Power draw, who cares...

auntjemima

auntjemima

[H]ard DCOTM x2
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Mar 1, 2014
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Am I the only one that doesn't give two fucks about power draw? It's constantly mentioned here. Company X has comparable performance to Company Y! Finally!... Oh, wait.. it uses some more megawatts.

Really? I could see for miners, it's a concern. That makes sense based on ROI, but for gamers, especially ones that are planning on buying the top of the line cards, who cares? Are you guys all running 450w power supplies or something?
 
I should have prefaced this with I run an Nvidia card, I have never used an ATI card either. That said, if AMD can make a comparable card for GAMING who cares what it's doing inside that little case as long as heat doesn't become a concern?
 
Everything depend, Power Draw is important to me up to some degree and it's related to cooling, I DO care a lot of heat produced and expelled inside and out of my case, I re-balance the airflow of my case with each new/different GPU used and unless someone is using full water and AIO mods, more power draw on a GPU mean more heat pumped inside the case making overall components hotter, specially those surrounding the GPU, crucially the PCI-E Bracket which become HOT, Hotter CPU temps, Hotter RAM temps, Hotter Chipset, Mobo VRM, etc matters to me as it can have a negative effect over my CPU and RAM Overclocks, so if you put me 2 cards that perform 10% one of each other one pulling 250W and the other 300W I will pick of course the 250W one as I tend to overclock the GPU as much as possible, and there power matters is not the same overclocking a 250W card to the realm of 300W - 350W than other 300W to the realm of over 450W for less performance which is always the case scenario of Nvidia vs AMD cards, I tend to run my single GPU machines with 600W - 750W Gold/Platinum PSUs a single GPU pulling 400W+ alone from that is an issue to me as it mean even more investment on PSUs to keep efficiency numbers at the 80% load range.

my first metric for a GPU is performance and second is cooling so yes, power draws matter to me and for everyone I recommend a "new" GPU as normally those kind of guys are careless with choice of cases, airflow and cooling they just want plug and play. yeah that's the "typical" gamer.
 
Maybe this thread should have been made as a poll.

I don't really care. I ran 290x crossfire. I didn't care about the power draw, I switched to nvidia for other reasons. So as long as the power draw is within reason, it doesn't matter to me that one or another card gets the same performance from 25% less power.

In order of importance:
  1. Cooler configuration - I'd never buy a blower type card
  2. Price - It must be within the range I'm willing to pay
  3. Performance - For the given price it must have the best overall performance, I usually look at aggregate scores from many games on sites that show those, even if the actual result depends more on driver optimization than raw horsepower, I'll choose which performs faster, raw horsepower didn't do me much good with 290x crossfire. My fps should've been halved when switching to the 980ti instead on average it went up 50%
  4. Personal preference (design, bundle options)
  5. And if I can't make up my mind based on all those then I might consider power draw.
 
The only time power draw matters to me is mining or if I'm shopping that HTPC/ Business PC space where I can only get 30 watts off the PCIe bus.

For the kids gaming rigs? It's not a factor, not even once. Both cases cooled a pair of 290x's back when that was a thing, nothing modern is going to torture it.
 
Same as above. Power draw mostly matters for my mining adventures. It is kind of fun that my current PC uses a lot less power and runs everything butter smooth.
 
I don't care how much gas my car uses!, As long as it gets me from point A to B! :confused:
 
Eyefinity area of gaming where I could see power draw being a factor as it makes the cards run higher clocks for desktop .. I run a Corsair TX 950 watt supply on an X58 Xeon X5660 clocked at 4.2Ghz and an overclocked 290x .
 
Yeah, I don't really care about power draw. But I'm also the kind of guy that buys a 1500W power supply "just in case" lol.
 
I've always seen power draw as the icing on the cake. I like it when I can build a little computer for a friend that is based on a lower-wattage PSU like a Corsair CX-430M and know that they can get a pretty decent GPU for their system. Or when I build myself a little LAN box and I don't need a ton of power to push a decent GPU.

That being said - if I'm going big rig, then I agree - it matters very little to me.
 
PSUs and heatsinks are a lot cheaper/more efficient now than they were many years ago.

In 2008, I paid $100 for my current CPU HSF which is now matched or beaten by the $20-30 212 EVO and H7. My 620W Bronze Corsair was $130. The same unit today is $50.
Video card heatsinks are a totally different league. The open-air design didn't even exist some 5+ years ago and drastically improves every cycle.

So the "cost" of handling a 200-250W GPU today is a lot cheaper than it was before. As time goes on more people will care less about power.
 
