IS 450W enough for a quad core computer?

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h20
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IS 450W enough for a quad core computer?

Post by h20 » Sun Aug 19, 2007 5:45 am

I'm planing on getting the 6600 quad, 2gigs of ram and a geforce 8800GTS 320mb

Now will my brand ANTEC 450W deliver enough power. I mean it's not cheap stuff

thanx
h20

thejamppa
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Post by thejamppa » Sun Aug 19, 2007 5:57 am

with high quality 450W PSU that should not be a problem. However, if your PSU is Antec SmartPower, then I'd suggest getting another PSU.

Chocolinx
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Post by Chocolinx » Sun Aug 19, 2007 6:10 am

I'd suggest the NeoHe line or one of the new 80+ PSUs they have.

h20
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Post by h20 » Sun Aug 19, 2007 6:22 am

thejamppa wrote:with high quality 450W PSU that should not be a problem. However, if your PSU is Antec SmartPower, then I'd suggest getting another PSU.
yes indeed its a smartpower 450W that came with my sonata 2

thejamppa
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Post by thejamppa » Sun Aug 19, 2007 6:34 am

Smart power has have huge failure per centage and caused several fire's due poor electronics. 80+ certified PSU's like NeoHE 380W or EarthWatt's would be better and safer choice.

h20
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Post by h20 » Sun Aug 19, 2007 7:00 am

honestly its worked perfectly fine with me and they wouldnt have produced so many sonatas 2 if it were so dangerous and i doubt they did a revision of the PSU.

SO if you say 450W is enough then i suppose I'm fine. Although on another forum somebody said 600-650W minimum, so I'm not sure what to think

amjedm
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Post by amjedm » Sun Aug 19, 2007 7:03 am

h20 wrote:honestly its worked perfectly fine with me and they wouldnt have produced so many sonatas 2 if it were so dangerous and i doubt they did a revision of the PSU.

SO if you say 450W is enough then i suppose I'm fine. Although on another forum somebody said 600-650W minimum, so I'm not sure what to think
I'm with jamppa on this one, I'd recommend a better model.

If you're sticking with the psu then try it first before shelling out on a higher wattage psu.

h20
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Post by h20 » Sun Aug 19, 2007 7:10 am

amjedm wrote:
h20 wrote:honestly its worked perfectly fine with me and they wouldnt have produced so many sonatas 2 if it were so dangerous and i doubt they did a revision of the PSU.

SO if you say 450W is enough then i suppose I'm fine. Although on another forum somebody said 600-650W minimum, so I'm not sure what to think
I'm with jamppa on this one, I'd recommend a better model.

If you're sticking with the psu then try it first before shelling out on a higher wattage psu.
what happens when not enough Watts are delivered.
Will i be able to monitor all this?

Matija
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Post by Matija » Sun Aug 19, 2007 7:14 am

FWIW, I've seen several dead SmartPowers at my old workplace (capacitors blown), and I've talked to a guy in a computer shop which has decided not to sell Sonatas anymore because of PSU issues and high failure rates. According to him, they have had a lot less noname PSUs returned than SmartPowers. To be fair, he said that not once has a SmartPower fried other components, but...

jaganath
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Post by jaganath » Sun Aug 19, 2007 7:25 am

on another forum somebody said 600-650W minimum, so I'm not sure what to think
a quality 450W unit is more than enough.Q6600 uses 100W, 8800GTS 100W, hard drives and MB another 50W at most.

h20
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Post by h20 » Sun Aug 19, 2007 7:31 am

anyways if the thing does blow up which i HIGHLY doubt, who is responsible for this if it is indeed the fault of the PSU?

Antec?

santacruzbob
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Post by santacruzbob » Sun Aug 19, 2007 11:08 am

600+ watts? that's such a joke. I bet you can easily get away using a 300W psu by a quality manufacturer.

Nick Geraedts
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Post by Nick Geraedts » Sun Aug 19, 2007 11:40 am

santacruzbob wrote:600+ watts? that's such a joke. I bet you can easily get away using a 300W psu by a quality manufacturer.
You could... but I wouldn't recommend it. That'd be pushing the PSU a bit too much. The Q6600 and 8800 are pretty power hungry by themselves. Add harddrives, RAM, motherboard, and a DVD drive, and you're easily pushing 250W at full load.

The 450W Antec should be able to handle that system. You might see/hear fan speeds start to ramp up at full load though.

dangman4ever
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Post by dangman4ever » Sun Aug 19, 2007 11:42 am

Like everyone else here has said, get a new power supply. Since you're planning on getting a high-end system, don't skimp on the power supply. The PSU is the most important item in your PC. Here's a list of quality PSUs with confirmed or close to 80+ efficiency:

Corsair VX450 450W PSU - $80
Enhance ENP-5150GH 500W PSU - $81
Corsair HX520 520W PSU - $105

Basically in this case, the more you spend, the better quality you get. FYI, the Corsair PSUs come with a five year warranty.

amjedm
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Post by amjedm » Sun Aug 19, 2007 1:47 pm

h20 wrote:
what happens when not enough Watts are delivered.
Will i be able to monitor all this?
I think you may have issues on startup (when the computer needs most power) or during load (you may get reboots).

dhanson865
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Post by dhanson865 » Sun Aug 19, 2007 2:24 pm

amjedm wrote:
h20 wrote:
what happens when not enough Watts are delivered.
Will i be able to monitor all this?
I think you may have issues on startup (when the computer needs most power) or during load (you may get reboots).
Another possibility is the computer will shut down and won't restart until you reset it. I'm not sure but I think you can just flip the power switch on the back of the power supply.

Myself I've never been able to draw more than 200 watts with any PC I've ever built so I'm not that closely familiar with overloading a PSU.

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