X1950 Pro vs. 7950GT Power Requirements

[Stratacoustix]

Hey, I'm new here as far as posting goes but I read these forums alot and this seems to be the best group of people to get advice from. I've read post after post regarding the X1950 Pro and power supply requirements, but every pc is different so I was looking for some information regarding my rig specifically. The X1950 Pro seems to be the best perfomance/price card out there right now and my budget is about $160 on a new card. I've only used Nvidia in the past but moving to ATI for this price range seems in my best interest. Also my psu, I feel, is borderline to use with this card but I'm looking for a second opinion.

I currently have a Rosewill R550S-2M psu, 550w, 420 max on the 12v1 and 12v2 rails. They are rated at 18amps a piece which seems enough...maybe. Cooling wise I feel that my Coolermaster Ammo Box, with 1 intake, 2 rear exhaust, and 1 ceiling exhaust fans will be enough, they are all LED if that has any impact on amps at all. The rest of my setup is below along with my soon to be upgrade. Any advice from experience with this card is greatly appreciated regarding my psu w/ my current and future system.

CURRENT
AMD Sempron 3100+
FIC Mobo
1 gig DDR400
1 x DVD/RW
1 x CD/RW
1 x Seagate Barracuda 250gb HD
SB Audigy SE sound card
SMC Network card
Front Bay LCD Display w/ temp etc.

UPGRADING TO
AMD X2 4400+
ASUS single PCI or Gigabyte Mobo (unsure yet of exactly which one)
2 gigs DDR2

everything else will be the same.

Thanks in advance.

 

[hughyhunter]

First off welcome to toms... This forum I have found to be very helpful to me and have seen it to be helpful to others too.

I think that you are highly misinformed about the price/performance of the x1950 series cards in this day and age. Those cards at one time were very fast especially compared to it's competition at the time Nvidia. However I dont know if you know this or not but right now this very second for 179 dollars you can get an HD 3850 from ATI that will blow any X1950 series card out of the water. The HD 3000 cards are also direct x 10.1 capablie and are capable of PCI-e 2.0

I would spend the extra money and get yourself one of those and you wont be unhappy... as for the power supply it's not really so much about the watts... of course it's plenty of watts... it's about the stability... the only way to find out is to get your new hardware and test it out on that PSU and then you'll find out sooner or later... sometimes it takes months to notice PSU instability issues... sometimes they rear their ugly head right away.

I noticed you are getting an AMD X2 4400... I would personally save a few extra bucks and get the black edition 5000+ and never look back. It's an unlocked processor and built on a 65nm process. This means overclocking galore!

Hope this all helps...

 

[kpo6969]

Your psu has 35amps so your good there. I second the 3850 and the 5000 (I have the 5000 myself but not the black ed. can't o'c mine)

 

[mactronix]

Just as kpo6969 says you have 35 amps you divide the 420watts by the 12 volts = 35
I would also recomend you get the 3850.
Mactronix