Krenum said:
I don't care how much gas my car uses!, As long as it gets me from point A to B! :confused:
Click to expand...

If you are buying a top of the line car, based on performance, the gas mileage is not usually a concern. You don't see Gallardo or Viper owners mentioning fuel mileage.
 
auntjemima said:
If you are buying a top of the line car, based on performance, the gas mileage is not usually a concern. You don't see Gallardo or Viper owners mentioning fuel mileage.
Click to expand...

Sure they do, after all Can't buy those top of the line cars if you don't have any money. Unless they were born into it.

Point being, save money where you can.
 
JustReason said:
For this site... no one should. But as long as there is one metric that one trails in then the other side will hammer it down everyones throat regardless of its REAL World impact.
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It's 32C in my room because my dad didn't want to fix the AC.

I had to go from overclocked Ryzen 1700 to i5 7400 to reduce the heat output of my PC.

I'd rather be using a GTX 1070 instead of the overclocked RX 480 I have but I got locked into the Freesync bandwagon.
 
Krenum said:
Maybe you should stop buying computer parts and fix the AC, or help your dad out if he needs it.
Click to expand...

We ordered the repair service subscription but we didn't get the confirmation letter yet.

He promised to get it fixed last summer, then he said it's too late in the summer so it's pointless to fix lol.
 
TheLAWNoob said:
We ordered the repair service subscription but we didn't get the confirmation letter yet.

He promised to get it fixed last summer, then he said it's too late in the summer so it's pointless to fix lol.
Click to expand...

Too late in the Summer?! Its June! The worst is yet to come, we still have Atomic August to deal with. Hope you get it fixed soon. Atleast swing down to Home Depot and get you a window unit.
 
Krenum said:
Too late in the Summer?! Its June! The worst is yet to come, we still have Atomic August to deal with. Hope you get it fixed soon. Atleast swing down to Home Depot and get you a window unit.
Click to expand...

Read. Comprehend. Post.
 
The wattage is directly turned into lots of heat for your room. Dunno about you, but having sweaty legs and such is no fun when gaming due to huge power draw. Also, hot cards tend to need noisier cooling solutions.
 
It depends who you talk too about AMD and Nvidia, but with so many people who are biased, they will change their power of view depending who has the better card...

There was a time when the 480 GTX was the most power hungry card ever, and People didnt give a shit about power. Even though AMD's card was just as good and used a shit ton less power.

Now this time its AMD who uses a shit ton of power, and Nvidias cards are very power efficient.

BUT right now you shoudn't even compare top tier video cards since AMD has no direct competitor to the 1070gtx/1080gtx/1080ti gtx/titan 2 XP. So you can really only compare 580 vs the 1060 6gb.

IF you ask me? I use whats the best price performance. I have a 1200w PSU who gives a fuck about power draw. But if you are building for lets say a mini-itx case. Well Nvidia is the way to go.
 
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GoldenTiger said:
The wattage is directly turned into lots of heat for your room. Dunno about you, but having sweaty legs and such is no fun when gaming due to huge power draw.
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Man I get some have to deal with it but come on we spend hours here modding our PCs and a little heat just lays waste to having MAXXED out PCs?

5 years ago I decided that heat and how it limits OCing and dust issues from having cats necessitated something, so I built an airconditioned case. I think the no dust part is best, trust me it is. But also being able to exhaust heat out of my house during summer and keeping it in during winter is quite great as well.

Oh and I get that saying FU to power usage is evident with me. I pay for it and am fine with it.
 
My opinion is more about efficiency, if a graphics card for example can achieve the same results as another graphics card but pull less power, obviously Im going to buy the one that can achieve the same results using less power. Why wouldn't you?, Especially living in Texas during the summer, I don't really prefer my computer turning into a space heater.
 
I do keep an eye on it, because I do realize it can contribute to heating up a room.

But more or less, it's not a major purchasing decision. Particularly since there is a rough soft cap of 250-300W or so.

What M76 said above I agree with (although there are a few limited situations I can think of to get a blower-type card, I agree they are not preferred when you don't absolutely need them).

M76 said:
Maybe this thread should have been made as a poll.

I don't really care. I ran 290x crossfire. I didn't care about the power draw, I switched to nvidia for other reasons. So as long as the power draw is within reason, it doesn't matter to me that one or another card gets the same performance from 25% less power.

