Question Safe to use an old Corsair 850W PSU with modern video cards?

[WhipperSnapper]

Power Supply at issue is: Corsair 850TX first generation.

Current rig has a Corsair VS600 600W PSU running an overclocked Ryzen 7 3700X (4.2 Ghz at 1.4V) and GTX 1080 FE.

I'm just starting to get into VR, so I might be interested in upgrading the video card IF the prices crash hard. However, the newer cards want more juice (with the RTX 40 generation wanting even more). (By "crash hard", I mean a RTX 3070 or the like for $275 on a white hot Slickdeal.)

I have an old Corsair 850TX vegetating in the carcass of a 2006 Opteron build. The original PSU died and I purchased the 850TX in a panic from a local Best Buy, so it only ended up having about 3 years of (medium) usage on it before moving to my previous rig in 2013 (which only has an Antec 500W PSU). The 850TX has not been used for about 9 years. I recently bought a cheap PSU tester off of Amazon. If the Corsair 850TX checks out, would it be safe to swap it out with the VS600 in my current rig?

Would an older PSU like that connect properly to a modern mobo and to a modern video card? Perhaps most importantly, would it be able to handle the power spikes from modern video cards?

Suppose I were lazy and didn't feel like swapping out a PSU...could I run a RTX 3070 or AMD RX 6800 with the current Corsair VS600 600W PSU?

 

[Tech Junky]

It's fine. They don't change in tech more than every 20 years it seems. The only change coming up is a new plug for the GPUs that will be able to pull up to 600W.

Take your current build and put it into PCPartPicker.com and see what kind of power you need / use. Not a hard thing to figure out.

 

[WhipperSnapper]

Damn, that PC Part Picker looks like a useful site; first I've ever seen of it.

 

[Tech Junky]

Go from 0 to hero in a few minutes. Takes the guesswork out of what used to be a tedious process in the 90's. For the most part it's accurate but, sometimes it's best to double check the manuals for measurements / specs so you don't end up with an issue when building.

 

[WhipperSnapper]

I think I feel better about this power supply calculator.

 

[Tech Junky]

@WhipperSnapper they're all generally within the margin of error. One that ains high is microcenter system builder and Newegg. To get a ballpark though it's usually pretty simple to take the CPU+GPU numbers and add 100w for misc parts.

 

[BoomerD]

The biggest potential problem (presuming everything else is up to snuff) is cabling. That old Corsair might not have the 8 pin (or 6+2) pci-e connectors for the video card. I have an old HX620 that only has 6 pin connectors, and according to Corsair, the 8 (or 6+2) pin cables are no longer available for it.

 

[WhipperSnapper]

That old Corsair might not have the 8 pin (or 6+2) pci-e connectors for the video card.

I'm more concerned about whether it has everything it needs to plug into the MSI x750-A Pro motherboard. It has four 6+2 PCI-E connectors; it's advertised as being able to power two cards for SLI/Crossfire. I wouldn't mind someone taking a look at the specs on the PSU to see and on the motherboard to check for me. It looks like the motherboard has some sort of power connector spot below the SATA plug-ins; not sure what I plug in there.

(EDIT - that "power connector spot below the SATA plug-ins is a USB 3.2 plug-in that goes to the case; LOL. Was just reviewing the mobo manual today and thought I'd check that part out.)

 

[Tech Junky]

If you build it in PCP it will tell you on the warning section if you have a compatibility issue. It's easy to get a different cable and plug it into the PSU.

 

[BoomerD]

I'm more concerned about whether it has everything it needs to plug into the MSI x750-A Pro motherboard. It has four 6+2 PCI-E connectors; it's advertised as being able to power two cards for SLI/Crossfire. I wouldn't mind someone taking a look at the specs on the PSU to see and on the motherboard to check for me. It looks like the motherboard has some sort of power connector spot below the SATA plug-ins; not sure what I plug in there.

Good catch. I don't think so. (presumably you mean X570, not x750?) It looks like the motherboard has 3 separate CPU power connectors...24 pins, 8 pins, 4 pins. I THINK the PSU has one 24 pin and one 4+4 pin.

Ran a quick build on PCPartspicker using that board and PSU:

The MSI X570-A PRO ATX AM4 Motherboard has an additional 4-pin ATX power connector but the Corsair TX850 850 W 80+ Certified ATX Power Supply does not. This connector is used to supply additional 12V current to the motherboard. While the system will likely still run without it, higher current demands such as extreme overclocking or large video card current draws may require it.

