• Some users have recently had their accounts hijacked. It seems that the now defunct EVGA forums might have compromised your password there and seems many are using the same PW here. We would suggest you UPDATE YOUR PASSWORD and TURN ON 2FA for your account here to further secure it. None of the compromised accounts had 2FA turned on.
    Once you have enabled 2FA, your account will be updated soon to show a badge, letting other members know that you use 2FA to protect your account. This should be beneficial for everyone that uses FSFT.

Aspire powersupply for overclocking

B

Ballz2TheWallz

2[H]4U
Joined
Jun 29, 2004
Messages
2,352
ive been wanting to build a pc for awhile now and the case i want comes with a power supply, this is critical for buget and i was wondering if its acceptable,ok,good,great for stability/ overclocking

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=11-144-018&depa=0

im planning on running the following
1 harddrive
1cd drive
msi neo2 platium
3000+ A64 winchester
512x2 OCZ pc 3200 el platium rev2
BFG 6800GT OC
the 6 fans in that case plus either a 92mm vantec tornado or possibly a much quieter 92mm fan
 
I wouldnt recommend it for overclocking
actually I wouldnt recommend it at all, but it might serve for a basic rig in a cool environment with a UPS

PS that link is busted (Hell newegg is down at least for me "No web site is configured at this address." and thats the main http://www.newegg.com/
 
well its back up now, might have been a quick reconfig on thier part (given the message)

Aspire is just this side of generic, their power supplies are rebranded makes and typically exaggerated by as many means as possible

of course they would actually have to supply some specs for it to be inflated :p
Id recommend you first plan on at least $100 for a supply
(meaning that if you need to run the computer in a cardboard box, you do that)
second that you actually figure out the amps per rail your config will need and get a reputable brand that will meet it

start with the How to Buy a PSU thread at the top of the board ;)


POWER SHMOWER by Mike Chin

or How PSU Power Ratings Mean Almost Nothing

A frustrating fact about PSUs is that there does not appear to be a stringent or regulated standard for reporting, advertising and labeling rated power. This is despite the existence of standards like ATX2.03 or Intel ATX12V.

There are well-established standards for measuring and rating HDD capacity, an engine's horsepower, or the heat generated by a furnace... but not one for how much power a PSU can deliver. There are so many cases of people with "450W" PSUs having power stability issues running a system that can't possoibly draw more than 150W. And "300W" units that keep running where the "450W" units are faltering.

It's not just about bad PSUs vs better ones. It's a dumb situation caused by uncontrolled marketing competition. Real regulation would bring PSUs out of snake oil territory and into a more sensible consumer-friendly terrain.

There are many ways PSU makers fudge to make their units seem more powerful.

1) Out and out lying. You add up the power on all the lines in many PSUs and they fall short of the rated power by 10, 20 30W or even more.

There are more sophisticated ways:

2) Limit the AC input voltage to a very narrow tolerance. The best PSUs are able to deliver their rated power given a decent range of AC input power, say 90~130V for a 120V unit. It's much more demanding to produce 300W w/90VAC input than with 120VAC, so what some PSU makers will detail in their tech specs (usually not in their consumer brochures) is to specify 115-120VAC for input power. A PSU specified this way will not deliver full power if the AC voltage sags, if there is a brown-out. Surely it causes instability more often than a PSU rated to deliver full power with 90-130VAC.

3) Specify a low operating temperature for rated output. This is quite common, but again not often seen in consumer brochures, but rather tech spec sheets provided usually only on demand by engineers or corp buyers. A typical PSU operating temp statement is somthing like this:

0ºC ~25ºC for full rating of load, decrease to zero Watts O/P at 70ºC

Examine what that says. Full power (let's say 400W) is available when the unit is at 0ºC ~25ºC. Hmmm. Think about this.

Have you ever felt air blown out of a PSU in a PC running absolutely full tilt (which it would have to do to get anywhere near 400W output) that felt cool to the fingers? 25ºC airflow would feel exactly that: Cool, given that normal body temperature is 37 °C.

So this PSU cannot deliver full rated power when its temperature goes over 25ºC. OK, what happens to the max power output capacity above that temp? It decreases gradually so that by the time the PSU temp reaches 70ºC, the PSU cannot deliver any power at all. So if you assume that this power drop as temp rises is linear, then max power capacity will drop by ~9W for every degree over 25ºC.