In order of importance:
  1. Cooler configuration - I'd never buy a blower type card
  2. Price - It must be within the range I'm willing to pay
  3. Performance - For the given price it must have the best overall performance, I usually look at aggregate scores from many games on sites that show those, even if the actual result depends more on driver optimization than raw horsepower, I'll choose which performs faster, raw horsepower didn't do me much good with 290x crossfire. My fps should've been halved when switching to the 980ti instead on average it went up 50%
  4. Personal preference (design, bundle options)
  5. And if I can't make up my mind based on all those then I might consider power draw.
Click to expand...
 
Krenum said:
My opinion is more about efficiency, if a graphics card for example can achieve the same results as another graphics card but pull less power, obviously Im going to buy the one that can achieve the same results using less power. Why wouldn't you?, Especially living in Texas during the summer, I don't really prefer my computer turning into a space heater.
Click to expand...
read my statement above.
 
Krenum said:
My opinion is more about efficiency, if a graphics card for example can achieve the same results as another graphics card but pull less power, obviously Im going to buy the one that can achieve the same results using less power. Why wouldn't you?, Especially living in Texas during the summer, I don't really prefer my computer turning into a space heater.
Click to expand...

Honestly, price matters more to me than the power draw. Yeah, power costs money, but unless your mining or running DC stuff on your card 24-7, it's going to amount to a rounding error for power price. I don't live in TX, but I do live in a pretty hot area of the US that requires a considerable amount of cooling to be comfortable.

I do look at power draw, but If price and performance and all other things are equal, then ok, yeah then (and pretty much only then) does power draw actually becomes a purchasing metric.

Now if I were mining or doing DC or something else - different story. But for personal/gaming use, not really a consideration.
 
Well, i did not care about power draw beyond limitations of my PSU but then my case burned me. Since then i kind of do.
 
I chose a 1070 over a 980 Ti for the most part because of power draw.

It's not always about AMD as some people would have you believe.
 
Krenum said:
I don't care how much gas my car uses!, As long as it gets me from point A to B! :confused:
Click to expand...
If fuel consumption would be important I'd have a diesel. I don't think I even looked at consumption figures before buying my current car. And neither did I for the last one. The key is as long as it's within reason, I won't care about it.
  1. Personal preference / style
  2. Performance
  3. Must be within the price range I'm willing to spend
  4. It's highly unlikely that there would be two cars that come out equal from the above 3, so I won't even look at fuel consumption.
 
Higher power draw means heat, noise, money loss, high room temperature, lower overclocks etc.

Only a fool would pick the lesser efficient one.

Is this thread about someone is close to release 225-375W cards that compete with 150-180W cards?
 
Algrim said:
I chose a 1070 over a 980 Ti for the most part because of power draw.

It's not always about AMD as some people would have you believe.
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But those are two cards with almost identical performance. Of course everyone within their right mind would choose the one with lower consumption. The question is did you put power consumption above other criteria, for example sacrificing performance for it?
 
Shintai said:
Higher power draw means heat, noise, money loss, high room temperature, lower overclocks etc.

Only a fool would pick the lesser efficient one.

Is this thread about someone is close to release 225-375W cards that compete with 150-180W cards?
Click to expand...
That's not the question. of course you'll choose the one with the lower consumption if there is nothing else to set them apart!

But will you buy card A with performance 100 and consumption 200, or card B with performance 80 and consumption 110? (I pulled the numbers from thin air no need to try and fit it to any actual hardware, it's just a practical example)
 
M76 said:
That's not the question. of course you'll choose the one with the lower consumption if there is nothing else to set them apart!

But will you buy card A with performance 100 and consumption 200, or card B with performance 80 and consumption 110? (I pulled the numbers from thin air no need to try and fit it to any actual hardware, it's just a practical example)
Click to expand...

Isn't it? Then what is the question of the OP. As I see it its comparable performance with different power consumption.

Would I pick A with performance 100 and power consumption 100 over B with performance 100 and power consumption 200? Absolutely!

Would I pick A with performance 80 and power consumption 110 over B with performance 100 and power consumption 200? That clearly depends what the actual numbers are. Else I would own a GTX1050TI or something.
 
Shintai said:
Isn't it? Then what is the question of the OP. As I see it its comparable performance with different power consumption.

Would I pick A with performance 100 and power consumption 100 over B with performance 100 and power consumption 200? Absolutely!

Would I pick A with performance 80 and power consumption 110 over B with performance 100 and power consumption 200? That clearly depends what the actual numbers are. Else I would own a GTX1050TI or something.
Click to expand...
I think the question was is efficiency more important than performance. At least that's the only logical way of asking this question.
Who doesn't care about consumption when there is no other factor to differentiate the cards is just stupid, or a fanboy, and only pretends not to care.
 
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