Question on power supplies

[pitsi]

Is there a way to know if the power supply I am using for my system is adequate, or if there is need to buy a more powerful one? Currently, I am monitoring my system with Asus PC Probe 2 on A7N8X and I get:

+12V -> 12.416
+5V -> 4.892
+3.3V -> 3.28
Vcore -> 1.616 (although I have set it to 1.6V in the BIOS, and it sometimes even gets to 1.632, is this normal?)

When should I get worried? Although I have no idea what this numbers mean, is the fact that +5V is below 5 something bad?

Btw, I am planning to buy a Radeon 9700 Pro soon so I guess that will need some extra juice right? I am currently using 1 DVD-ROM, 1 CD-RW, 1 HDD, 1 FDD, Athlon XP 1800+ on A7N8X.

And one last thing. Is it ok to leave my PC on for a few days (maybe 5 or 6) without even restarting? I've done this quite a few times using my old power supply but yesterday it died on me (first time ever!). Are power supplies sold by companies like Antec or Enermax designed to be able to work under these conditions or no power supplies should be left working for so many days?

 

[Quetzacoatl]

It would be helpful if you actually told us which power supply you are using...if you don't trust those readings (which I wouldn't from any Asus board), then grab a multimeter from any good electronic shop and test the individual lines yourself. THey are fine, but not for any seriousi overclocking, too low on your 3.3 line. Don't worry about the above average CPU voltage, Asus generally adds a little to each "stock" speed on their motherboards

Instead of Rdram, why not just merge 4 Sdram channels...

 

[pitsi]

I am using Q-TEC's 300W (www.qtec.info/13233) and yes, I am planning to overclock my TbredB 1800+ CPU. Also, I am planning to sometime upgrade my power supply but right now, I want to know how to "read" those numbers given by either my Asus board or a multimeter. For example what would be a *good* reading for the 3.3 line? Anything above 3.3V maybe?

Also, do you know if for example Antec's TruePower 430W has any problems working for maybe 5-6 days straight, without turning it off?

 

[pitsi]

I just installed MBM5 and it shows my +12V -> 11.80

 

[Teq]

Power is an approximation, dependent on many factors such as temperature, current load, factory adjustment, etc. No matter how hard they try, there is no way to get it exact. I have a precision bench supply here that is supposed to deliver 12v but it's always at either 11.9 or 12.1... and that's a piece of test equipment.

Anything within 5% of ideal is just fine.



--->It ain't better if it don't work<---

 

[svol]

As said if it is within 5% range of the default then it is OK. But if you want to OC and use a Radeon 9700 Pro then I recommend a larger PSU, something above 350W with decent quality.

My dual-PSU PC is so powerfull that the neighbourhood dims when I turn it on