pico vs PW-200-M and other questions
Posted: Sat Oct 15, 2011 12:37 pm
Hi everyone,
this is my first post here, but I have been reading around for the last few months.
This will be my first quite pc build, but I have built a handful of other pcs over the last decade.
This will be an htpc with some mild gaming thrown in on the occasion. I will be sized constrained as I will be building this in an broken NES.
The big burning question I have is just how much I could get out of the follow psu setups
http://www.mini-box.com/picoPSU-192-XT- ... -Power-Kit
http://www.short-circuit.com/combo/pw20 ... -acdc.html
or buy
http://www.short-circuit.com/product/PW ... 4-ATX.html and http://www.short-circuit.com/product/pr ... -acdc.html separately and figure out a way to solder the wires to make them work
my build will be:
cpu- I5 2400
ram- 8gb tbd
hd- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822152236
mb- min itx tbd
video- AMD 6570 low profile- active vs passive cooling
optical -http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6827135251
in addition there will be a small handful of usb devices(keyboard reciever, blue tooth....)
I have seen a lot of people in the forums using the pico 150 or 160 with an I5 of some flavor, but very few who do so and have a graphics card. The big problem I see with using the pico is that it limits 12v to 8A which equals 96W. I know the I5 shouldn't be coming close to the theoretical max of 95W but when you throw on the video card which if I recall runs on the 12v line, and then all the other MB parts running on that, I think its a little to close for me. That's why I am leaning towards the pw-200 which can go up to 12a on that line. but then I worry that the max 150w of the power brick may not be able to handle the rest of the system.
On a side note, does anyone know why everyone who sells the pico has it offered with a 192W brick. This seems silly to me as the pico maxes out at 160w, or am I missing something with that?
Ok so that was the big part of my question, here comes a few little ones
For the graphics card, if I have read correctly, when using a system with sandybridge installed it will use the integrated graphics when in normal non-graphics intensive use. First is that true, or is that limited to specific chipsets/MB? If it is true, then adding a graphics card with a fan, even a loud fan, should effect noise the 90% of the time this is a movie box right? It should only spin up when the card is activated, ie when I am playing games. If so I personally would be fine with this, as I tend to turn up the tv when I am playing games anyway.
For this setup I was planning on have a single intake and a single output fan. In addiditon to that I was going to try to place the MB so the cpu lines up over a vent hold already in the bottom of the case, and I was going open up said hole a little and possibly even create a duct to directly draw air from it to the cpu fan. That leads me to the next question, how loud is the stock I5 fan? And how well does it cool?
To put this all in perspective I'm not counting on creating an absolutly quite computer, but one that makes less noise and is a lot more powerful than my current one. Currently I am running an Athalon 64 3000+ in a AOpen XC Cube EX761 with a passively cooled nvidia 6500. The cube sounds like a helicopter on start up, but isnt horrible when watching most movies or tv as we keep it about 12 feet away(under the tv). Thanks in advance for all the help once I am done I will post pictures.
-Zach
this is my first post here, but I have been reading around for the last few months.
This will be my first quite pc build, but I have built a handful of other pcs over the last decade.
This will be an htpc with some mild gaming thrown in on the occasion. I will be sized constrained as I will be building this in an broken NES.
The big burning question I have is just how much I could get out of the follow psu setups
http://www.mini-box.com/picoPSU-192-XT- ... -Power-Kit
http://www.short-circuit.com/combo/pw20 ... -acdc.html
or buy
http://www.short-circuit.com/product/PW ... 4-ATX.html and http://www.short-circuit.com/product/pr ... -acdc.html separately and figure out a way to solder the wires to make them work
my build will be:
cpu- I5 2400
ram- 8gb tbd
hd- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822152236
mb- min itx tbd
video- AMD 6570 low profile- active vs passive cooling
optical -http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6827135251
in addition there will be a small handful of usb devices(keyboard reciever, blue tooth....)
I have seen a lot of people in the forums using the pico 150 or 160 with an I5 of some flavor, but very few who do so and have a graphics card. The big problem I see with using the pico is that it limits 12v to 8A which equals 96W. I know the I5 shouldn't be coming close to the theoretical max of 95W but when you throw on the video card which if I recall runs on the 12v line, and then all the other MB parts running on that, I think its a little to close for me. That's why I am leaning towards the pw-200 which can go up to 12a on that line. but then I worry that the max 150w of the power brick may not be able to handle the rest of the system.
On a side note, does anyone know why everyone who sells the pico has it offered with a 192W brick. This seems silly to me as the pico maxes out at 160w, or am I missing something with that?
Ok so that was the big part of my question, here comes a few little ones
For the graphics card, if I have read correctly, when using a system with sandybridge installed it will use the integrated graphics when in normal non-graphics intensive use. First is that true, or is that limited to specific chipsets/MB? If it is true, then adding a graphics card with a fan, even a loud fan, should effect noise the 90% of the time this is a movie box right? It should only spin up when the card is activated, ie when I am playing games. If so I personally would be fine with this, as I tend to turn up the tv when I am playing games anyway.
For this setup I was planning on have a single intake and a single output fan. In addiditon to that I was going to try to place the MB so the cpu lines up over a vent hold already in the bottom of the case, and I was going open up said hole a little and possibly even create a duct to directly draw air from it to the cpu fan. That leads me to the next question, how loud is the stock I5 fan? And how well does it cool?
To put this all in perspective I'm not counting on creating an absolutly quite computer, but one that makes less noise and is a lot more powerful than my current one. Currently I am running an Athalon 64 3000+ in a AOpen XC Cube EX761 with a passively cooled nvidia 6500. The cube sounds like a helicopter on start up, but isnt horrible when watching most movies or tv as we keep it about 12 feet away(under the tv). Thanks in advance for all the help once I am done I will post pictures.
-Zach