GTX 260 real power consumption ?

[zoro8500]

Hello,

Basically i have a E6750 processor with 3Gb ddr2 ram,1 sata drive and 1 dvd drive attached to p31 neo motherboard running on 400W FSP model no:ATX-400PNF.

I wanted to upgrade my pci express graphic card to GTX 260 which i knew was power hungry and it will be risky to run it on my existing psu so i bough a hcs-620W antec power supply and attached the new graphic card to it. it ran for 2 days fine with no problems at all.

However i left the pc overnight to download some updates but when i woke up in the morning, the computer wouldnt boot up and the fan on the graphic card wasnt working. I took the card out and tested it on someone else pc and it worked fine. i attached a previous much slower card and i still had no display.

I also checked the outputs on the +12 rails and it was 12.1. fan on processor was turning on and so is the case fans and light. anyway i decided to put back my old psu and the computer booted up with no problems.

so far its running well and temperature of card at idle is 42 and while gaming on high setting it is around 70.
do i need to upgrade my psu or shall i leave it ??

 

[inzone]

It sounds like the psu that you bought is defective so why not send it back for a replacement. That way you would have an upgraded psu.

 

[nforce4max]

That is why you should never buy cheap power supplies. In the end they can cost you much more in repairs than what a high quality unit would have cost up front.

As for the card it depends on which one you got. If your card has the back plate it is the 65nm core while the 55nm version uses less and runs cooler does not have the back plate.

 

[inzone]

The GTX 260 draws about 182w which is about half of the capacity of the 400w psu so I would say that it might be risky to run it for an extended period of time and you should send the other one back for a replacement.

 

[Red Team FTW]

I run a GTX 275 and overclocked Phenom II x4 CPU on a Coolermaster 460watt PSU that is apparently overrated and delivers closer to 420watts continuous power in reality and it runs everything fine I think your PSU was faulty of just cheap quality.

 

[zoro8500]

hello,


guys the power supply i bought is not a cheap one. as stated in the thread, it is antec HCG-620w which had great reviews and single 48A +12 rail, more than enough for my graphic card.
as for the card version i have, it is XFX GTX 260 XT edition with 610mhz. the power supply is going back for refund from the shop i bought it from but since my current psu is running the graphic card fine with no random shut down or crash, is it worth the upgrade ????

 

[inzone]

As I had said in my previous post the card draws 182w and like you said it is running but the thing to think about is over the long usage of it will the power supply hold up and with the video card drawing almost half the capacity of the psu the overall draw has to be close to the maximum wattage capacity of the psu. That is the question and nobody can really answer that because there's no way to tell. Is it going to last and what kind of gameing are you going to do how much will you stress the video card and the rest of the computer. It is up to you if you want to take the chance or not.
The thing you can think about is that you had bought the Antec psu and you can either take it back for a refund or for a swap to another Antec psu and then you will have the 400w as a backup

 

[residentdean]

way too small, I would get a quality 650psu just to be safe there under a hundred dollars.

 

[jsc]

One of my systems has an OC'd Q9550, 4 GB RAM, a GTX260-216, a Gigabyte EP45-UD3P motherboard, 3 hard drives and an optical, and a Soundblaster card all powered by a Corsair 750TX.

Running 3 instances of Prime95 to load the CPU and 3DMark06 to load the GPU, it pulls 375 watts from the wall as measured by my Kill-a-Watt meter. Figuring 80% PSU efficiency, the system pulls 300 watts from the PSU.

The 620 watt Antec will be more than adequate. One of my CX400 Corsairs would be adequate.

 

[zoro8500]

As I had said in my previous post the card draws 182w and like you said it is running but the thing to think about is over the long usage of it will the power supply hold up and with the video card drawing almost half the capacity of the psu the overall draw has to be close to the maximum wattage capacity of the psu. That is the question and nobody can really answer that because there's no way to tell. Is it going to last and what kind of gameing are you going to do how much will you stress the video card and the rest of the computer. It is up to you if you want to take the chance or not.
The thing you can think about is that you had bought the Antec psu and you can either take it back for a refund or for a swap to another Antec psu and then you will have the 400w as a backup

Yeah iam refunding the antec and i think iam getting the Corsair 650TX instead. good idea ?

 

[delluser1]

The GTX 260 draws about 182w which is about half of the capacity of the 400w psu so I would say that it might be risky to run it for an extended period of time and you should send the other one back for a replacement.

