500 watts not enough for single graphics card?

[PTNLemay]

My last computer (an old pre-built from Acer) had it's PSU die, the new PSU I got for it turned out to be the first piece of the rig I'm building now.

When I got it I told myself I wouldn't do any over-clocking or SLI/Crossfire, so I figured 500 Watts would do me fine. It's a nice gold+ rated LEPA and everything. But I did some searching on google and found this calculator that worries me. http://support.asus.com/powersupply.aspx

With the following...

Core i5 2500K,
GTX 560 Ti,
4 dimms of DDR3,
1 hard drive,
1 DVD drive,
no USB peripherals,
and 5 fans (I actually have 6 in my case but I only have cables to power 5 of them).

The minimum recommended power peaks at 550W... If I want to throw in an extra HDD or some external USB hard drives the needed power jumps up to 600W. I'm... very surprised at this, because I was sure you didn't need this much unless you started playing with multiple graphics cards. I looked it up and the i5 peaks at 131 W, while the 560 Ti supposedly requires 170... I'm not sure where he's getting the other 300 watts.

Is this caluclator exaggerating? Or is 500 W really not acceptable for my situation?

 

[rolli59]

Not knowing your PSU but if it is quality it will run those specs, the ASUS calc is on the high side because of all the crappy PSU's on the market. Try this one http://extreme.outervision.com/psucalculatorlite.jsp

 

[xtreme5]

it good for your whole setup don't worry

 

[xtreme5]

it good for your whole setup don't worry

 

[PTNLemay]

I have an 80+ Gold LEPA, 500 Watts. It says on the box it has a "12 V rail with 18 A output that supports next gen 6-core processors", so I assumed it would be mean enough to do the job.

I hear the GTX 460 and the Radeon 6850 are each closer to 130 W... And they should be able to handle things like the Mass Effect games or Diablo III. I just don't want to be nervous when plugging in 3 external hard drives simultaneously, not to mention MP3-player charging & syncing. Yes I plan on making this a gaming rig, but I also want it to be a multi-tasking workstation. I'll slash my graphics if it means I can run lots of peripherals.

Try this one http://extreme.outervision.com/psucalculatorlite.jsp

Huh... for some reason my ISP is blocking that website, I get this odd error page.

 

[tlmck]

The LEPA website I found says that has 3 +12v rails with 25a each. If this is your PSU, you will be fine with that setup. http://www.lepatek.com/eng/product_content/1/1/3/#produkte

LEPA is also on the approved list, so the Cert. seems to be valid. That is if your model number is one this list. http://www.plugloadsolutions.com/80PlusPowerSuppliesDetail.aspx?id=241&type=2

 

[rolli59]

I have an 80+ Gold LEPA, 500 Watts. It says on the box it has a "12 V rail with 18 A output that supports next gen 6-core processors", so I assumed it would be mean enough to do the job.

I hear the GTX 460 and the Radeon 6850 are each closer to 130 W... And they should be able to handle things like the Mass Effect games or Diablo III. I just don't want to be nervous when plugging in 3 external hard drives simultaneously, not to mention MP3-player charging & syncing. Yes I plan on making this a gaming rig, but I also want it to be a multi-tasking workstation. I'll slash my graphics if it means I can run lots of peripherals.


Huh... for some reason my ISP is blocking that website, I get this odd error page.

Looking at the specs posted above it will do fine.

 

[Quaddro]

usually gold/platinum psu has underrated label on it in order to reach gold effeciency.

You can pull out around 100-150 watt more than label without any worried..

 

[PTNLemay]

Well thank you, that certainly is comforting.

 

[PTNLemay]

Best answer selected by PTNLemay.