2500k + 480 SE power draw

daveash

daveash

daveash

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Joined
18 Mar 2011
Posts
325
Hi all, did some tests on my rig today with a power meter, first of all these are my specs:

i5 2500k @ 4.5ghz
Gigabyte 480 SE @ 840
4Gb OCz Platinum DDR3
2x 500Gb HD in Raid 0
DVDRW Drive
2x 120mm case fan
4x 140mm case fan
CoolerMaster V8 cooler
CoolerMaster Real Power 850w modular PSU
CM690 II case

Power meter was measuring draw from my base unit only, monitor etc were on different circuit.

Idle: 134W
GPU Load: 360W
GPU+CPU Load: 480-550W (550W was peak, but mostly stayed around the 500W mark).
In game: 404W peak

All tests involving GPU were roughly 60W less when the GPU is at stock.

Thought some of you may want to see this as there's been a lot of questions recently about power draw of 480s. The good news for me is that I can add a 2nd 480 in SLi on my current PSU. :)
 
Hi there thanks for this info i basically have the same setup.

Have the corsair Ax 750 so i can add another if i need to.

Just need to build the damn thing first sitting here in bits :(
 
Are those values adjusted for efficiency loss, or is the amount being drawn by the components through the PSU less (like, maybe ~85% of the amount showing at the wall).
 
That's interesting. I have the same number of fans as you but only a single hdd with a SSD and my 480 is at 800/1900 with stock volts. My idle is 132w. Max peak i have ever managed was 497w when running furmark stability test and Prime both at the same time. My gaming load is a lot less than yours though being mostly in the mid to high 200's though occasionally it has hit 320w but that's rare.


topdog, if his meter works the same way as mine that's power drawn from the wall socket.
 
With the spec in sig, my usage is.

Idle, 290w
Prime95, 430w
Gaming, 630w
Furmark, 740w
Prime and furmark, 860w and climbing so i quickly stopped it, cpu clocked at 4.2ghz, 1.3125 vcore, 2x gtx 470's @750/1500/1674, 0.987v. Psu is a corsair HX850, 2 hdd's, 1 optical drive and 7 fans.
 
Don't forget that the power usage at the wall is not the PSU that you need. PSUs are not 100% efficient, and so the actual power consumption by the system is lower (just multiply the wall power by 0.8 for an 80% efficient PSU, which is an ok estimate).
 
pastymuncher said:
topdog, if his meter works the same way as mine that's power drawn from the wall socket.
Click to expand...

Thanks for that. I expect as much too, but it wasn't clear if the values were raw as read from the meter or adjusted for PSU efficiency. After all, if your components are only drawing 850W and you have a 1K PSU, seeing 1K drawn at the wall isn't "omg my PC is about to explode" territory. Not quite, anyway, as it has some headroom provided the quality is there.
 
Cant remember the exact figures, but with my 480 and the system in my sig I got 615W with Furmark and Prime running.
 
Marvin said:
Don't forget that the power usage at the wall is not the PSU that you need. PSUs are not 100% efficient, and so the actual power consumption by the system is lower (just multiply the wall power by 0.8 for an 80% efficient PSU, which is an ok estimate).
Click to expand...

Thanks, I'd forgotten that. Yeah, this is just the power being drawn from the wall.
 
pastymuncher said:
That's interesting. I have the same number of fans as you but only a single hdd with a SSD and my 480 is at 800/1900 with stock volts. My idle is 132w. Max peak i have ever managed was 497w when running furmark stability test and Prime both at the same time. My gaming load is a lot less than yours though being mostly in the mid to high 200's though occasionally it has hit 320w but that's rare.


topdog, if his meter works the same way as mine that's power drawn from the wall socket.
Click to expand...

That is odd, maybe you just lucked out with power frugal components?
 
You also have to question the accuracy of the power meter especially if its a cheap unit, i have no doubt they go through limited calibration and would not be supprised if on a good day they are +- 10%
 
setter said:
With the spec in sig, my usage is.

Idle, 290w
Click to expand...

That's a scarily high idle power draw, even for 2 cards. Don't the cards downclock at idle properly? I know the 470s are power hungry under load but at idle do they really nerd to drink that much?
 
Randall8686 said:
You also have to question the accuracy of the power meter especially if its a cheap unit, i have no doubt they go through limited calibration and would not be supprised if on a good day they are +- 10%
Click to expand...

It has a stated accuracy of +/- 3%, so not perfect but I think it's doing a good job. I have a 3000W rated kettle that I tried it with and it displayed a power draw of 3002W, which proves nothing but indicates it's doing its job quite well.
 
Randall8686 said:
You also have to question the accuracy of the power meter especially if its a cheap unit, i have no doubt they go through limited calibration and would not be supprised if on a good day they are +- 10%
Click to expand...

There are large variations in accuracy as you say. The more expensive ones can be as accurate as +/- 0.10% while i have seen cheap ones listed as +/- 5%. Mine is +/- 1% and gives me exactly the same reading as my Zalman ZM-MFC2 multifunction controller although i have'nt a clue how accurate that's supposed to be.
 
pastymuncher said:
There are large variations in accuracy as you say. The more expensive ones can be as accurate as +/- 0.10% while i have seen cheap ones listed as +/- 5%. Mine is +/- 1% and gives me exactly the same reading as my Zalman ZM-MFC2 multifunction controller although i have'nt a clue how accurate that's supposed to be.
Click to expand...

Yeah, there was little point me spending £££s on something super accurate, I just needed something to give me a fairly good idea of what I'm pulling at load. I really just wanted to see if I could get another 480 is SLi with this PSU, which I think I can.
 
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