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Is Antec Quattro 1000w a good PSU?

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Hello esteemed fellow readers of Tom's! Kindly share your knowledge and personal experience, if any, about the mentioned PSU.
I have the rig in my sig and I'm planning to CF my 5870 when prices drop a little, and since the summer here is so hot I thought I may have to install the 2nd 5870 in the 3rd PCI-e slot and keep my short gigabyte 8800GT (for physX) in the 2nd one to give the first card some room to breathe, and since I can do that because the 902 has 8 slots, the only problem remains is that I need a PSU that draws the air from the front side not the top, so I'm limited in choices (for those who don't know, the Antec 902 has no space between the last slot and the PSU, so installing a dual slot card in the last PCI-e slot will obscure the fan of my current PSU and any one that shares the same design, sure I can mod my case to make some holes at the bottom and install my PSU upside down, but I don't want to, because I never did that before!)

So what do you think of the Quattro 1000? I read some reviews but I want your input.

One more thing: If I do what I intend to do the graphics subsystem will look like this:
HD5870 16x
8800GT 8x
HD5870 8x
From a pure performance stand point, will it better be like this:
HD5870 16x
HD5870 16x
8800GT 1x (The mobo will set the 2nd and 3rd slots to 8x 8x by default but I can force 16x 1x from bios)
... and by how much better?

Thanks for any help!

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Power supply Master

i however have heard that the antec truepower quattro series has random quality issue. there have been more than normal cases where when brand new the fans would stay on full and not throttle down, along with some other issues...it still is a great psu :) 
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Thank you all for your replies.

@ obsidian:
No I can't, unless I mod the case, coz there are no holes at the bottom of the case to draw air into the CPU.
@ JohnnyLucky :
I read one of these reviews as well as others. Thanks for sharing the links.
Power supply Master

8x + 8x config will have a minimal performance drop when compared to a 16x + 16x config.. So you should be fine with your first setup thoughts.. Coming to your PSU query, the Antec TPQ series is excellent.. However, i don't see your system requiring that much power even at full load.. A good 850W PSU should suffice.. For that i'll recommend either the Corsair HX 850 or the XFX 850W Black Edition.. Grab the cheaper one out of the two..

How about the 8800GT in 1x, will that effect performance in physX titles?
I know a 850w PSU is enough, but I want to have some headroom and I plan to keep the unit for a while. Again I say I can't have any PSU with a fan on the top side unless I mod my case.
Power supply Expert

8800GT @ 1x pcie will affect its performance considerably. It will be a function of your physics application.

Why not consider a 5970 to avoid pcie lines issue? It is a cleaner setup with one card.

Another option is a 480 or 470. That would eliminate the need for the 8800gt for physics. The PSU you are considering is already sufficient to take care of such GPU.

Less card is a cleaner setup.
Power supply Expert

Antec PSUs are great. The downside of its multirail setup is there are more parts to fail(More ocp, ovp, rail reg...etc). I had 2 850 Quatro failures over a year ago.

If you opt for single GPU card solution(i.e. 480, 5970) you won't be constraint to choose Antec 1000 Quatro. You can consider Corsair for example.

Nvidia's GPU are better for gaming and engineering(i.e. Physics, CAE) applications. My GTX 280 enable me run Mathlab codes a lot faster. The 480 or 470 can do a lot better.

What MB do you have or plan to use?

@ Leon:
I am talking about the rig in my signature, I already have a 5870 and I plan to crossfire it with another.
At 8x, Mafia 2 never used more than 40% of the 8800GT even though I set apex physx to high, so I was wondering if 1x is sufficient. I was hoping if someone have tried this but I guess I have to test it myself.

@emperus:
I disagree. PhysX is written primarily for nVIDIA GPUs and CPUs can not provide the parrallelism needed, and this is clearly evident in benchmarks. Just to be clear, I don't wish to start a debate whether physX is worth it or not, I have the 8800GT laying around from my previous build, so why not use it and see everything games can offer. Even if I don't put the 8800GT, I still want to put the 2nd 5870 in the 3rd PCI-e 16x (physical, 8x electrical) to improve the cooling of the first card.
Power supply Expert

On Case 902 or 900(which i have). Using a Corsair CPU with PSU face-up should not be a concern.

I have CF 4890, and it has another card on my last Slot. I'm not sure if its another USB expansion card or another data acquisition card. I use Corsair HX 1000 faceup.

I installed the case side fan and it helps a lot.

You should not be confined or limited to Antec PSU. PSU with fans set-up like corsair should still work.
Power supply Master

avatar_raq said:


@emperus:

I disagree. PhysX is written primarily for nVIDIA GPUs and CPUs can not provide the parrallelism needed, and this is clearly evident in benchmarks. Just to be clear, I don't wish to start a debate whether physX is worth it or not, I have the 8800GT laying around from my previous build, so why not use it and see everything games can offer. Even if I don't put the 8800GT, I still want to put the 2nd 5870 in the 3rd PCI-e 16x (physical, 8x electrical) to improve the cooling of the first card.


Quite possibly, you misunderstood my comment.. I never meant to recommend swaying away from the 8800GT.. I just commented on the reduced efficiency while operating at 1x speed..
Power supply Expert

Emperus said:
Better than keeping your 8800GT (for physx) at 1x, you can let the CPU to perform the physx calculations..




Using Nvidia GPU for high calculation/math intensive process is 20x least better than Intel Quad Core CPUs @ 4x100% CPU. Not even Intel's latest quad core will come close.

I use this everyday for circuit simulation and Math lab intensive calculation. Not even close. Thats the reason my GTX 280 and 8800GT are on 16x PCIE config. 1x pcie will definitely choke it and the CPUs (even @ quad core 100% ) won't be able to compensate for the performance lost.
Power supply Expert

2176612,12,372259 said:
@ Leon:
I am talking about the rig in my signature, I already have a 5870 and I plan to crossfire it with another.
At 8x, Mafia 2 never used more than 40% of the 8800GT even though I set apex physx to high, so I was wondering if 1x is sufficient. I was hoping if someone have tried this but I guess I have to test it myself.

Your proposal will work. The first option on Question-2 will work. It would be good to evaluate your 2 propose setup to confirm which will give you a better results.

My point is, based on the information you presented you should not be limited to Antec 1000W PSU. You have options and it will work.

Thanks for your concern and replies guys.
If you read about my mobo, the ASUS Rampage 2 Extreme, you'll find that the first 16x slot is placed at the 3rd position (facing the 3rd slot of the case) and the 3 PCI-e slots are placed only 1 slot apart, so using dual slot GFX cards at the first and 2nd 16x PCI-e slots will not leave any space between them.
On the other hand, moving the 2nd card to the 3rd PCi-e slot (aka the 7th and last slot of the mobo) will make the card hang below the lower edge of the mobo and necessitates a case with 8 slots (more than the ATX standard by 1), the 902 fortunately has 8 slots, but there is no space left between the last slot and the PSU, therefore the last card will obscure any top facing PSU fan.
As I said before I can turn the PSU upside down but I have to make holes in the bottom plate of the chassis, which I don't want to.
I don't know if I made this clear or not. If you don't understand what I said, please say so and I may take photos or even draw a diagram!

yeah i would say your best bet is a PSU that will work fan down just make sure your not on carpet, as for the case mod, use a jig saw to remove a square and then cover it with a metal mesh and weld that down thats pretty hard core modding,

or just get a drill and mark all the places though you will wear through a few bits and the bottom/inside of teh case with be full of sharp freshly drilled holes.

you could by a PSU that draws from inside the case and vents out the back and just find a few to box it off from the GPU's so your not sucking in hot air.
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