Dangerous for the Power Supply?

[BOREophyll]

I am about to place an order with AVAdirect.

The system I am interested (a GT3 mini pc) has a built in 350w power supply.

I am upgrading the graphics card to a Radeon 5770. As far as I know this card requires a 500w-600w power supply. I contacted AVAdirect and questioned them as to how they are offering an upgrade to the Radeon 5770 when the power supply is only 350w.

Here's there response:

"These video cards take anywhere from 70 to 135 watts to operate. Even with
the best CPU we have available the system will only take around 330W total.
We've done extensive testing with these components to make sure it will
operate and continue to do so for years to come."


Are they wrong or are all the other sites requiring you to upgrade to a 500-600w power supply for high end graphics cards wrong?

I did a search on the forums and found out that it is dangerous to run a PSU so close to its maximum output. Why would AVAdirect sell a system that does this?

 

[logainofhades]

Usually the recommendations are so high because too many people buy crap PSU's. What are the rest of the specs for the system?

 

[BOREophyll]

CUSTOM GAMING PC Phenom™ II AM3 GT3™ Slim Portable Gaming PC $977.24 UPDATE $977.24

* GTR TECH GT3™ SFF Black Case, ATX, 350W PSU, Aluminum/Steel
* ASUS M4A78T-E, AM3, AMD® 790GX, DDR3-1600 (O.C.) 16GB /4, PCIe x16 CF /2, SATA 3 Gb/s RAID 5 /5, VGA+DVI, HDA, GbLAN, FW /2, ATX, Retail
* AMD Phenom™ II X4 945 Quad-Core 3.0GHz, AM3, HT 4000MHz, 4x 512KB L2 + 6MB L3 cache, 95W, 45nm, Retail
* KINGSTON 4GB (2 x 2GB) ValueRAM PC3-8500 DDR3 1066MHz CL7 (7-7-7) 1.5V SDRAM DIMM, Non-ECC
* SAPPHIRE Radeon™ HD 5770 850MHz, 1GB GDDR5 4800MHz, PCIe x16 CrossFire, DVI /2, DP, HDMI, Retail
* SEAGATE 320GB Barracuda® 7200.11, SATA 3 Gb/s NCQ, 7200 RPM, 16MB cache
* RAID No RAID, Independent HDD Drives
* MICROSOFT Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit Edition, OEM
* WARRANTY Silver Warranty Package (3 Year Limited Parts, 3 Year Labor Warranty)

 

[logainofhades]

Yea I would think 350w would be pushing it a bit with that system. Also if you ever want to go CF, you will have to change the PSU anyway. Might want to look elsewhere or even try to build your own. Probably see some decent examples over in the homebuilt section.

 

[Kewlx25]

http://www.techspot.com/review/209-ati-radeon-hd-5770/page3.html

- Intel Core i7 965 Extreme Edition (Overclocked @ 3.70GHz)
- x3 2GB G.Skill DDR3 PC3-12800 (CAS 9-9-9-24)
- Seagate 500GB 7200-RPM (Serial ATA300)
- HIS Radeon HD 5770 (1GB)

Total system power under load: 284watts
Your PSU: 350watts

You got some playing room but it is close. And that's assuming a high overclock. You can chop off about 30watts if you don't OC your CPU

 

[ksampanna]

While getting a bundled psu, in extreme cases, be prepared for random system crashes, graphic artifacts, etc, & then having to deal with replacements, warranty claims, etc, which, no matter how much you trust your vendor, are always a pain in the ass.
The wise thing, then, would be to buy a quality psu. But therein lies the issue of whether your new psu is compatible with the case (& there's no way of knowing that, unless you buy the system)
The best thing to do would be to go ahead with the purchase w/ the bundled psu; & persist with it until it conks out. Then you could order a replacement. In the meantime, try to find another psu (but a better qulity one) which will fit within the case. The replacement which arrives afterwards can then be used as a backup psu.

 

[saaiello]

350 watts is about the exact amount your system will need to run with a 5770 so it should be fine especially if the manufacturer said it would be OK considering I would imagine they would replace the PSU if it does fail so I am sure they made sure it would be ok before makeing that an option for an upgrade.

 

[shovenose]

give it a shot

 

[BOREophyll]

Best answer selected by BOREophyll.