Seasonic 850w Bronze vs XFX 850w Bronze for R9 290?

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KingSaif

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I'm getting an R9 290 and an i5 4690k this year and maybe in 3-5 years I may do Crossfire but I would like to know which PSU is better. Both the Seasonic M12II-850 Bronze (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00607JNIM/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_S_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=3C4FQQQXYGWLL&coliid=I1WOR65LNUGJFW) and XFX PRO850W (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0045L4BNW/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_S_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=3C4FQQQXYGWLL&coliid=IIDK04YS5KM08&psc=1) are the same price on Amazon at $110, but from what I've heard, Seasonic makes the best PSU, but on Amazon, XFX has wayyy more reviews and same score of 4.5...which should I get? OR should I choose a different PSU, such as Corsair or some other brand? Or higher/lesser watt because I was thinking maybe I can cheap out and get 650w bronze for now and then in 3 years when I do crossfire or get a new GPU go 850w-1000w? Which seems like the better option? Thanks :)
 
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650 watts is plenty even factoring in overclocking. The Seasonic M12 platform is getting close to 6 years old while the G series is much newer and just like with the graphics cards more efficient. The G series is a superior unit in every way.

Many people have a huge misconception that they need more power than they actually do. As I explained above 750w or 850w would be a bad choice for you as it's just not necessary for your listed setup and it's not enough for 2 cards. It won't damage anything to run a unit with more wattage than you need but it doesn't help anything either.

Also an 80 Plus Bronze 650w unit will pull 747.5 watts from the wall to make that 650 watts. The rest is wasted as heat.
An 80 Plus Gold 650w unit will only...
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Seasonic makes all XFX power supplies. The above poster is correct in that they are the same platform internally. In 3-5 years newer cards will be out that will not use nearly as much power or generate nearly as much heat as the 290/290X. This can already be seen with the GTX 970 and 980. The trend is moving to less power not more, at least hopefully the next AMD cards can come close to what Nvidia did with Maxwell.

850 watts is not a good size for a 290 since a system with a single 290 only needs a 650w unit and a system with 2 in Crossfire needs 1000 watts.

http://www.realhardtechx.com/index_archivos/Page362.htm

I'd get a GTX 970 or 980 myself. But the post above will show you how much power your system will need and here is our tier list showing quality. Stay with tier 2 and up for a high power system like that.

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-1804779/power-supply-unit-tier-list.html
 
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Winly

Winly

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Thats a very nice and informative post! love it
 
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KingSaif

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Wow, thanks for the informative answer! Since the single r9 290 will be fine with 650w, do u think I should go with 750w for now in case I don't do crossfire and instead get a new, more powerful GPU which the 750w will be able to handle? Or will the 750w be too much for the initial 3-5 years and result in under consumption (if that makes sense)?
 
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KingSaif

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The amazon price of the 650w and 750w are the same, so I'm thinking of going with the 750w, but I was wondering if the extra 100w would be enough to OC my GPU and CPU at a pretty high level. If this helps, I'm thinking of getting either the Corsair 450D which has pretty good airflow or the Phanteks Enthoo Pro which is a full tower and has way more than enough space and great airflow. With both of these cases I think I can minimize the temps greatly if i choose to OC, what do u think?
 
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Look at the RealhardtechX page and look at the flagship cards from Nvidia. GTX 480 and GTX 580 needed 600 watts. Then the GTX 680 dropped that to 550 watts. The GTX 780 came along ( and was a significantly more powerful card ) and still only needed 575 watts because along with more power came more efficiency. Now we have the GTX 980 and Maxwell and you only need a 520w power supply for a flagship card that is faster than a GTX 780 Ti.

AMD is not doing so well in that department. The 290 and 290X are hot ( 90 celsius! ) and use a huge amount of power needing 650 watts to have similar performance to the GTX 780/780 Ti and GTX 970/980. Hopefully AMD will be closer to what Nvidia can do with their next gen cards due out sometime next year. As is though you only need a largish power supply if you plan on using AMD cards. The next gen Nvidia cards based on the 20nm ( hopefully, there are issues at the moment) manufacturing process will be very efficient just like the 970 and 980 and be even more powerful.

Anyway, 650 watts for any single card is fine. That's why I went with this Seasonic 660w I have now. That turned into a rant sorry about that :D Hopefully it answered your question though!
 
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The amazon price of the 650w and 750w are the same, so I'm thinking of going with the 750w, but I was wondering if the extra 100w would be enough to OC my GPU and CPU at a pretty high level. If this helps, I'm thinking of getting either the Corsair 450D which has pretty good airflow or the Phanteks Enthoo Pro which is a full tower and has way more than enough space and great airflow. With both of these cases I think I can minimize the temps greatly if i choose to OC, what do u think?
Click to expand...

You don't need to go over the RealhardtechX recommendations for overclocking. They already factor in plenty of headroom. Are you in the US?
 
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KingSaif

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oh ok didn't know that, but thanks for all the informative answers :) I will certainly now consider the 650w but i;m still leaning towards the 750w since it's the same price, if u had the choice which would u choose right now and why (sorry last question before i choose best answer xD)
 
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I would pick this assuming you can order it for this price.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00918N4A0/?tag=pcpapi-20

Plenty of power, a much newer platform that is 80 Plus Gold certified and is modular. This unit would be in tier 1 in our tier list I posted above except it uses a slightly lower end fan than the X and Platinum series units do. Electrically the G series is almost perfect.

Review: 9.8/10 from jonnyguru ( the best power supply testing site ).

http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story6&reid=348

 
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KingSaif

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Thanks for the suggestion and yes I can afford that price, but wouldn't 750w Bronze for $20 less be a much better deal than 650w Gold since the Seasonic makes XFX psu anyway? And would 650w be enough to handle GPU and CPU OC'd high? I'm not really familiar with overclocking at all so please excuse me if I sound like a noob but I'm really trying to think about the future with this build. thx a lot man for all the answers I really appreciate it
 
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650 watts is plenty even factoring in overclocking. The Seasonic M12 platform is getting close to 6 years old while the G series is much newer and just like with the graphics cards more efficient. The G series is a superior unit in every way.

Many people have a huge misconception that they need more power than they actually do. As I explained above 750w or 850w would be a bad choice for you as it's just not necessary for your listed setup and it's not enough for 2 cards. It won't damage anything to run a unit with more wattage than you need but it doesn't help anything either.

Also an 80 Plus Bronze 650w unit will pull 747.5 watts from the wall to make that 650 watts. The rest is wasted as heat.
An 80 Plus Gold 650w unit will only have to pull 715 watts from the wall to make the same 650 watts. Less heat and less power bill.
 
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KingSaif

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Thanks a lot bro, I think I'm gonna go with the Seasonic 650w :)
 
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