Enermax 400W powerful enough?

gav2pac

gav2pac

gav2pac

Associate
Joined
2 Feb 2007
Posts
155
Location
South Wales
hi guys, ive got my 10% discount ready and want to buy a ati 4850, but will my Enermax Liberty 400W ELT400AWT take it?
my system at the moment is CPU e6600 o/c to 3 ghz, 2gb ram, 7900gs, 1 hard drive and a few fans.

cheers:)
 
thats great! do i need a 6pin gpu converter? if so do overclockers stock them as im not sure if my psu has one
 
They sometimes come with the cards, if they are cheap here though (couple of quid) I would order one just incase. They can be had for buttons from a famous auction site (including delivery) if you are stuck :)
 
Oh and your PSU will be fine. You can power most things on a quality branded 350W + PSU. It is only when you start getting into Dual top spec GPUs with overclocked Quad cores that you need a little more juice (and then no more than 500W)
 
sibeer said:
Oh and your PSU will be fine. You can power most things on a quality branded 350W + PSU. It is only when you start getting into Dual top spec GPUs with overclocked Quad cores that you need a little more juice (and then no more than 500W)
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This is just a general question - if the above is correct, then why do people by 1000-1200W PSUs?
 
panthro said:
This is just a general question - if the above is correct, then why do people by 1000-1200W PSUs?
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Lack of understanding, power consumption is a huge area of ignorance sadly. I'd imagine that the vast majority of enthusiasts have PSU's well beyond what they actually need because they don't know any better.
A good 850W will run a super-highend CF 4870X2 system, comfortably for example.
 
I actually think the move towards over the top PSU's stems from the horror stories of cheap PSU's blowing up. About 5 years ago the majority of systems were running with the PSU's included for free in cases. The cases got cheaper and the components got more power hungry, so eventually lots of people had them blow up and take the systems with them. All of a sudden everyone realised that a good PSU was an essential part of a stable, reliable PC. As the manufacturers are promoting these massive PSU's in turn people feel their machine must be powerful enough to need one, if not now then at least by the time they next upgrade. Fact is though, the only component that requires significantly more power than in previous years is graphics cards. This is still only going to take a system above a decent 400W supply if you install more than one.
 
In rough terms 100W per high spec GPU is sensible cover, so whilst a 400W supply will run a top system with one GPU happily, if you really are going to run 3 x 4870X2 cards in Crossfire then maybe you have a case for a 850W-1000W PSU. I am certain though that there are far more people with the PSU's than with the kit to use them :)
 
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