Is this a good Energy-Efficient PC Build?

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greenishPC
Posts: 5
Joined: Mon Sep 06, 2010 7:00 pm
Location: Brooklyn,NY

Is this a good Energy-Efficient PC Build?

Post by greenishPC » Mon Sep 06, 2010 7:05 pm

Just wanted to ask if any of you see any improvements/compatibility issues on this build. Looking to put together an energy-efficient PC that doesn't sacrifice too much speed. Its mostly a mainstream pc that I occasionally program on. I don't do any gaming although I might connect this pc to my hdtv once in a while (hence the mATX and the case).

Budget is about $1000 so I'm under it at this moment. I'm planning to reuse my 24" monitor, keyboard, and mouse.

Processor: From what I gather, the i3-540 is the best performance per watt (I've been waiting for the AMD Fusions to come out but its just too far off.) I'm using the IGP so I don't need a dedicated graphics card (mainly to save electricity). I'm pretty sure since it comes with the heatsink and fan, it would also come with the thermal paste but I'm not too sure.

Hard Drive: Getting a X-25 80GB SSD for the OS and the apps. The secondary hard drive is the only non-energy conscious part - its a Western Digital Caviar Black but its only a little over a watt I would be sacrificing so I can live it.

Memory: G.SKILL ECO Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)

Power Supply: SeaSonic X650 Gold 650W. The power supply is definitely overkill but its one of the cheaper 80 Plus Gold from a reputable brand.


Thanks in advance for your help!

maalitehdas
Posts: 166
Joined: Tue May 27, 2008 12:04 am
Location: Finland

Post by maalitehdas » Tue Sep 07, 2010 7:28 am

650W PSU will run with low efficient in your build so you don't get the benefits of 80+ gold with it. Go for Seasonic X-400, it reaches decent level already at 80W.

Your selected CPU is great, just for correction best performance / watt is reached with VIA processors. The don't have on board video but company has those chipsets to pair with the processor.
Image
* All benchmarks normalized to performance/TDPmax of the VIA C7 processor @1.5GHz
Last edited by maalitehdas on Tue Sep 07, 2010 7:44 am, edited 1 time in total.

AZBrandon
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Post by AZBrandon » Tue Sep 07, 2010 7:37 am

maalitehdas wrote:Your selected CPU is great, just for correction best performance / watt is reached with VIA C7 processors.
Maybe 5 years ago the C7 has the best performance per watt at the low end, but nowadays the Intel CULV processors take that honor.

maalitehdas
Posts: 166
Joined: Tue May 27, 2008 12:04 am
Location: Finland

Post by maalitehdas » Tue Sep 07, 2010 8:06 am

I had to update my knowledge on this... If these are the best model of each (in GHz/TDP) VIA is still in the lead.

CULV
Core 2 Solo SU3500
1.4 GHz
3 MB
800 MT/s
7x
1.05-1.15 V
5.5 W

VIA
Nano U3200
1.4 GHz
1 MB
800 MT /s
14×
5 W (idle 100 mW)

ilovejedd
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Post by ilovejedd » Tue Sep 07, 2010 9:58 am

maalitehdas wrote:650W PSU will run with low efficient in your build so you don't get the benefits of 80+ gold with it.
As efficiency goes, the SeaSonic X650 is pretty decent. It's not really that far removed from the X400.

X650: http://www.silentpcreview.com/article986-page4.html

X400: http://www.silentpcreview.com/article1062-page5.html

Code: Select all

DC   X400  X650
20   69.8  65.1
40   80.4  77.3
65   84.5  82.6
90   85.4  86.6
150  88.8  88.3
200  92.2  90.8
300  90.9  91.7

greenishPC
Posts: 5
Joined: Mon Sep 06, 2010 7:00 pm
Location: Brooklyn,NY

Post by greenishPC » Tue Sep 07, 2010 10:00 am

Thanks for your suggestion! I was going to downgrade to the 400W power supply but looking at what you found i might just reconsider.

Thanks!

MikeC
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Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada
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Post by MikeC » Tue Sep 07, 2010 10:11 am

maalitehdas --

We haven't had a Nano to examine but since VIA compares them only to the Atom, I suspect there's no contest against the CULV SU3500 -- this is a Core2, which generally out-processes everything else (non-intel) out there at the same clock speed.

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