Pico PSU Requirements for an SFF build

J

jb1

Limp Gawd
Joined
Dec 27, 2014
Messages
500
Hi all,
I'm planning a build using a pico PSU and I wanted to get a sense of how far it might be reasonable to push these things. This build is going to go in a Streacom FC1 EVO case which I am going to modify to take a single slot, PCI-E powered GPU. I'd like to include to the following:

1. 85W haswell CPU (no overclocking)
2. 65W Nvidia GPU (GTX 645)
3. One SSD

I have two PSU contenders:
1. 200W, 144W on 12V rail with 162W Peak on the 12V rail
http://www.mini-box.com/PW-200M-DC-DC-power-supply

2. 250W, 228W on the 12V rail
http://www.hd-plex.com/HDPLEX-250W-Hi-Fi-DC-ATX-Power-Supply-16V-24V-Wide-Range-Voltage-Input.html


My question is, given a combined TDP of 150W, would this CPU/GPU combo be out of the question for the 200W supply? It's only 6W over the 12V rail at at full load... Or, is this crazy and should I be going for the 250W supply?
 
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Why don't you use the picoPSU 160-xt? Combine it with a 192W power brick and it'll be more than enough. Takes up less space too.
 
Ah, great idea. I wasn't sure if power output was limited to the picoPSU itself! I thought that total power was limited to what the PSU could supply itself.
 
It is to an extent. The 160-xt is more of a special case, as it actually very strong, being able to provide a lot more than its rated current. Anyway, I think the pico acts as a sort of "pass-through" for the power, take from that what you will.
 
Interesting, if that's true then the 160-xt should be totally fine for this... any documentation on how much current it can really output? Anyways, thanks for the help!
 
Sounds interesting! I thought about the same thing, but chickened out because of heat concerns.. Please document your build when you get that far :)
 
You should be fine, the only way you'll hit those power numbers combined is running something like Prime95 & Kombustor simultaneously. I've done that on my 3770K + 750 Ti on a HD Plex 160 and Kill a Watt from the wall showed 167W, so call it ~135W at the mobo figuring 80% overall eff.

Numbers I posted last year

http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1040959416&postcount=530
 
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I figured that serious loads would be needed to hit both of those numbers combined, but I was just alarmed by the 108W Max on the 12V rail of the picoPSU 160-xt. However, it sounds like this really isn't an issue. In addition to what rawrr is saying, I also found a review on amazon using a 100W AMD CPU + 75W AMD GPU on this little thing...

@eggDK, yeah, I'm a little concerned about heat as well... my plan was not really to use this thing as a gaming powerhouse. I want to run a 4K display at 60Hz over DP 1.2 for work, and my old motherboard and CPU can't do it. The GTX 645 was the only thing that I could find that occupied one slot, was powered over PCI-E, had 1GB GDDR5 for some light gaming, had DP 1.2, and was less than $50 on ebay :)
 
The 160-xt is pretty amazing. I was talking to a guy who worked with Mini-box engineers stress testing it. I don't know how much cooling (if any) the put on the thing, but they found a maximum of 265W.

So GPUs should be possible. There's a guy over on a different forum planning to use a GTX 960 with it. I was planning a build with a 970, but the consumption on that sporadically fluctuates, so I doubt it will work, especially when limited to 12V bricks.
 
Wow, 265W! Neat. Alright, I'll definitely be using the 160-xt for this build. Thanks for your help!
 
jb1 said:
I figured that serious loads would be needed to hit both of those numbers combined, but I was just alarmed by the 108W Max on the 12V rail of the picoPSU 160-xt. However, it sounds like this really isn't an issue. In addition to what rawrr is saying, I also found a review on amazon using a 100W AMD CPU + 75W AMD GPU on this little thing...

@eggDK, yeah, I'm a little concerned about heat as well... my plan was not really to use this thing as a gaming powerhouse. I want to run a 4K display at 60Hz over DP 1.2 for work, and my old motherboard and CPU can't do it. The GTX 645 was the only thing that I could find that occupied one slot, was powered over PCI-E, had 1GB GDDR5 for some light gaming, had DP 1.2, and was less than $50 on ebay :)
Click to expand...


