PSU 600W enough for this system and SLI?

[ManBearPigNL]

Hi i am wondering if this PSU will be enough to cover this system?

i5 2500K
4 GB Kingston HyperX 1600
MSI N560GTX 1GB
Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB
LiteOn IHAS124 (DVD writer)
2-3 case fans
Scythe Samurai ZZ
ASUS P8P67-M PRO (rev. 3)

The PSU i have selected for this system atm is the OCZ StealthXStream 2 600W.
I am fairly certain this is enough for this system, but will it be enough for an additional 560 (ti) ?
btw feel free to comment on my system, I am going to use this for gaming.

 

[sarinaide]

Looking at the good manufacturers 600w range PSU, the general +12v Amps range from 42-48A, the 560TI from reading around is at minimum a 30A card, but stranger things have happened. I would trust the 700w range more (54-62A)

You may have to wait until someone more qualified than myself answers, but I am not sure a M-ATX board can support 2x560TI.

 

[Onus]

Use the PSU calculator at http://www.extreme.outervision.com/psucalculatorlite.jsp to determine the minimum size you need. OCZ is not "bad," but Seasonic, Antec, Corsair, XFX, and Enermax/LEPA are better.

 

[ManBearPigNL]

Using the calculator i end on 581W recommended, is there enough headroom with an 600W PSU, if not is an 650W PSU enough or do i need a 700W?

thanks for the help so far

 

[RazberyBandit]

I have strong doubts that it's enough for SLI'd 560Ti's.

I friend of mine tried to SLI two GTX460 on an OCZ ModXStream 700 and it wouldn't work. There's something about OCZ's 600-700W PSU's and their power distribution. With his modular model, all the fixed cables were on one rail, with all that rail's power aimed at the motherboard. The modular cables were on a separate rail, and had to power all the additional components. (The drives, GPU, etc.)

If you look here at Hardware Secrets' review, you can see that despite it's 4 rails, the StealthXStream follows a similar strategy, where 12V1 and 12V2 are for CPU power, 12V3 is for peripheral devices (SATA & MOLEX connectors), and 12V4 is the PCIe power cabling (1x 6-pin and 1x 6+2-pin for GPUs.

Considering each 560Ti requires 2x 6-pin PCIe cables, you'd have to use adapters to support a 2nd 560Ti. That means you'd have to steal quite a bit of power from the 12V3 rail.

The OCZ StealthXStream 2 600W (the new version) isn't much different from the old one, as seen here.

Honestly, I would look for a 700W (or more) unit that actually has all the required PCIe connectors built-in.

 

[ManBearPigNL]

Ok, so I think i'm not going with the 600W OCZ, but as i get 581W with the calculator, will this XFX 650W XXX edition do the trick maybe? It's review seems quite good, i'm not very experienced with PSUs, but the XFX one has 4x PCIe power, so that would be better right?
Also does a PSU lose a lot of it's 'power' after like 2 years? Because i am not planning to buy the 2nd 560 yet, i will wait ~ 2 years. This slows down the aging of the PSU right, since i'm not using as much power?

 

[ManBearPigNL]

Oh forgot review link
http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/xfx650w/

 

[RazberyBandit]

In two years, you could find yourself hard-pressed to even find a 2nd 560Ti. It's been a little more than 2 years since I bought my HD4890 (May, 2009), and the only way I can get a 2nd one now is to buy a used one through eBaY. That is, unless I want to pay $300 for one that was never used. (Mine was only $200 brand new.)

And in two years' time, a single GTX 7-series card might completely wipe the floor of two 560Ti's. You just don't know... It's just impossible to see that far ahead.

If you were planning to SLI within the next 6 months, I wouldn't hesitate to give a go ahead on buying a PSU that could power two cards right now. But 2 years? There's just too many "what ifs" that could arise in that much time.

You may be better of simply building for a single 560Ti now if you can't see yourself actually SLI'ing until that far down the road. And in that case, a solid 500W PSU would be sufficient for a single 560Ti and 2500K.

 

[ManBearPigNL]

Yeah that's true, but i was thinking about it in this way, in 2 years when a nex GTX series (or 2) is out, the 560 will be pretty cheap right, like maybe 30-40 euros? My plan is not to get a system then which can run max on every game in 2 years, but a reasonable performance boost for 40 euros. But, getting a motherboard that is 22 euros more expensive as well as a PSU that is 25-40 euros more expensive, i'm not too sure anymore. Do you think the 2nd card will make a difference on the fps in games, or will it just be 2 fps? I'd like to hear you guys' opinions on this.

 

[RazberyBandit]

In two years, the GTX5-series cards won't be in production any longer, and the overwhelming majority of retailers will have sold off their stock. Such is the case for nearly every higher-end GPU. You will very likely end up in the same position I'm in presently -- having to consider used ones in order to add a 2nd card 2-years after the initial purchase. Hell. I had to look for second-hand cards within a year because 4890's virtually disappeared from regular vendor channels within 3-6 months of the release of AMD's 5000-series.

Two years from now, I believe it would be a more realistic scenario to actually replace a 560 with a new card from that generation than it would be to add a second one for SLI.

 

[ManBearPigNL]

OK thank you all, i've decided to get a non SLI MB and a lower Watt PSU. Thanks for all the help.
How do i close this tread?

 

[RazberyBandit]

I think your decision is a good one. The money saved on the motherboard and PSU should actually be enough to make the jump from a GTX560 to a GTX560Ti, should you choose to do so.

And sorry, but you can't close the thread. That only applies to "Question with a specific answer" threads, whereas this is a "Discussion" thread.

 

[ManBearPigNL]

Ok well i've made my decision, so no more discussion on the matter, a little weird a discussion thread can't be closed but oh well.
Again thank you all for the help, as for any TH admins, maybe it's handy to enable users to lock discussion threads

 

[Mousemonkey]

Looking at the good manufacturers 600w range PSU, the general +12v Amps range from 42-48A, the 560TI from reading around is at minimum a 30A card, but stranger things have happened. I would trust the 700w range more (54-62A)

You may have to wait until someone more qualified than myself answers, but I am not sure a M-ATX board can support 2x560TI.

No it isn't, with a power draw of 170w it's a 14.16A card.

Ok well i've made my decision, so no more discussion on the matter, a little weird a discussion thread can't be closed but oh well.
Again thank you all for the help, as for any TH admins, maybe it's handy to enable users to lock discussion threads

Why? We don't let users lock question or poll threads.