Now having examined as many PSUs as I have over the last 2~3 years, I have to say there's not a single PSU in ANY PC I have ever used or examined that would not measure at least 30~35ºC almost anywhere inside the PSU under almost any kind of load. And if/when it is pushed, 45ºC is nothing at all, especially for or near hot running components like voltage regulators.

So let's say 40ºC is a fairly typical temp inside a PSU. This 400W rated unit would actually be able to deliver a max of just 220W at that temp. Hmmm. Interesting, isn't it? At 50ºC, the available power would drop to just 130W. No wonder some PSUs have 3 fans each capable of 50 cfm!!

Here's a simple fact: Really high quality PSUs are actually rated for full power output at as high as 40ºC. The trick is get a hold of the spec sheets that tell such information so you can compare apples to apples. Or ask.
Click to expand...

or

from dansdata
Unethical PSU Marketing 101.

Here's how to make overly optimistic power supply specifications. It's really simple.

First, power the thing up. You can make an ATX power supply that isn't connected to a motherboard turn on by grounding pin number 14 on the big motherboard power connector. It's easy to spot that pin, because it's the only one with a green wire going to it.

Use any handy bit of wire - like the paper clip in this picture - to connect pin 14 to any ground contact. The ground contacts are the ones with the black wires going to them. Presto, the PSU will turn on.

Now, break out your brick-sized power resistors and load the heck out of one of the output rails - the +5V rail, for instance. Measure the current as you increase the load, until the voltage sags unacceptably far below the rated voltage.

How do you tell what an unacceptable voltage sag is? Well, you could choose a nice conservative small permitted sag - say, 0.1 volts - so that your results are genuinely useful to your customers. Or you could just ignore the voltage and say that when a fuse (or some other component...) blows, that must have been the limit, right there.

OK. Now you've made a big fat amperage number for the +5V rail. If you blew up the PSU in the process, get another one, and repeat the process for +12V and +3.3V, and for the low current rails as well.

On no account, though, should you test more than one rail at a time. This is the key to the whole scam.

A big beefy PSU may be able to deliver 50 amps (say) on the 5V rail when nothing else is under load, and 25 amps (say) on the 12V rail when it's similarly all alone. But the 12V and 5V rails together may only be able to deliver, say, 350 watts between them, when they're both under load. Watts equals amps times volts.

In a real PC, all of the power rails will always be under load together.

But you're not testing what the PSU can really do - you're making pretty numbers for the sales brochure!

So test all of your rails alone, get an amperage figure for all of them, multiply that figure by the voltage of the rail it came from (the nominal voltage, not whatever the voltage had sagged to as the PSU pumped electrons through the dessert spoon you'd soldered to the circuit board), then take all of the resulting wattage figures and add 'em up. That's a wrap, folks. Ship it!
Click to expand...

Power supplies become increasingly expensive
When I initially asked about this on a mailing list, Solaris x86 advocate Al Hopper told me I was drowning in my tea, and that it was "all very simple". I love the simplicity of Unix people.

He explained that the later P4 CPUs take their power from a 12 Volt feed and, using the onboard voltage regulators, generate the high current, low-voltages they need to operate (anywhere from ~ 1.6V to around 2.7V). So the first requirement is a PSU that has plenty of power available from the 12V supply. Since the older ATX compatible PSUs didn't supply much current from the 12V section you have to ensure that your new PS delivers enough current (or power in Watts) from the 12V section. That's why using your old P3 ATX PS is a big "no-no".

He then described the history of the post-P3 power supply mess:

The earlier Athlon motherboard manufacturers decided to solve the 12v problem by using an additional 4-pin square connector to get the extra 12V those CPUs required. However many older PSUs didn't provide the 12V 4-pin square connector.

The motherboard makers then wised up and decided that there was nothing magical about a square 4-pin connector, so they put a normal hard disk type socket on the motherboard and provided the 12v power via a standard hard disk (4-pin inline) connector. Problem solved - you may now use your older PSUs provided they supply sufficient 12V current (many did not).

Further confusion came from PSU manufacturers not specifying the capabilities of the PSU in a way that allowed the end user to verify it's 12V power output rating.

In the meantime the ATX spec was saying "use the new 6-pin" inline connector - and very few motherboard makers implemented it.

Just to be sure, some motherboard makers, implemented *both* the hard disk style 4-pin inline connector and the square 4-pin connector. They said "use either or both in any combination you like".