Depends on the card, if you overclock the snot out of the most power hungry version , ( there were 3 ) and are running Furmark, yes.

We've got jsc's input on his power draw ( " One of my CX400 Corsairs would be adequate " , his sytem draws more than the OP's)
Another of our senior residents ( no disrespect invisik ) runs a pair of 260's and an overclocked Q6600 on an Antec EA500D
My 980x and a pair of 260's only registered a 500 watt draw from the wall.
My OC'd E8400 and GTX260 only pulled 310 from the wall , funny thing, my stock I7-930 and ENGTX460TOP pulled the same.

Getting the picture ?
It's more about quality, than amount of watts on the label.
A good quality 400w would be fine for the OP's machine for any period of time.

 

[zoro8500]

Depends on the card, if you overclock the snot out of the most power hungry version , ( there were 3 ) and are running Furmark, yes.

We've got jsc's input on his power draw ( " One of my CX400 Corsairs would be adequate " , his sytem draws more than the OP's)
Another of our senior residents ( no disrespect invisik ) runs a pair of 260's and an overclocked Q6600 on an Antec EA500D
My 980x and a pair of 260's only registered a 500 watt draw from the wall.
My OC'd E8400 and GTX260 only pulled 310 from the wall , funny thing, my stock I7-930 and ENGTX460TOP pulled the same.

Getting the picture ?
It's more about quality, than amount of watts on the label.
A good quality 400w would be fine for the OP's machine for any period of time.

i agree with you to be honest but i thought my power supply is crap and its running good so far. it did say on the unit it has 2 +12 rails each at 18A which is insufficient for the card i have cuz it needs 38A together. maybe the card is consuming less cuz it is running on 1.0 pci express rather than 2.0

 

[delluser1]

i agree with you to be honest but i thought my power supply is crap and its running good so far. it did say on the unit it has 2 +12 rails each at 18A which is insufficient for the card i have cuz it needs 38A together. maybe the card is consuming less cuz it is running on 1.0 pci express rather than 2.0

FSP isn't bad, they provide the internals for many budget grade psu's ( OCZ SXS comes to mind ), my only problem is that they are usually short lived ( 2.5-3.5 years ) units.
As far as I know, 38 amps is a Guru3d or BFG power reccomendation, they all smoke/smoked good stuff.

 

[inzone]

Yeah iam refunding the antec and i think iam getting the Corsair 650TX instead. good idea ?

The Corsair would be a good choice and provide enough power with some to spare. I don't ever believe in running a Pc with a power supply that is just good enough , I like to have a cushion but that is my preferance and I will always do that and don't see anything wrong with it. So I will always tell people that you can have more than you need , if you don't use it then you don't but it's there and if you need it you have it. So I would rather have it and not use it then not have it and need it.
.

 

[nforce4max]

The GTX 260 draws about 182w which is about half of the capacity of the 400w psu so I would say that it might be risky to run it for an extended period of time and you should send the other one back for a replacement.

That would have to be a highly overclocked 65nm edition and not the more common 55nm edition. As a matter of fact that is more than a stock clocked gtx280.

 

[inzone]

That would have to be a highly overclocked 65nm edition and not the more common 55nm edition. As a matter of fact that is more than a stock clocked gtx280.

I actually got that from here , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GeForce_200_Series

 

[nforce4max]

I actually got that from here , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GeForce_200_Series

Actually those numbers are for only the max for the vrm spec and that is only achived when the card is overclock and under full load.

 

[inzone]

That can be why the Pc is working fine with the card installed but he does need to be aware of the fact that if under those circumstances the card can draw that much power and could cause a shut down.

 

[zoro8500]

That can be why the Pc is working fine with the card installed but he does need to be aware of the fact that if under those circumstances the card can draw that much power and could cause a shut down.

so are u saying iam fine if i dont over clock it ??? basically iam playing saints row on ultra setting and the pc is fine, temp jumps to about 70o on the card but i guess thats normal. i sent the faulty psu unit for a refund but shall i use the money to buy something else or keep it and dont bother ??

 

[inzone]

That would be up to you to decide as long as you are aware that playing at the highest settings and overclocking the card can result in problems and naturally we don't know about long term use and how often you play games. The most demanding thing that the video card will do is play a game so if you do occasional gameing then you should be fine but if you like playing a lot then you should think about possibly upgradeing the psu. I will recomend that anyway just because I think a Pc should have a little headroom and not be right on the edge just because it works.