New PSU Recommendation

AP2

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Jun 25, 2007
Messages
1,570
Hello,

I've been having some issues with my PC - when playing a game or even doing a W7 index score, it shuts down and reboots saying a faulty PSU. The current power supply unit I'm using is:

Athena Power 400W Flex ATX PSU
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817338080&name=Server-Power-Supplies

I'm thinking of a new Seasonic Fanless PSU, but how much wattage do I really need?

asus p8z77-i deluxe
3770k
evga gtx 670
16gb gskill (8gb x 2)
2x samsung 830 128gb
2x samsung 2tb harddrive
aquacomputer aquaero xt
aquacomputer d5 pump
2x scythe gentle typhoon ap-15
 
kingwin lzp-550 is a great psu and it is very quiet. The fan in mine rarely(never?) comes on. It is expensive though.
 
With a stock 3770k and 670, you need less than 350 watts.
 
It's pretty amazing everything gets faster and consumes less power... a year(ish) ago you could never get away with a top line cpu and video card @ 350 watts
 
With a stock 3770k and 670, you need less than 350 watts.


that's what I thought as well, but I think my current 400W PSU isn't up to par. I ended up buying a Seasonic X-750 cause it was on sale @newegg for 99 shipped. Thanks again!
 
3770k under full load stock: less than 70 watts.
GTX 670 under full load stock: less than 200 watts.
Everything else: ~60-70 watts.

Total max theoretical load: less than 340 watts.
Typical gaming load: somewhere around 250-300 watts, depending on the game.

Either your power supply was faulty, or something else was wrong, not a lack of power.
 
The problem was that it was an athena power. Probably Sirfa or Andyson made garbage.
 
Yeah he did well. It was the right choice going with a 750w instead of getting one that did not allow for expansion. I only looked at corsair because that is what I usually buy, but seasonic is usually seen as equivalent or a bit better so it is a good choice. I am at work so I read the first couple posts and the last, I didn't see that he already purchased nor did I have time to do some comparison shopping, just a suggestion to help him on his way.

...
 
that's what I thought as well, but I think my current 400W PSU isn't up to par. I ended up buying a Seasonic X-750 cause it was on sale @newegg for 99 shipped. Thanks again!

I was just going to link that!!
 
I also ended up purchasing the Seasonic Platinum Fanless 520. Now I just gotta choose which unit to go with. My goal is to have a system quiet as possible.

As for future expansion, I'm using a ITX board so only one GPU for me.

What do you guys think? 750 or 520 Fanless?
 
How much was the Fanless 520? The Fanless will be guaranteed silent, and is more than sufficient.

The 750 was an awesome deal though, and hard to pass up. It also has a fanless mode, where the fan is shut off when the internal temps are low enough.

You can always upgrade to something like the 690, that will warrant a larger power supply ;)
 
i purchased the 520 for 150 shipped.

I just installed my X-750 and while running Windows Assessment test, I get a squealing sound coming from the PSU as well as playing Borderlands 2. Is this normal?
 
Squealing sound = coil whine.

Coil whine can either come from the PSU, motherboard, or GPU. It is completely random based on what hardware you have, the individual random characteristics of the capacitors, and how sensitive you are to such noise. It is completely normal for coil whine to exist, and in fact it is always there. It's just usually at a high enough frequency that you don't hear it. That said, Seasonic seems to have a higher rate of coil whine complaints than other PSU manufacturers.

However, having an annoyingly loud PSU is grounds for an RMA (Newegg and Seasonic will usually allow you to RMA PSUs based on coil whine).
 
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