Power supply question!

omgshinoda

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Nov 16, 2011
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18,510
its been awhile since i asked the community, but you guys always helped me when i was stuck.
so i built a budget gaming desktop few month back,

AMD FX-8120 CPU
-ASRock 970 EXTREME3 AM3+ Motherboard with SATA3 6gb/s
-OCZ 700W PSU (80 plus certified) Modular PSU
-8 GB of DDR3 1600Mhz Memory (4 x 2 GB)
-Radeon HD 6850 Video Card
-1 TB Hard Drive 7200 RPM
-CD/DVD multi combo burner Drive
-Sentey Optimus Extreme Case (Red LEDs)
-LED fans - 120mm Front, 180mm Side, 120mm Top (Rear 120mm plain)

managed this setup with $670.
and now i have got some money for few potential updates.

only thing that concerns me is my power supply, im not so sure if it can handle another 6850, or possibly bit faster card like 6870 or so on.
i came to current setup with help of very helpful people on the forums, but i cant exactly calculate current power usage.

so possible update to this set up is additional SSD for primary games and the OS and/or another ATI HD6850 card (so thats 2 in total) or 1 better graphics card.
thanks in advance :)
 
Solution
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mgriffen

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Jun 5, 2012
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The estimated Power needed for your setup with an additional Graphics Card is still only 639 W.
Duel 6870's calculates out to be about 702 W
Personally I would go for the SSD.
But the question is: Are you only interested in higher frame rates or overall computer performance?
 

omgshinoda

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Nov 16, 2011
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Thanks for the reply! I would be interested in performance area, since all i play is Diablo 3, Mass Effect 3, and some other steam games. But I'm a day trader so i usually have other things going on my other monitor even when im gaming.
 
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Guest

Guest

it just needs a little googling to find power consumption benchmarks.
your CPU:AMD FX-8120, AMD FX-6100 and AMD FX-4100 CPUs Review. Page 8
power-2.png

your GPU:Radeon HD 6850 & 6870 review
Measured power consumption - 6850
Subjective obtained GPU power consumption = ~ 121 Watts
by the way same review:
Measured power consumption - 6870
Subjective measured GPU power consumption = ~ 141 Watts

so your system power would be 164 and 121 for CPU & GPU. add in 4 watts for each stick of RAM(4*2=8), 10 watts for your HD to spin up and and since i am not familiar with the 990 i will over compensate with 12 watts for the chipset (intel's need 8) for a total of 320 watts. opps 5 watts for the CD/DVD drive while in use :)

another 6850 will give a total of 440 watts and with an SSD 448 watts.

and according to HardOCP OCZ ModXStream Pro 700w 40C Update
1233025707I0ONK2cqGH_1_2.gif

you can go up to 552 watts on the 12 volt rail. which is where you're gonna need that power from.
 

4745454b

Titan
Moderator
so your system power would be 164 and 121 for CPU & GPU.

Why are you adding in even more system power? The TDP of the 81xx chips is 125W is it not? Looking at that chart they are being shown as ~165W. That's because the "system" is already included. No need to add in ram and other parts as they are already in there. 165W + (2* 130) = 425 for CF 6850s and 81xx.
 
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Guest

Guest

thanks i miss the "total system power" on the chart.

not enough coffee today :sleep: