Im building the following setup, mostly as a download station and HTPC,

CPU Intel Core i3-2100T (supose to have the same idle consumption as a atom/zacate with much better performance)
MOBO Intel DH61DLB3 (for my intended purpose i dont think ill benefit from a H67 and no OC so no P67/Z68)
MEMORY Corsair XMS3 4GB 1333MHz CMX4GX3M1A1333C9 (seems cheap and have had good experiences with corsair on memory).
CASE LIAN LI PC-Q08B (expensive but love the form factor).
HDD Hitachi Travelstar 5K750 0J11563 (low consumption drive, i had very good experiences with Hitachi on my laptops).
HEATSINK Thermalright HR-02 (would like to go fanless on the cpu but its ok if ends up needing a fan).

The setup should draw between 15 to 20W at idle 45-50W at heavy load. The PSU im not sure, i would like to go with Pico PSU, but i know very little about them, so just looking for some suggestion. I see a lot of people using Pico PSU with dell and other bricks, not sure why though, i see pico offers some combos that seems enough for my needs but since i dont know much about this psu im checking with you guys,

1) Which combo would you suggest for my setup (the pc will be at 1-5% load 95% of the time).
picoPSU-150-XT + 80W Adapter Power Kit
PICOPSU-160-XT + 150w AC-DC Power Adapter, 12v 12.5A

2) I saw JonnyGuru Pico PSU Round Up, where the FSP120-AAB 19V power brick + pico-PSU-120WI-25V. Would this be a better combo for my setup? im just a little worried also since its 20pin instead of 24pin and doesn't come with 4pin for cpu.

3) I can fit a full PSU inside the Lian Li, just gotta drop the heatsink and go for THERMALRIGHT AXP-140-RT, would Seasonic X-400 Fanless 400W be better for my setup? my guess its worst cause of the low power i need it would be inneficient, but im not sure.

4) or Anyother that you know would be better for my setup.

Thanks for your opinions, suggestions or advise,

You need a 12 volt power brick.

You also need to make sure that the brick connects to the Picopsu. Apparently you can't always determine that visually. I don't know how you can make sure.

It would be nice if someone found a good 175 or 200 watt brick, made sure its connector fit the Picopsu... and then sold it for just that purpose.

@ces, thanks for replying to my thread,



Just wondering about the 12V brick need, i was reading the JonnyGuru Reviews - Pico PSU Round Up from there,



I crazy rushed into looking the exact things to see if i could buy it, and found,
pico-PSU-120WI-25V $55
Fujitus FSP120-AAB Power Supply Charger AC Adapter 19v 6.3a $25 (not 100% sure if its the same one, but seems like it).

Unfortunately he didnt tested the 150XT nor the 160XTs, not sure if they are better compared to something like,
Premium picoPSU-150-XT/12.5A 150W AC-DC $83

Couple of things that i dont understand (my knowledge is limited on PSU),

1) the JonnyGuru combo uses a 19V brick with a PSU that i asume regulates or converts also to 12v, 5v and 3.3, while the 150XT depends on the bricks 12V i think, only converts 5v n 3.3v. Would either work fine with my setup? what do you guys think its better?

2) The JonnyGuru combo Pico 120wi25 also is a 20pin and doesnt come with 4pin for the cpu, while the 150xt comes with a 24pin and the cpu 4pin. In this kinda situations i chose the dumb easy way, if it has 24 pin search for 24pin, if the board has 4pin then search for psu with 4pin. Im not sure if i can run with a 20pin and no 4pin, or if it would be better.

I have a ASUS H61 mini-ITX / i3-2100 / 64GB SSD / DVD-RW / 4GB system running with a picoPSU 120-WI-32 and a 19V adapter in a Lian-Li PC-Q07 case. When it was the same but with an H55 / i3-540 the most it drew was 84W from the wall running prime95. I ready that same johnnyGURU article and it's what prompted me to buy the WI version not to mention I had an old laptop adapter with the 2.5mm x 5.5mm from an IBM Thinkpad that happened to fit.

To mount the picoPSU jack in the PC-Q07 case I made a custom backplace that I can also mount an 80mm fan in. Here are some pictures.







I can make more of these for mounting in an ATX PSU opening or an SFX12V opening with or without the fans (I am actually running the i3-2100 w/o the fan and it's fine and even more quiet). PM me if you want more info.