It definitely heats up my L2 running that stress scenario, but IIRC cores never went much above 80C after an hour though all fans are ramped at that point. Under normal video usage system isn't breaking a sweat but no 4K display loads to compare.
 
Stevo_ said:
It definitely heats up my L2 running that stress scenario, but IIRC cores never went much above 80C after an hour though all fans are ramped at that point. Under normal video usage system isn't breaking a sweat but no 4K display loads to compare.
Click to expand...

Nice! Yeah I wouldn't be using this for 4K video, I wouldn't think the extra resolution should cause much change in temperatures as long as I'm not doing anything too taxing with it.
 
Do you think I could use PICO-PSU-160XT with a E3-1220L V2 (17W) and a reference GTX-960 (100W) ?
 
Thanks. I need a special h61 slim itx motherboard for this build (called microstep SH61-L2), but I don't know where to purchase it (safely) ?
 
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Slim itx... don't those boards have an integrated power distribution system (i.e. you plug the brick directly into the board)?
 
rawrr said:
Slim itx... don't those boards have an integrated power distribution system (i.e. you plug the brick directly into the board)?
Click to expand...

Yeah, but some also have an on-board molex power takeoff from the input that you can run the Pico off of and power the GPU.
 
Here is a link to Micro-step SH61-L2 (but the site seems a bit dodgy):
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/h61-...otherboard-LGA1155-processors/1948669146.html

I have four questions though about this motherboard:
1) Is it really pci-e x16, or only x8 or x4 ?
2) does the bios allow E3-1220L V2 cpu ?
3) does the 2 x mini pci-e allow mSATA ssd ?
4) is it stable ?

I guess I could find out if only I could get my hands on it.
 
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Is there some compelling reason you need that exact mobo? Aliexpress is not too bad, but you are at the mercy of descriptions.
 
That is a good question :) The answer is because I want it all to fit inside a M350 itx case (2.5 litres).
So the mantra is slim, slim, slim ... low power and get the heat out of the case asap
 
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osl said:
Here is a link to Micro-step SH61-L2 (but the site seems a bit dodgy):
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/h61-...otherboard-LGA1155-processors/1948669146.html

I have four questions though about this motherboard:
1) Is it really pci-e x16, or only x8 or x4 ?
2) does the bios allow E3-1220L V2 cpu ?
3) does the 2 x mini pci-e allow mSATA ssd ?
4) is it stable ?

I guess I could find out if only I could get my hands on it.
Click to expand...

Aliexpress is a disaster. Full of crap with some gems, and the wait for products is often longer than a month.
 
osl said:
That is a good question :) The answer is because I want it all to fit inside a M350 itx case (2.5 litres).
So the mantra is slim, slim, slim ... low power and get the heat out of the case asap
Click to expand...

OK thought it might be a CPU you already had or something. Most of the thin-ITX boards I've seen if they have PCIE at all it's x4, but sometimes x1. There's a build using an Asrock j1900 board which is x1 over an x1 to x16 cable with an EVGA 750Ti and getting decent benchmarks. Asrock actually has a thin-itx version of that mobo that would make it doable in an m350. Still see Intel DQ77KB mobos available has x4 but 1155 socket.

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1835501
 
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osl said:
I know. But pcie x4 or J1900 totally cripples the gpu
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PCIe x4 at 3.0 bandwidth doesn't cripple the gpu actually. A bunch of tests have been done and iirc frame hits are minimal.
 
Well, I think it is possible to build a decent pc game system with a 960 GTX in a M350 case, but I guess I will have to build it to prove it. That is a challenge.
 
osl said:
Well, I think it is possible to build a decent pc game system with a 960 GTX in a M350 case, but I guess I will have to build it to prove it. That is a challenge.
Click to expand...

