1000W power supplies

PSUs: The source of DC power for all components in the PC & often a big noise source.

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valnar
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1000W power supplies

Post by valnar » Sun May 06, 2007 12:00 pm

I don't know if I'm impressed or disgusted that some people need a power supply like this.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/other/ ... undup.html

I just bought a 430W power supply for my home "server" and that's only because the motherboard manufacturer recommends it. I don't even think I need it.

-Robert

jaganath
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Post by jaganath » Sun May 06, 2007 12:16 pm

I don't know if I'm impressed or disgusted that some people need a power supply like this.
you don't?!

TBH only 0.00001% of worldwide domestic PCs need such capacity, however many will buy it because of overestimation of power needs.

kater
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Post by kater » Mon May 07, 2007 1:47 am

jaganath wrote:many will buy it because of overestimation of power needs
e-penis factor too

Anyway, I like this roundup - nicely written, lotsa pics and technobabble with graphs, etc. Where else can you stare at pics of welding machines like that?

Sylph-DS
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Post by Sylph-DS » Mon May 07, 2007 2:40 am

I was just playing around with the eXtreme Power Supply Calculator, and I kinda failed at rising over 800W without exceeding the limits of what's reasonable (With the calculator, I can stack in 120 HDDs, 45 optical drives, 140 fans, 20 PCI-e cards, 8 sticks of DDR2 and 4 quad core processors, but in reality that's just not possible.)

I think 7 out of 10 1000W PSUs that are sold seperately (not in an XPS or whatever) are sold to people thinking "Meh, I have a shitload of money, let me just get 'the best' of everything, I don't care if it's redundant.", then there's 2 that think that their PC actually needs all that power, and 1 more that actually needs it.

Max Slowik
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Post by Max Slowik » Mon May 07, 2007 3:45 am

ATi was giving them away with their upcoming video card reviews. Now I have two :)

They're freaking loud. . .

continuum
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Post by continuum » Mon May 14, 2007 10:23 am

Sylph-DS wrote:I was just playing around with the eXtreme Power Supply Calculator,
Yeah... pretty much every PSU calculator out there on the 'net is useless. Thankfully some are less useless than others and hence are only 30-50% off base rather than 100% or more.
I think 7 out of 10 1000W PSUs that are sold seperately (not in an XPS or whatever) are sold to people thinking "Meh, I have a shitload of money, let me just get 'the best' of everything, I don't care if it's redundant.", then there's 2 that think that their PC actually needs all that power, and 1 more that actually needs it.
Probably not even that many who actually need it. +12v rail draw kills most people these days, often because they're still using old ATX12V 1.x units or they're using $35 "OMG 500W!!!!" specials that can't handle 500W for more than a few seconds... they panic and think they must need more than 500W when their box only draws 275W from the wall.

*sigh*

jaldridge6
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Post by jaldridge6 » Mon May 14, 2007 7:56 pm

Well, at least it makes the "low" wattage psus a little cheaper... I think every home should have a wattage readout LCD on every outlet. That way, people could understand how much each of their appliances are using up. I still find it amazing that some people have dozens of 100W light bulbs in their homes. We could seriously do much better than this, but, eh.. fuck it.

reyn116
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Post by reyn116 » Thu May 17, 2007 5:33 pm

its called "men's pre-occupation with size" hahaha

jammin
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Post by jammin » Fri May 18, 2007 7:49 pm

jaldridge6 wrote:Well, at least it makes the "low" wattage psus a little cheaper... I think every home should have a wattage readout LCD on every outlet. That way, people could understand how much each of their appliances are using up. I still find it amazing that some people have dozens of 100W light bulbs in their homes. We could seriously do much better than this, but, eh.. fuck it.
I would agree with that.
I have a 9W bulb in my room and I tend to turn that off when I'm sitting at my computer (I have a CRT which I can't really afford to replace at the moment).

Actually being able to see the power draw of appliances would open peoples eyes.
There are some nice product concepts based on this, but none have really taken off on a large scale.

JazzJackRabbit
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Post by JazzJackRabbit » Fri May 18, 2007 8:47 pm

jammin wrote: I have a 9W bulb in my room and I tend to turn that off when I'm sitting at my computer (I have a CRT which I can't really afford to replace at the moment).
So you're sitting in the dark in front of the monitor? Not a good idea. You may save a few dollars on your electricity bill only to spend hundreds if not thousands on your eye care bills in the future.

Redzo
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Re: 1000W power supplies

Post by Redzo » Sat May 19, 2007 12:58 am

valnar wrote:I don't know if I'm impressed or disgusted that some people need a power supply like this.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/other/ ... undup.html

I just bought a 430W power supply for my home "server" and that's only because the motherboard manufacturer recommends it. I don't even think I need it.

-Robert
Just let ppl buy what they want to buy....Why would you be "impressed or disgusted" becouse somebody bought big PSU ? Or is maybe envy becouse these guys can actually afford this sort of gear ? Sound like it to me.

jaganath
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Post by jaganath » Sat May 19, 2007 1:51 am

maybe envy becouse these guys can actually afford this sort of gear ? Sound like it to me.
yeah,I'm so envious of how deluded they are about how much power their PC uses. Not. e-penis much?

valnar
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Re: 1000W power supplies

Post by valnar » Sat May 19, 2007 4:48 am

Redzo wrote: Just let ppl buy what they want to buy....Why would you be "impressed or disgusted" becouse somebody bought big PSU ? Or is maybe envy becouse these guys can actually afford this sort of gear ? Sound like it to me.
Wow. Where did that from? I take it you don't have humor in Sweden?

