Thermaltake Toughpower 700W ATX 12V 2.2 SLI question

BDT

Distinguished
Oct 8, 2010
4
0
18,510
Hi there folks,
First of all, many thanks for taking the time to read this and offer advice, much appreciated.

I have a machine that I built about 4 years ago and upgraded about a year ago with a new mobo, grpahics card, and memory.
Like the procrastinator that I am, I bought two graphics cards to do SLI, installed the one, then never got around to putting the other one in. I know, I know, retarded, but I never claimed not to be.

In any case, i was looking to get the other one plugged in, and I'm a bit stumped as to what to do in regards to how to connect it to the PSU. The PSU I have is a Thermaltake Toughpower 700W, 12V ATX, v 2.2. Specs here, pics attached.


At the moment I have an EVGA GeForce GTX 470 (Fermi) 1280MB 320-bit connected via a PCI-E cable to the one connector and the other via a 2-to-1 molex connector to the end of my molex cable that also powers my optical drive and a few fans.

I've tried to research to find out where I can get a few cables, mainly either two PCI cables that will plug into the red ports on the PSU to completely power the second graphics card, and another molex cable that will plug in so that I don't need to leach power off the primary molex line.

I don't know if this is the right idea, or if I should be going about it differently. I could also use a few other SATA power connectors, preferrably right angles, which I can find if I can get the cables from the PSU sorted out.

Thanks again in advance for the help, hope I made the issues sufficiently clear, if not please let me know adn I'll do my best to clarify.

Thanks,
-T

PSU pics:
QSOD0



Rest of comp specs:
1 x GIGABYTE GA-X58A-UD3R LGA 1366 Intel X58 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
2 x EVGA 012-P3-1470-AR GeForce GTX 470 (Fermi) 1280MB 320-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card
1 x Intel Core i7-950 Bloomfield 3.06GHz LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor BX80601950
1 x OCZ Vertex 2 OCZSSD3-2VTX90G 3.5" 90GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
1 x G.SKILL PI Series 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL7T-6GBPI
 
Most modern units 650W and up have 4 x pcie connectors.
Could be stretching it with your present unit.
You could buy an adapter and try that.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812198022
Now's a good time to buy a newer psu though.
Seasonic X760 Gold
http://us.ncix.com/products/?sku=57600&vpn=X%2D760%20Gold&manufacture=Seasonic%20Electronics&promoid=1055
XFX 750W PRO750W XXX Edition Single Rail
http://us.ncix.com/products/?sku=62224&vpn=P1750BNLG9&manufacture=XFX
XFX 750W PRO750W Core Edition
http://us.ncix.com/products/?sku=59617&vpn=P1750SNLB9&manufacture=XFX&promoid=1055
 
Each GeForce GTX 470 is going to draw around 14.25 to 14.75 Amps from the +12V rail under a typical gaming load.

For a system running with two GeForce GTX 470 graphics cards in 2-way SLI mode NVIDIA states that the power supply should have a combined +12 Volt continuous current rating of 56 Amps or greater and with at least four 6-pin PCI-E Supplementary Power Connectors.

Your Thermaltake Toughpower W0106RU 700W with its combined +12 Volt continuous current rating of 56 Amps meets the electrical requirement.

You should connect one 6-pin PCI-E Supplementary Power Connector to the primary graphics card and the other 6-pin PCI-E Supplementary Power Connector to the secondary graphics card.

The EVGA 012-P3-1470-AR GeForce GTX 470 should have included two dual 4-pin Molex to 6-pin PCI-E power dongles with each card.

You should have two modular cables with four 4-pin Molex connectors on them. Connect both to the power supply unit.

Connect a dual 4-pin Molex to 6-pin PCI-E power dongle to each of those modular cables that you've plugged into the power supply unit. Plug one of those 6-pin PCI-E power dongles into the primary graphics card and the other 6-pin PCI-E power dongle into the secondary graphics card.

Hopefully this should work. I couldn't find a reputable review of that power supply unit so there is no tear down information available showing the +12 Volt rail distribution. Thermaltake does not provide this information either. This is my best guess at what may work for you.
 

BDT

Distinguished
Oct 8, 2010
4
0
18,510
So, interesting developments. Have been out of town for a bit adn had to order some cables, so first got around to connecting the second card now.

I initially connected both one 6-pin PCI-E Supplementary Power Connectors to the secondary graphics card.
SLI bridge slipped on, and I fired up.
Both cards worked, I enabled SLI, and wsa off to a glorious few hours of Skyrim.
Then, when I powered up mu machine next, it had a horrendous resolution. Neither card was working, and it was the mobo's graphics card that was. Screen was still plugged in to the first graphics card. In device manager, it both cards showed up, and had Error 43.
After having tried multiple different configurations, both cards work fine independently, when slotted as single cards. No combination of power cables to the cards works to power both of them on. however, I did have both of them work at twice with the original power cable arrangement as described above.

So, I'm thinking that perhaps the power supply doesn't actually have the amps to power the cards.

Any thoughts?

Thanks,
-T


 
As the power supply ages it will gradually lose capacity.

Your power supply, when it was new, may have been sufficient but since it was just right on the borderline of meeting the minimum recommended system power requirements it may not be sufficient anymore.

Your computer's symptoms seem to indicate a power supply that can't cope with the load.

I think your "glorious few hours of Skyrim" was enough to heat up and degrade the power supply's capacity to the point where it's not able to provide enough power on its +12V rails anymore.
 
i have the thermaltake tp 850w it is a good unit and comes with 2 8 and 2 6pin as wll as 2 8-6 adapters... the unit itself is robust and above all quiet... which is a surprise considering most of the reviews said it was a bit noisy...
would i recommend it? no! there are better units out there for less money that will perform just as well, if not a little better on efficiency. thermaltake make great cases, there record on psu's is less than stellar.