Your biggest problem will be cooling the CPU with the GPU and CPU sandwiched so close there's not really much room for a heatsink of any kind. That's what was good about the J1900 mobo TDP of 10W and from his benchmarks the x1 was probably more of an issue for speed on some but not all games, but still allowed buillding a "decent" gaming system.
 
True. I hope that the only 17W of the e3 1220L V2 would make it possible to use flat heatpipes to move the heat from the CPU (and chipset) to the GPU heatsink.

AMEC THERMASOL ultraflat, bendable heatpipe looks interesting.
 
I really like these ideas for fitting such a powerful computer in the M350 case!

I'm still collecting parts for my Streacom F1C EVO (http://www.streacom.com/products/f1c-evo-chassis/) mod–– the plan is to fit a single slot GPU on top instead of an optical drive and use the back exhaust as output for the card.

Anyone think I can fit a dual slot ITX card in this thing? From the measurements I've done, a dual slot card would extend an additional 6-7mm below the I/O shield for the motherboard unfortunately.
 
jb1 said:
I really like these ideas for fitting such a powerful computer in the M350 case!

I'm still collecting parts for my Streacom F1C EVO (http://www.streacom.com/products/f1c-evo-chassis/) mod–– the plan is to fit a single slot GPU on top instead of an optical drive and use the back exhaust as output for the card.

Anyone think I can fit a dual slot ITX card in this thing? From the measurements I've done, a dual slot card would extend an additional 6-7mm below the I/O shield for the motherboard unfortunately.
Click to expand...

I'd also like to know the answer to this.
I'm not sure whether a 2 slot card would fit in easily, but I'm almost sure one could fit it if one does not use the thin I/O plate.
 
How much room do you have for the GPU heatsink + fan (from GPU surface) ?
 
kooki said:
I'd also like to know the answer to this.
I'm not sure whether a 2 slot card would fit in easily, but I'm almost sure one could fit it if one does not use the thin I/O plate.
Click to expand...

When I've got the case in hand I'll do some measurements from the top of the CPU heatsink and fan to the top of the case to give us a sense on the real limits of the thing. I'm pretty much set on single slot for my design now due to cost, but I want to get a handle on what might be physically possible for dual slot ITX for an upgrade in the future.
 
Is the smallest (height) known CPU heatsink size 23mm?
We need smaller stuff! :mad:

Have you guys seen this set of photos? Its really cool and might give you some idea on the Streacom fc1: http://www.sweclockers.com/galleri/8843-laines-nano

4630141782.jpg
 
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kooki said:
Is the smallest (height) known CPU heatsink size 23mm?
We need smaller stuff! :mad:

Have you guys seen this set of photos? Its really cool and might give you some idea on the Streacom fc1
Click to expand...

Yeah I have seen these! This was my inspiration to try to do this with a graphics card.

The streacom fc1 is 77mm high... so 23mm for the CPU heatsink + 35mm for the dual slot GPU = 58mm.... so this might be possible... right?!
 
Well... It is 77mm on the outside... so you'd have to add the mobo standoffs which should be around 7mm (I'm guessing, since this may vary a lot).
Also I thought dual slot GPU was 39mm (but I hope you are right about it being 35mm XD)
So... it should be quite crowded but it should work... I hope...
 
Don't forget the motherboard PCB (~1.5mm) and CPU socket height (~8mm). And yes, dual slot GPUs are ~39mm thick. The bracket makes it a little thicker overall (~42mm), but that's not really a concern for the CPU cooler clearance.
 
Oh yeah the PCB is also an issue.
I thought the silverstone one was actually 23mm from the mobo, as shown in this diagram from their web page:
eaabafa9a9.jpg
 
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kooki said:
Well... It is 77mm on the outside... so you'd have to add the mobo standoffs which should be around 7mm (I'm guessing, since this may vary a lot).
Also I thought dual slot GPU was 39mm (but I hope you are right about it being 35mm XD)
So... it should be quite crowded but it should work... I hope...
Click to expand...

True, so, 7+39+23... 69, about 8mm of space :)
 
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