-Robert

jammin
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Post by jammin » Sun May 20, 2007 8:58 am

JazzJackRabbit wrote:
jammin wrote: I have a 9W bulb in my room and I tend to turn that off when I'm sitting at my computer (I have a CRT which I can't really afford to replace at the moment).
So you're sitting in the dark in front of the monitor? Not a good idea. You may save a few dollars on your electricity bill only to spend hundreds if not thousands on your eye care bills in the future.
I should have mentioned that I also have a lamp (LED), so I don't actually sit in the dark.
The main light tends to cause glare on the screen as well, which is also bad for your eyes.

The amount of time a lot of people spend infront of a computer (myself included) is concerning.
I do try and look after my vision and hearing :)

Slaugh
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Post by Slaugh » Mon May 28, 2007 10:19 pm

There's a good article on real power consumption and 1000/1200 Watts power supply @ BeHardware.
Before moving on, let’s touch on the arguments of the above two manufacturers. With Enermax, there was a configuration with a consumption of 933 watts. Based on a Quad Opteron system, it had the specificity of having no less than a mere 24 hard drives.

Thermaltake went even farther, offering a configuration that consumed 1105.5 watts. The only problem was that only 605.5 watts were used by the PC, the other 500 was for an amplifier and speakers. These are peripherals that aren’t linked to the PC power supply.
Yes! I really need a 1000 Watts power supply! :roll: :lol:

http://www.hardware.fr/medias/screensho ... IMG0019431

kater
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Post by kater » Mon May 28, 2007 10:26 pm

This is what a system with FX-74 pulls from the wall when the CPU's are loaded. Translates to app. 370W DC. Add X2900XT CF (app. 360W DC) and you would still have to have a bunch of HDD's to even get close to 1 kW DC.

Image

Pic courtesy of techreport

HueyCobra
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Post by HueyCobra » Tue May 29, 2007 12:52 am

Mmmm, 2kW :idea:

Joe Public
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Post by Joe Public » Thu May 31, 2007 11:34 am

Hehe. I bought a 620W Corsair and even I know I overshot the requirements for my rig by a bunch. I won't need a new PSU for a long while at least, not even a 1kW one.

jaldridge6
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Post by jaldridge6 » Thu May 31, 2007 11:43 am

may the whole world be enlightened to the kill-a-watts wattage meter.

Herb W.
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Post by Herb W. » Thu May 31, 2007 2:50 pm

While 1K may be over the top, if you want some headroom with SLI'd 8800 GTX cards as I will, you have to go pretty high - consider the results from the aforementioned testing on such a loaded system at Be Hardware:
Consumption doubled compared to the previous configuration, because we are at 384.7 watts in stand by and 687.6 watts in load.
So even a 700 watt PSU isn't too safe - I'd want at least a 750. And Nvidia themselves on their approved list don't go any lower than 750. Also you need to consider the 12V load - a staggering 484 volts on the 12V rail -- 41 amps. Unfortunately that eliminates every SPCR tested PSU - I was hoping I could go with the Seasonic 700w modular recently tested but I guess not.

Time for SPCR to test a few SLI-capable 750+ watt PSUs! :shock:

Oleg Artamonov
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Post by Oleg Artamonov » Thu May 31, 2007 3:09 pm

Herb W. wrote:from the aforementioned testing on such a loaded system at Be Hardware
http://www.behardware.com/articles/670- ... ption.html
"The power source actually supplies 567.6 watts, of which 85.3% are on the +12V, efficiency being 82.6%. So this configuration justifies the purchase of a 600-650 watt supply, and even one a little higher if you like to have a little room"

Herb W.
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Post by Herb W. » Thu May 31, 2007 7:32 pm

Yes I caught that after posting - the quote I posted didn't mention the fact that it was the at-the-wall measure, so given the 80% efficiency of the PSU only 567 watts were used by the computer - thanks.

Khrono Devil
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Post by Khrono Devil » Sun Jun 03, 2007 9:58 pm

Its very hard to get a PC to draw over 500W DC, 8800GTX SLi, QX6700 @ 3.7Ghz, 4GB ram, 2 HDDs, 1 DVD, 5 120mm fans and a pump use less than 510W. I would imagine HD2900XT Xfire would use less than 550W.

A quality 600W+ PSU will handle a 510-550W load easily. A 550W+ load it would handle but get very noisey.

Low Quality Power Supplys usually rate their Wattage/Amperage at temperatures below 25C. Maybe a water cooled PSU could reach those temps but most PSUs with a 500W+ load would be around 40C+. As the temperature of the PSU rises the total Wattage/Amperage and Effiency lowers.

nVidia know that a quality 600W PSU can power SLi easily, but they also know a cheap generic 600W PSU can't. Thes why they have the 750W/12v-41amp minimum.

A quality 1KW PSU could almost power 2 Highend gaming rigs or 3 Midrange gaming rigs. A 2KW rig is for idiots ( maybe not if your using pelts ). At most a quality <800W will power any sane rig with ease.

24 Hard Drives = 312W, that is if they all spin up to full speed at the same time ( which is unlikely unless its a very large RAID array ). After the spin up they would only use 192W and 120W when they are idling. ( That would be using Seagates 7200.10 drives )

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