058
1
81
I normally do an overkill on PSU's but this is not my usual build. I want to use a pico PSU at or near 100W for a mod running the hardware below. I have the power requirement for the the CPU and drives but not the board and tuner card. Unless they pull a hell of a lot more than the CPU and drives I figure I should be able to do this and come in under or near 100W. Does this look right?

MSI Motherboard I'm not a MSI fan but selected this one because it is the smallest mATX board with HDMI. It is 1.5" shorter than other mATX boards with DVI or HDMI and it will be going in a case with a depth of 9" max.

35W Conroe

A used Hauppauge PVR250 with MCE Remote with IR Blaster

Fans - 1x120mm, 1x92mm @ about 1800RPM each

Notebook Drive for the OS - 3 watts under load

WD Green Drive

A pico PSU

I would be looking at an ITX board but couldn't find one with HDMI out and a PCI slot for the tuner card.

Thanks.






 

elconejito

Senior member
Dec 19, 2007
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www.harvsworld.com
i have the following components in my mediacenter. According to kill-a-watt at idle it pulls 86-87w, during "normal use" about 92-93w (haven't measured wattage at peak). Using a pretty inefficient 500w coolermaster PSU.

e7300 CPU
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L (ATX mobo)
DVDRW (can't see what it is without pulling it out)
Radeon 4350
2 x AverMedia Combo PCI-e (each has a separate ATSC & NTSC tuner)
2 x 1TB WD Green WD10EADS hard drives
2 x 120mm fans + stock CPU fan

I think you should be well under 100w.
 

Texun

Platinum Member
Oct 21, 2001
2,058
1
81
Originally posted by: elconejito
i have the following components in my mediacenter. According to kill-a-watt at idle it pulls 86-87w, during "normal use" about 92-93w (haven't measured wattage at peak). Using a pretty inefficient 500w coolermaster PSU.

e7300 CPU
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L (ATX mobo)
DVDRW (can't see what it is without pulling it out)
Radeon 4350
2 x AverMedia Combo PCI-e (each has a separate ATSC & NTSC tuner)
2 x 1TB WD Green WD10EADS hard drives
2 x 120mm fans + stock CPU fan

I think you should be well under 100w.

I appreciate the info. It seems odd to even think of using a small power supply but space is limited and the pico PS would be a cleaner way to do the build. According to some info I found the 102W pico PS is able to power systems with 65W CPU's, but of course that's a little vague since nothing was mentioned about other hardware.


 

Texun

Platinum Member
Oct 21, 2001
2,058
1
81
Right now it looks like the MSI\Intel combo is out. The MSI was the only mATX to come in at 8"x9" but reviews of the IGP say it can't do more than 720P. I'm looking at a Zotec 780G iTX again but with a 45W AMD. I think (fingers crossed) I will still be okay. I need a PCI slot and can't find an intel board with PCI and a good IGP.

 

Zap

Elite Member
Oct 13, 1999
22,377
2
81
You can get PicoPSU up to 150W, so maybe get one of those for a bit of overhead. It would still be more efficient and compact than the next higher wattage unit, a Seasonic 300W (ATX and SFX versions). It is also native 24-pin for the motherboard connector.