If you build it in PCP it will tell you on the warning section if you have a compatibility issue. It's easy to get a different cable and plug it into the PSU.

Oh hell no. Unless he can get a cable with the same cabling "class" from Corsair, NEVER mix PSU cables. (there is no standard for how they're wired.)

 

[mikeymikec]

I don't know how old that 850TX (I assume that since it's in a 2006 build then it might be pretty old, but of course it could have been added later) is, but it might be worth checking that it supports the C states that modern processors use. I had a hickup with my old VX450 when I changed to Haswell in that the PSU didn't support the C6 (IIRC) state that the processor could, so that feature needed to be disabled in the BIOS.

 

[VirtualLarry]

It's easy to get a different cable and plug it into the PSU.

DON'T Mix--and-match modular PSU cables. It can lead to fire.

 

[BoomerD]

DON'T Mix--and-match modular PSU cables. It can lead to fire.

 

[Meghan54]

I'm more concerned about whether it has everything it needs to plug into the MSI x750-A Pro motherboard. It has four 6+2 PCI-E connectors; it's advertised as being able to power two cards for SLI/Crossfire. I wouldn't mind someone taking a look at the specs on the PSU to see and on the motherboard to check for me. It looks like the motherboard has some sort of power connector spot below the SATA plug-ins; not sure what I plug in there.

I think that plug-in below the SATA ports is a USB3 plug-in. I’d be more concerned about being able to fill both the cpu plug-ins at upper left corner. U need an 8-pin and 4-pin. Some boards can run with only one filled; some require both be filled to run properly. Should be mentioned in manual.

 

[WhipperSnapper]

I think that plug-in below the SATA ports is a USB3 plug-in. I’d be more concerned about being able to fill both the cpu plug-ins at upper left corner. U need an 8-pin and 4-pin. Some boards can run with only one filled; some require both be filled to run properly. Should be mentioned in manual.

Current PSU is: Corsiar VS600. It seems to only have the 8 pin connector, so I'm guessing the TX850 would be OK in those regards. I've been reading comments in various places where people are saying that plugging in an additional 4 pin power connector is not necessary unless you're doing heavy overclocking and that it was included primarily for marketing purposes.

 

[WhipperSnapper]

I don't know how old that 850TX (I assume that since it's in a 2006 build then it might be pretty old, but of course it could have been added later) is, but it might be worth checking that it supports the C states that modern processors use.

So...I pulled that Corsair TX850W out of the carcass of a derelict Opteron 190 system. I was curious as to why mine had six PCIe 6x2 plugs so I ran a Google search and ended up reading some threads at HardOCP. (Turns out it was a manufacturing error.) Anyway, in another thread there's a discussion about whether the ATX standard may have changed rendering these olds PSU's obsolete. It's worth a read:

Yet another old power supply problem thread (10yr old corsair TX650W)

So after getting my i7-12700K up and running I went to upgrade my wife's computer which had been crashing (probably because of the power supply?) to my old Ryzen 5 3600 / B550 Aorus Elite /16GB DDR4 / RX580 and with a new Samsung 980 1TB NVMe SSD... I tried just using this quite old Corsair...

hardforum.com

Guess I'll probably just have to look for a modern modular PSU if I want to upgrade from the Corsair VS 600.

 

[mikeymikec]

So...I pulled that Corsair TX850W out of the carcass of a derelict Opteron 190 system. I was curious as to why mine had six PCIe 6x2 plugs so I ran a Google search and ended up reading some threads at HardOCP. (Turns out it was a manufacturing error.) Anyway, in another thread there's a discussion about whether the ATX standard may have changed rendering these olds PSU's obsolete. It's worth a read:

Yet another old power supply problem thread (10yr old corsair TX650W)

So after getting my i7-12700K up and running I went to upgrade my wife's computer which had been crashing (probably because of the power supply?) to my old Ryzen 5 3600 / B550 Aorus Elite /16GB DDR4 / RX580 and with a new Samsung 980 1TB NVMe SSD... I tried just using this quite old Corsair...

hardforum.com

Guess I'll probably just have to look for a modern modular PSU if I want to upgrade from the Corsair VS 600.

That thread has a much easier suggestion:

"So, long story short, you could probably just disable "Fast Startup"" - it's as useless as a chocolate teapot anyway!