Is 250 watts enough power?

[Xerin1]

I am upgrading my parents' pc to a 1 GHz Duron with 256MB Ram and an Epox 8KHA motherboard. They currently have an Enlight 250w power supply. Is this enough or do I need to go with a 350w power supply?

Also, any thoughts on whether this is a good bang for the buck upgrade are appreciated. They don't want to spend much money, just want a solid PC for general home use and occasional gaming.

Thanks!

 

[LuDaCriS66]

Go with an even 300 just to be sure. Obviously, more is better but 300w is generally the minimum these days.

 

[Migroo]

Well, if you dont need to spend the cash there is not much point.

Try the old PSU with the upgrades. If the machine is OK stability wise, then dont bother getting the 300W model.

If you have problems, then by all means you should buy a more powerful PSU.

 

[BFG10K]

Duron systems might be able to squeek by with a 250W PS, depending on how much stuff you have in the system. If it's a standard system (1 HD, 1 CDROM, 1 video card, 1 sound card and a modem/NIC) it should be OK.

 

[Xerin1]

Thanks all, this is a pretty standard system. I'll try it with the 250 watt PSU and see how stable it is...sounds like they may be ok without needing an upgrade.

 

[neuralfx]

the rule of thumb is 60% load, i wouldnt use the 250w, it will probably work, but how long? .. i would just go ahead and upgrade the psu, so you wont have to worry about it .. just my thoughts ..
-neural

 

[MaDHaVoK]

I don't think you wil have any problems, but you can always replace your psu, if your system isn't stable.

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

my duron 750 system was on a 250w....it froze sometimes....i accidentally blew the thing (doh!) and now i'm stuck on a 140watter for a bit....man it crashes ALOT, mp3's slow down when i am doing intensive stuff, and in general i can DEFINITELY tell that its not good.....unfortunately i am a broke/poor bastard and a proper 300 watt psu will have to wait...but not for too long, in about a week i'll be gettin paid so i'll get it then.

let me tell you, this 140w psu SUCKS!!!!

 

[Huma]

I think psu wattage is one of the most overhyped things i see on these boards today.

I've been running a 250W powerman that came stock in my inwin S500 for almost a year with a 1.2ghz tbird, 3 harddrives, 2 rom drives, gf2, nic, sblive rock solid (A7V133 mobo).

I've been jamming these same cases and 250W psus in most of my friend's machines (tbird/duron) that I build, some with as many drives as me, and we have yet to experience instability due to it.

Two of us have put our rigs through 30 hours of video encoding (mpeg4v2) at 90%+ cpu usage without any trouble at all. If you have a quality power supply, you'll be fine.

Don't buy into the 350W psu or your comp will die idea.

 

[Jiggz]

Call it overhyped or anything that suits you. But what do you do when you have stability problem using a 250W PSU and then tried your friend's 300W and the problem goes away? You still stick in your 250W and say it's overhyped? This is basically what the responds on this post were saying except that a handful are kinda "quick on the gun" to say the bigger the better when it comes to PSU.

Oh by the way, keep track of this thread coz someone will post and say he got the same system configuration and have stuck every conceivable speed of AMD CPU's in his system and remained rock solid using a 100W PSU!

 

[jeremy806]

Check the current rating on the 5V supply.

When it comes to AMD CPUs, your problem is often current before watts.

That is, it's not the "300" that is making the system stable, its the higher current rating.

jeremy806

 

[Jerboy]

<< my duron 750 system was on a 250w....it froze sometimes....i accidentally blew the thing (doh!) and now i'm stuck on a 140watter for a bit....man it crashes ALOT, mp3's slow down when i am doing intensive stuff, and in general i can DEFINITELY tell that its not good.....unfortunately i am a broke/poor bastard and a proper 300 watt psu will have to wait...but not for too long, in about a week i'll be gettin paid so i'll get it then.

let me tell you, this 140w psu SUCKS!!!! >>




How d'ya blow a power supply? or are you talking about different blow.