Question: When I upgrade, do I really need to get another 650+ watt PSU to compensate for inaccurate manufacturing specifications?
I have used many calculators to give me an idea of how much power my computer is using. They all state that my system uses 500 to 650 watts (or they recommend PSU's that will supply that much power).
When I plugged my computer into my Kill-A-Watt to see how much the PSU was drawing from the outlet, it NEVER exceeded 200 watts under load from before it posted through some stress testing! I ran Prime95 on each core and transferred data from a DVD-RW to a HD at the same time. I assume that if I were ripping from all three DVD-RW drives, running prime 95 on each CPU core, and transferring files between all 5 hard drives...etc, I could get it over 200 watts, but probably not by too much.
Knowing that the PSU is not 100% efficient, that tells me that even with a large number of components (but low end video card), my system is pulling well under 200 watts from the PSU. Am I missing something here? I have gone through two 550+ watt PSU's on various builds of this computer over the past 5 years. I use a UPS that does not condition the line. I understand that PSU manufacturers are notorious for overstating power ratings. One of the PSU's that failed was cheap, and the other one was a decent Fortron.
My current system is an Athlon 3800 X2 that has been overclocked at times, but is not currently. I will probably be upgrading to a decent Intel quad core soon. Except for the motherboard and RAM, everything else will stay the same.
Again: Do I really need to get another 650+ watt PSU? Am I missing something here?
Specs:
Athlon 3800 X2
MSI K8N Neo4
2 Gb RAM
Radeon 1300 Pro
(5) 7200rpm hard drives
8 USB devices
(3) DVD+/-RW drives
(1) 120mm fan
(3) 92mm fans
(2) PCI cards
I have used many calculators to give me an idea of how much power my computer is using. They all state that my system uses 500 to 650 watts (or they recommend PSU's that will supply that much power).
When I plugged my computer into my Kill-A-Watt to see how much the PSU was drawing from the outlet, it NEVER exceeded 200 watts under load from before it posted through some stress testing! I ran Prime95 on each core and transferred data from a DVD-RW to a HD at the same time. I assume that if I were ripping from all three DVD-RW drives, running prime 95 on each CPU core, and transferring files between all 5 hard drives...etc, I could get it over 200 watts, but probably not by too much.
Knowing that the PSU is not 100% efficient, that tells me that even with a large number of components (but low end video card), my system is pulling well under 200 watts from the PSU. Am I missing something here? I have gone through two 550+ watt PSU's on various builds of this computer over the past 5 years. I use a UPS that does not condition the line. I understand that PSU manufacturers are notorious for overstating power ratings. One of the PSU's that failed was cheap, and the other one was a decent Fortron.
My current system is an Athlon 3800 X2 that has been overclocked at times, but is not currently. I will probably be upgrading to a decent Intel quad core soon. Except for the motherboard and RAM, everything else will stay the same.
Again: Do I really need to get another 650+ watt PSU? Am I missing something here?
Specs:
Athlon 3800 X2
MSI K8N Neo4
2 Gb RAM
Radeon 1300 Pro
(5) 7200rpm hard drives
8 USB devices
(3) DVD+/-RW drives
(1) 120mm fan
(3) 92mm fans
(2) PCI cards