Power supply advice

Pugsport

Member
well i have finally work out which parts im going to go for i think but i used a psu calculator to check wattage of pc with new parts and it was coming out at 845w

so i just wanted your advice as to in your opinion if this was right or not and secondly if running a 860w psu would be pushing it or not

pc specs including the upgrade parts will be

Processor: - Intel Core i5 2500k
Motherboard: - gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD5-B3
Graphics card: - sapphire R9 290 tri x, in crossfire
Memory: - Corsair dominator platinum ddr3 1866mhz 2x8gb
Solid State Drive: - samsung 840 Evo 500gb
Hard drives: - using 3 standard 7200rpm hard drives at the moment
Sound card: - i want to install a sound card but im unable to use my pci express slot x1 due the the first being taken up by the heat sink on the motherboard and the second one is covered. so i need to try and find something that works on a standard pci express slot
Fans wise: - ill be looking at running 2 480 rads in push pull and also 3 system fans just for some air flow.
Pump: - Alphacool VPP655 Single Edition Variable Speed

i dont think i have forgot to list anything
 
Id go for an RM1000 or something similar.
Should cover you.
Or an AXi 1200.

Seems like a good calculator what mobo you got. Not gonna run into bottle necks on your CPU or have you OC'ed it and my general rule of thumb would be give 10% the total power. that way your protected against surges or miscalculations and longer life of the PSU.
 
Id go for an RM1000 or something similar.
Should cover you.
Or an AXi 1200.

Seems like a good calculator what mobo you got. Not gonna run into bottle necks on your CPU or have you OC'ed it and my general rule of thumb would be give 10% the total power. that way your protected against surges or miscalculations and longer life of the PSU.

yer i was thinking the RM1000 or the AX1200 if the AX860 was not gonna be enough, was not 100% if running that close to the limit would/could cause issues and reduce life of the power supply

using a Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD5 motherboard http://www.overclock3d.net/reviews/cpu_mainboard/gigabyte_z68x_ud5_b3_review/1

its not overclocked at the moment as the heatsink i had been been using was great and till i started over clocking (temp went up badly) i thought it could have been a thermal paste issue so i changed it but it did not make much difference. i then check it with a straight edge and found it was curved (not much but i guess it was enough to stop it working so well, i did think about taking it up the workshop and putting it on the milling machine but it just seemed like to much hassle for a £50 cpu cooler. after the hassle with the cooler im now looking to go water cooling.

i did discuss this issues in another thread and was told i should be all right. ill be looking to upgrade motherboard and cpu next time round due to age

thanks for the advice :)
 
850 is fine for a pair of R9 290's. Nothing wrong with going for a 1000 watt unit but you wont need it.

As for which one, Im really big on the new EVGA G2 line. Theyre built by Superflower and based on their just excellent Leadex line. After seeing nothing but stellar reviews for them and Jonny Guru giving them mostly 10's I finally bought a 750 watt G2. Theyre usually cheaper than the comparable Seasonic units or really close in price at least. Hard to beat for the money.

Im not crazy about the Corsair RM line. Not that theyre bad, just not that theyre great. Their AXi line however is superb. Cant go wrong with those at all and the Corsair Link software looks like it would be a lot of fun to play with.
 
I have a very similar setup to yours and I use the RM1000, which is def. overkill. I would recommend going around 800W to 900W (or lower). I don't run a watercooling system off my PSU tho, so I didn't factor that in, I don't know if it makes any sort of difference.

My corsair-monitor says I'm using around 45A on the 12V rail (540W) while mining cryptocurrencies with CPU and GPU (fans @ 100%) so I would hazard a guess you could go even lower than 800W and have room to spare.
 
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I just gave headroom, thats all.
Id run 860 for twin cards in a watercooled system to give motor headroom and just incase additions to the case or heavier draw fans.
 
Saphire Radeon Tri x

4GB Sapphire Radeon R9 290 Tri X OC, 28nm, 5200MHz GDDR5, GPU 1000MHz, 2560 Streams, DPort/DVI/HDMI

System Requirements
PCI Express® based PC is required with one X16 lane graphics slot available on the motherboard.
1X75 Watt 6-pin PCI Express power connector is required.
4096MBMinimum of system memory.
Installation software requires CD-ROM drive.
DVD playback requires DVD drive.
Blu-ray™ / HD DVD playback requires Blu-ray / HD DVD drive.
750 Watt Power Supply is required.
1X150 Watt 8-pin PCI Express power connector is required.
64-bit operating system highly recommended
A display with digital input (HDMI, DisplayPort or DVI) is required

So Tri x in crossfire, I would assume he means 2 of them, so as suggested, a 850W PSU or above would really be ideal for everything leaving you some room for future expansion, and some head room not to stress PSU so it running flat out all time.
 
im sorry i assumed it ment tri as in amount of cards. if not then defo a 860W

I would of assumed that also if I hadn't seen the replies and then done a quick google search of it.

The card does look nice though, but the yellow and black colour scheme wouldn't go with my rig :)
 
not your fault buddy you was clear i just mis read it

haha yer i know that feeling mate, i quite often read what i think is there rather than what is there.

Right guys now I have my final parts list set out I just wanted to make sure that an 860w psu was going to be enough before I order it

Going to be using the following the parts

CPU: - 2500k until the new line of Intel CPU’s come out
GPU: - Sapphire R9 290 Tri-x in 2 way crossfire
Ram: - 2 x sticks of 8 GB DDR3 1866MHz
HDD: - 1 x 1 TB WD Green storage drive and 1 TB WD blue or black drive for extra programs
SSD: - 1 x 500 GB Samsung 840 evo drive for OS and some programs and 1 x 250 GB Samsung 840 evo for games
Sound card: - this is one thing I’ve not made my mind up on yet as I was going to use the Asus D2X card but all the PCI-e x1 slots on my motherboard are unusable. Cannot use the first x1 slot on the board because the heat sink is to high and stops anything plugging in to it and the second slot is covered by the GPU. I’m guessing ill end up using something like the Asus Xonar d1

Cooling bits

Pump: - 2 x Alphacool VPP655 Single Edition Variable Speed Pump Motor
Radiator fans: - 16 x Corsair SP120 high performance edition, I do have space for another 480mm radiator and I’m sure if going to use just the two radiators or use all the space and add the third radiator. I know I won’t get better temps with the extra radiator
Case fans: - x 2 Corsair AF120 high performance edition, 1x Corsair AF140 quiet edition
Fan controller: - 1 x Lamptron CW611

Also have case lighting and the normal keyboard, mouse and maybe a headset that will also be using psu power

I think that pretty much cover all the parts that will be drawing power from the power supply

I was looking at using a Corsair AX860 or a Corsair RM1000 but not sure which would be better suited as id like a little head room power wise just in case things change and also don’t really want to run the power supply at its max all the time
 
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