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PSU for crossfire x1900's?

T

TheInternet1980

Gawd
Joined
Sep 23, 2005
Messages
810
Well my Silverstone Zeus 650W (55A over 4 12v's) doesn't seem to be up to the job of powering my system. (Reboots during Prey with crossfire enabled). About the only intensive games I can get running are source based.


Anyhow,

I was thinking about picking up the Enermax 850 or 1000w PSU's with 5 12v rails.

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=270343

or

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=270344

Any opinions? Would either of these allow me to run my crossfired 1900's now, and a single r600 later without issue? Advice is appreciated. Thanks!
 
650 W would be plenty if it were from a solid manufacturer. Get an Antec, Fortron, Seasonic, PC P&C, or similar instead of going for the big wattage numbers, which can be and routinely are manipulated by manufacturers to be much higher than the actual performance of the unit.
 
You could add a gpu psu like this to your existing system to power one of the video cards. It'll be a whole lot cheaper than a 1k PSU.
 
arthur_tuxedo said:
650 W would be plenty if it were from a solid manufacturer. Get an Antec, Fortron, Seasonic, PC P&C, or similar instead of going for the big wattage numbers, which can be and routinely are manipulated by manufacturers to be much higher than the actual performance of the unit.
Click to expand...

From my understanding the Zeus was pretty damn good in it's day. I've heard nothing but positive things about the Silverstone, it's just starting to show it's age for a multi-gpu setup. Is there anything else that could be causing the system to reboot, other than not getting enough power on the 12v's, with crossfire enabled and the system loaded? (I'm using 6.9 cat's BTW, so perhaps that could be an issue?) If you're saying 650W should be enough, then I would venture to guess the 55A over the 4 12v's of the Silverstone should be sufficient.

However, if I'm going to buy a new PSU. I would want one of the two I listed. Not for the high wattage numbers (which Enermax does not have a history of inflating), but for the 5 12v rails. With 17A per rail, I think I'd be pretty set for r600 and perhaps beyond.
 
IanG said:
You could add a gpu psu like this to your existing system to power one of the video cards. It'll be a whole lot cheaper than a 1k PSU.
Click to expand...

I'm feeling lazy...do you know the As put out by the 2 12v rails of this little unit?

Yeah, that thing won't work for me...I need 36A minimum for crossfire 1900's.

Load: 21A (Peak Load: 25A) Min. Load 0A
Click to expand...

per

http://www.bigbruin.com/2006/powerexpress_1
 
Looks like 21A... no metion on how it's split between 12v1 and 12v2. The thermaltake website also lists a model that's crossfire certified... model # W0130RU

You could just use it to power one of the cards, and the regular psu to power the other.

I think there's another couple of manufacturers of these types of PSUs, but that's the only one I could quickly find on the egg.
Edit: FSP BoosterX 3 looks like another one.
 
Referring to that Thermaltake graphics card PSU, you're forgetting that Crossfire requires 36A TOTAL...that's including everything else on your 12v rails. On these dedicated graphics card PSUs (2 of them that I know of...Thermaltake and the Fortron Booster X3), 25a is DEFINITELY enough to power two high end graphics cards.

You can read this review on the Fortron 300w Booster X3, also with 25a on the 12v...and notice how it runs the x1900 crossfire setup just fine...
 
TheInternet1980 said:
From my understanding the Zeus was pretty damn good in it's day. I've heard nothing but positive things about the Silverstone, it's just starting to show it's age for a multi-gpu setup. Is there anything else that could be causing the system to reboot, other than not getting enough power on the 12v's, with crossfire enabled and the system loaded? (I'm using 6.9 cat's BTW, so perhaps that could be an issue?) If you're saying 650W should be enough, then I would venture to guess the 55A over the 4 12v's of the Silverstone should be sufficient.

However, if I'm going to buy a new PSU. I would want one of the two I listed. Not for the high wattage numbers (which Enermax does not have a history of inflating), but for the 5 12v rails. With 17A per rail, I think I'd be pretty set for r600 and perhaps beyond.
Click to expand...
I don't claim to be a PSU expert. Zeus might be great, I've just never heard them mentioned as a "solid" PSU manufacturer (a list which is shockingly short). But I have doubts that power is your problem. People grossly overstate the power requirements of vid cards, including on this forum. I can't remember the exact figures, but the max power drain of Crossfire 1900 XTX's is only like 350 W. Processor is not more than 100 W on top of that unless it's a Prescott EE or something, and other components are pretty much negligable. Now, it is possible that the 650 W figure is peak rather than sustained, measured at 40 degrees C rather than a more realistic 50, or that too much load is being put on one of the 4 rails. In any of those cases, it might be asking for 450 or 500 W and getting less than that.
 
arthur_tuxedo said:
I don't claim to be a PSU expert. Zeus might be great, I've just never heard them mentioned as a "solid" PSU manufacturer (a list which is shockingly short).
Click to expand...
I'm not an expert with PSUs either, but I believe Falcon NW uses Silverstones' PSUs in their builds. So I doubt Silverstone is some second rate PSU brand.
 
Ah, how timely is this thread for me? I just got my 1900XT last night, and of course my current 430w ps won't run it...although it's run my 6800GS with no trouble...guess the 1900 wants a lot more juice.

Will order the fortron gpu power supply as soon as Newegg's servers are working again. :D
 
You might try checking out the Power Supply forum. There are several PSU "experts" there and a sticky with PSU recommendations and brands to avoid.
 
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