The spec then evolved to the 24-pin main connector. Again, most motherboard manufacturers did not wish to make their customers mad by mandating that they replace their power supplies. This might cause their customers to avoid motherboard upgrades. Some used a "special" 24-pin connector with the extra 4-pin connection blocked off, or colored so that the user could plugin a 20-pin plug into the correct end of the 24-pin socket on the motherboard. Many others simply ignored the 24-pin requirement in the specs. Again - problem solved - use your older PSU.
Click to expand...


Power Supplies are all about the worse case senerio
too high a draw, too high a temperature, too unstable a source AC Power
and supplys that under normal circumstances are adequate, blowup and often kill stuff
(this can happen to even quality supplies, but they should shutdown safely withoput killing components)
so we are a pretty conservative lot in here, considering the power supply has the potential to fry components worth exponentially more that it is.

To make matters worse there are very very few reviewers able to review a supply, the best that can be said for most of them is that it didnt blow up their config that day, because the power from their outlet happend to be stable that day, they didnt overload it and it wasnt too hot.

exceptions are rare
http://www.leesspace.com/Published_reviews.htm
http://www.silentpcreview.com/section4.html

so get as good a UPS, Thermal Solution, and PSU that will actually power your connfig with room to spare as you can afford ;)

part of the bad rap generics get is do to the public buying the line of bullshit they feed them and overloading them
the rest is from value engineered components, PSU at that level are a commodity
which never bodes well for quality

without at least basic specs on that 420, your playing Russian Roulette
and most of the chambers hold rounds
 
um $100 for a powersupply, sorry bud i cant even afford the system im gettin with the shipping yet, and getting slower compents would just make me depressed everytime i look at the machein just the reason i didnt build last year, oh well guess ill jus repeat so much for my xmas, why cant they make cases cheaper by not including the damned psu
 
i have set in myy head what i want and i get very displeased when i buy somthing other then that, unless theres another case on newegg with 6x 80mm fan slots and removable motherboard tray, a window like that and as big as that one and looks the same then i dont want it i have looked everywhere for a case i like and i have yet to find one
 
well youd be alot more depressed if you buy the case and supply only to have it not work or worse fry components

which by the way happens in here alot, dont trust supplies bundled with cases
that supply is inflating the case cost by all of $5 (wholesale)
you dont want it powering your new expensive components
but somehow I doubt it even could, its likely biased towards the +5V rail to power the CPU\mobo
whereas your board is biased towards the +12V

2 months ago my brother-in-law went through this
(served him right for not consulting me)
fried the mobo with a 400 watt RAIDmax that didnt have a snowballs chance in hell of powering the config he put together
(which was less hungry then the one you have)
powered up a few times then fried
 
made an exception and ran some numbers for you

http://www.xbitlabs.com/misc/picture/?src=/images/video/ati-vs-nv-power/6800gt_table-b.gif&1=1
http://takaman.jp/D/?M=PbQDQbdHdSCSkT2kG5@BDjHeqO5HDvXCMZ&english
(the two LAN cards are actually two more fans)

you need a supply with at least 26A on the +12V rail
the calculator lists the actual amperage, the supply however is likely rated at 25C
once you adjust it to your operating temperature 26A will be a closer figure
but Id recommend even higher (like 30A)
total wattage would vary considerably depending on the make and model
but an ATX12V v2.0 supply would be a good idea

an entry level supply being the FSP Group \ Fortron Blue Storm
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=17-104-934&depa=1
$89 w\ 15A on each of the +12V rails
that happens to be a 500 watt, most of that unused capacity on the combined +3.3V & +5V rail for backward compatibility

for comparision a fanless design geared towards a modern board that doesnt have that extra fat
http://www.newegg.com/app/viewProductDesc.asp?description=17-103-925&depa=1
a 350 watt with 16A and 18A on the +12V rails yours for a measly $167 :p
 
damn....well me haveing no job and not legal for me to get one i cant raise the extra $100 in less then 4 months, god i hate fucking child labor laws, but thar forton would go good with my blue shiney case if i had the money
 
well youd be able to save a few pennies ($10 > 20) buy getting an older ATX12V v1.3
20 pin power supply (provided it still had the amps you need)
but youll give up, future usability, and it will have fewer amps on the +12V rail
I was thinking of the Fortron 530

but considering Id say its better to come up with a little bit more now and
have the possible ability to upgrade in the future

the Fortrons are widely considered the best bargin, reliable and affordable
with specs you can trust, FSP Group is actually comprised on Fortron and Sparkle Power
and they are rebranded quite alot as well (most AOpen supplies, many OEM manufacturers)
they consitantly test higher than their rated capacity
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top