How many watts is your power supply?

Wedge

Wedge

1
Thanks for this info dx. I'll read it thoroughly.

The reason I'm wanting another is because I'm going to add another fan (maybe 2, to keep the HDs cooler). Also, in a few months I'll be adding HD number 3. It just seems the sensible thing to start looking at a better power supply because I had a feeling the 250W just isn't going to cut it.
 
dx

dx

1
Yep, with what you want to do a 250W is not going to cut the mustard. 350W should be fine. But if you can spend the extra $20-30, go for the 425-450W and you'll have plenty of power.
 
A

albedo039

1
I bought a new P4 2.53 and PE motherboard and rad8500. Used a generic 450W and would crash all the time. Especially when using the 3D grafx. Swapped it for an Enermax 460W. They cost a lot of brass but I was just glad to have a stable computer.
 
D

DrStrange

1
AFAIK PSUs output power on 3.3v and 5v and 12v. These are known as rails? The puter components will use one or two of these rails. The label on the PSU will tell you the max power of these rails. Find out the watts used by the components. Some eg hard drives will have their power usage labelled. If not,eg mobos, CPU etc. check the manufacturers sites eg AMD list their CPUs consumption. XP CPU uses around 75w . I forget which rail it uses. You add together the power usage of all your components, compare it to the max power from the PSU and as a general rule of thumb if your components use watts that exceed 80% of the max PSU output, then buy a bigger PSU! ;)
 
Wedge

Wedge

1
I found this info over at Hard Forum under the FAQs. It was posted by FLECOM, so give him credit for this:


Power supply: How big a PSU do I need?
AGP video card - 20-30W
PCI video card - 20W
AMD Athlon 900MHz-1.1GHz - 50W
AMD Athlon 1.2MHz-1.4GHz - 55-65W
Intel Pentium III 800MHz-1.26GHz - 30W
Intel Pentium 4 1.4GHz-1.7GHz - 65W
Intel Pentium 4 1.8GHz-2.0GHz - 75W
Intel Celeron 700MHz-900MHz - 25W
Intel Celeron 1.0GHz-1.1GHz - 35W
ATX Motherboard - 30W-40W
128MB RAM - 10W
256MB RAM - 20W
12X or higher IDE CD-RW Drive - 25W
32X or higher IDE CD-ROM Drive - 20W
10x or higher IDE DVD-ROM Drive - 20W
SCSI CD-RW Drive - 17W
SCSI CD-ROM Drive - 12W
5400RPM IDE Hard Drive - 10W
7200RPM IDE Hard Drive - 13W
7200RPM SCSI Hard Drive - 24W
10000RPM SCSI Hard Drive - 30W
Floppy Drive - 5W
Network Card - 4W
Modem - 5W
Sound Card - 5W
SCSI Controller Card - 20W
Firewire/USB Controller Card - 10W
Case Fan - 3W
CPU Fan - 3W

The wattage numbers above are estimates and may be rounded to the nearest 5 watts. The given wattage may only reach the specified level during power-up or during peak usage. Always purchase a power supply with a bit more wattage than you calculate you'll need, to make room for future upgrades
 
S

scarecrow

1
The nominal wattage is not the real issue. What's important is that the CPU uses good components, and the output current is fully stabilized -by using active components/transistors and hi-Q film or non-electrolytic capacitors. Needless to say using such components will skyrocket the price of the unit, but IMHO it is well worth the $, surely much more than a fast CPU.
 
dx

dx

1
@scarecrow..... right on the money bud. At the end of the day, you get what you pay for. That is why I recommend PC Power&Cooling, because their components are of a much higher quality than the Taiwanese PSUs (most of the PSUs out there at the moment). They built their reputation with building PSUs for servers and it is still their main clientele.

@Wedge..... nice snip from the FAQ. With these voltages it will at least get peeps in the ballpark. But as scarecrow has said, no amount of extra voltage is going to help you if the voltage line tolerances and power regulation are poor (common is lower quality components).
 
Laz

Laz

1
Get a nice Enermax 400/450 watt unit.

You will have no problems using a quality unit such as this. ;
 
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