Is 800 W sufficient enough for 2 R9 280X being cross fired?

Alex Arj · Oct 7, 2015

Hi Guys I appreciate if you can advise me on this,
Can i crossfire 2 R9 280X for the following system?
My motherboard is MSI Z170A PC MATE and my power supply is High Power HPL-800BR-F14S (800 W), System is Intel I7 6700K with 16 GB ram.
Thanks for your kind advise

Darkbreeze · Oct 7, 2015

No. That PSU shouldn't even be used with a single card as it's a low quality, most likely Tier 4 or Tier 5 model made by Sirfa. Plus, the actual recommended capacity for the R9 280x CF is 900w, which is assuming a less than great, but not terrible, unit.

Get a reliable Tier 1 or Tier 2 model of 850w or higher as listed here:

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-2547993/psu-tier-list.html

Emerald · Oct 7, 2015

According to this to R9 280X CF you should be looking at a 900W+ PSU

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

Darkbreeze · Oct 7, 2015

True, but I know for a fact that any Tier 1 or 2 quality 850w will run the 280x CF just fine and never come anywhere close to capacity under load. Still, that IS the recommendation as outlined by both RealHardtechX and the MSI recommendation page.

Alex Arj · Oct 7, 2015

Sorry for asking rookie questions, but what is CF and Tier?

Darkbreeze · Oct 7, 2015

CF is crossfire. Tier is a suggested level of performance and reliability, which I think you'd understand if you had visited the link I posted. It's like a standard of quality, performance and reliability. Similar to bronze, silver and gold 80plus efficiency ratings, which of course have NOTHING to do with quality or reliability, just efficiency.

Alex Arj · Oct 7, 2015

Dear Darkbreeze
Is is essentially wise to install two R9 280X on this mother board. The second PCI-E slot is only 4x. Does it worth to spend $300 to change PSU to install the second R9 280X on this (MSI Z170A Pc Mate) motherboard?

Darkbreeze · Oct 7, 2015

No, not really. You'd be better off selling your current 280x and going with a higher tiered single card. Crossfire and SLI kind of suck when it comes to scaling and support in many titles anyhow, even at x8 or x16 speeds, much less at x4 speeds. I wouldn't bother with it. Even if you only sold your current card for 150-ish, with the 200 dollars another 280x would cost new, you could easily afford a 290x, GTX 970 or something similar. BUT, you would still need to replace the power supply, or at least, it would be advisable.

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