PC shuts down when playing games

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LiamMartin

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Jan 23, 2015
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Hi, I have an Alienware X51 (2012 model, trust me I already know not to buy alienware agan), 330W power brick, EVGA GTX 970 FTW Ref. I'm fairly certain the motherboard can't handle anything more than 330W, and I realllly don't wanna have to downgrade my GPU. Is there any way I can get this to work? I've heard of people getting a 970 to work on this system, but those were with different variants. Should I just sell this version and get a less bulky one? Or is there something I can do to keep the random shut downs from happening

Edit: By "turn off", I mean the pc just shuts down, as if I had been holding down the power button. Sometimes, it'll just be the gpu that fails and the two screens using that card go black. Then the system restarts
 
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ingtar33
ugh... 330W to drive a sandybridge i3 and a gtx970?

you could try lowering the boost clock, undervolting the gpu, and underclocking it. should be able to do all of those things with MSI Afterburner

Though i'm curious about what you mean when you say it shuts down. does it blue screen? does it restart? or does the whole system just turn off?

cause if it turns off that's not really a power problem thats a temp problem.

personally i wouldn't use a 330W psu with a 970... i think a 450W-500W would be min for that unit.
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ingtar33

ingtar33

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Dec 17, 2012
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ugh... 330W to drive a sandybridge i3 and a gtx970?

you could try lowering the boost clock, undervolting the gpu, and underclocking it. should be able to do all of those things with MSI Afterburner

Though i'm curious about what you mean when you say it shuts down. does it blue screen? does it restart? or does the whole system just turn off?

cause if it turns off that's not really a power problem thats a temp problem.

personally i wouldn't use a 330W psu with a 970... i think a 450W-500W would be min for that unit.
 
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andy_Man

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Nov 17, 2014
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"Load power consumption for GTX 970 follows the same path as the GTX 980, almost down to the watt in this case. The GTX 970 FTW actually sees slightly higher power consumption at the wall, while reducing it to reference clocks brings down the power consumption to a flat 300W"

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8568/the-geforce-gtx-970-review-feat-evga/15

Leaving at most 30Watts for the rest of your system. (which obviously isn't enough)
Edit: You can try and find a stronger PSU to fit in the case, I don't know the form factor.
 
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LiamMartin

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Jan 23, 2015
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Thank you, but that still doesn't solve my problem. The card itself draws 145w, and I've found that it actually leaves more power for the rest of the system than my 750ti did when I still had a 240w.
 
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LiamMartin

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Jan 23, 2015
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Actually, I made off with an i5! haha but I'll try msi, I was using EVGA precision, which I figured would've worked. Maybe I'll have more luck with msi. Also, I cannot upgrade the psu, since the x51 runs off a power brick and not an internal psu. That one fact has been driving me insane ever since I started to actually learn about what I bought. Fool me once haha
 
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ingtar33

ingtar33

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Dec 17, 2012
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yeah. msi afterburner is sorta the gold standard of gpu overclocking utilities

as for your comment. TDP is not power draw. yes, the 970 is a 145W TDP gpu. however, TDP doesn't = max power draw. max power draw of the 970 hovers around 220-300W depending on the reviewer.
 
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LiamMartin

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Jan 23, 2015
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Ah ok. From what I've read, the x51's power board (or motherboard, I still haven't quite found my way around the pc lol) won't handle more than 330w. Is there a way I can switch something out so I can take a better psu?
 
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