New PSU, Upgrade too

mtjdavis · 25 Oct 2006 at 23:00

Hi all,

Well my generic PSU finally gave up life, leaving a distinct smell of burning metal.

My current specs are-
Athlon 64 3000+
Epox 9NPA+ (Mobo)
Sparkle 6600 256mb
Nforce4 On-board Sound

So i'm looking for a fairly robust PSU, which will survive upgrades and last a while.

I'm also looking to upgrade my CPU, Mobo and GPU soon so, these are my suggestions-
Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 for about £120
Leadtek GeForce 7600 GT 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-080-LT) - £99.86
I'm not sure about a motherboard, but the Gigabyte's are looking good. A mobo with SLI would be good too, so any suggestions?

This upgrades mainly geared towards gaming/DVD's.
Overall i've got a budget of about £350-400 for PSU + Other stuff

So any suggestions towards the PSU and improvements to the other stuff is greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance.

semi-pro waster · 25 Oct 2006 at 23:13

Any decent PSU of 430w+ would do here, look at Enermax, FSP, Seasonic and Tagan and find a model that will fit into your budget along with the rest of the parts you need.

Matrix · 25 Oct 2006 at 23:14

mtjdavis said:
Hi all,

Well my generic PSU finally gave up life, leaving a distinct smell of burning metal.

My current specs are-
Athlon 64 3000+
Epox 9NPA+ (Mobo)
Sparkle 6600 256mb
Nforce4 On-board Sound

So i'm looking for a fairly robust PSU, which will survive upgrades and last a while.

I'm also looking to upgrade my CPU, Mobo and GPU soon so, these are my suggestions-
Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 for about £120
Leadtek GeForce 7600 GT 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-080-LT) - £99.86
I'm not sure about a motherboard, but the Gigabyte's are looking good. A mobo with SLI would be good too, so any suggestions?

This upgrades mainly geared towards gaming/DVD's.
Overall i've got a budget of about £350-400 for PSU + Other stuff

So any suggestions towards the PSU and improvements to the other stuff is greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance.

I'm in the same boat i'm looking to upgrade within a few weeks.

Looking at the Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 too and a DS4 mobo.
Ram , GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC5300 667MHz Value DDR2 Dual Channel Kit though i'm not sure if this is good to overclock with?
As for PSU this looks good to me Hiper HPU-4K580-MK Type R 580W Modular ATX2.2 PSU - Black UV. Are these any good?

I'm not really a game so i've been told this would be agood card for me to use and i could run games on it BFG 3DFuzion GeForce 7600 GT 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/DVI

mtjdavis · 25 Oct 2006 at 23:22

What do you use your pc for?
If you don't need a powerful GPU you can just buy a 7300 and save some money

Matrix · 25 Oct 2006 at 23:24

mtjdavis said:
What do you use your pc for?
If you don't need a powerful GPU you can just buy a 7300 and save some money

Surfing, downloading, some video work, I would like to play some more games but my old ( 5 years old)Radeon 64m isn't up to it no more

Any advice on the PSU?

mtjdavis · 25 Oct 2006 at 23:29

Yeah, i think it looks good to me.
Only thing i'd say is it doesnt look that quiet, but thats just based on looking.

Otherwise, i think i might invest in one

Matrix · 25 Oct 2006 at 23:32

mtjdavis said:
Yeah, i think it looks good to me.
Only thing i'd say is it doesnt look that quiet, but thats just based on looking.

Otherwise, i think i might invest in one

Yeah i'm not sure how quiet. But it's not in another room than the one i sleep in so thats not bad.

I'm hoping someone maybe able to let us know how quiet it is. I like the fact you can just connect what you need and not have to hide and tape up all the other connectors like i have to on my PSU now.

locutus12 · 26 Oct 2006 at 01:00

Matrix said:
I'm in the same boat i'm looking to upgrade within a few weeks.

Looking at the Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 too and a DS4 mobo.
Ram , GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC5300 667MHz Value DDR2 Dual Channel Kit though i'm not sure if this is good to overclock with?
As for PSU this looks good to me Hiper HPU-4K580-MK Type R 580W Modular ATX2.2 PSU - Black UV. Are these any good?

I'm not really a game so i've been told this would be agood card for me to use and i could run games on it BFG 3DFuzion GeForce 7600 GT 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/DVI

that psu for that system ??? unless your planning to add 4 hard drives 3 cd drives 6 usb devices and a couple of 7950GX2`s in SLI it would be a complete waste.

Intel Core 2 Duo E6300
DS4 mobo.
GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC5300 667MHz Value DDR2 Dual Channel Kit
BFG 3DFuzion GeForce 7600 GT 256MB GDDR3

a good branded 400 watt power supply would power that with ease.

i just put your system through psucalc here

http://extreme.outervision.com/PSUEngine

350 watt psu would cover it.

ive been getting really annoyed of late as allot of people are buying PSU`s WAAAY over what they need for now or the future and usually due to bad advice. that psu calc site is a very very useful and resonably accurate tool and i recomend people use it before buying a PSU thats £40 and 300 watts more than they need.

Matrix · 26 Oct 2006 at 03:15

locutus12 said:
that psu for that system ??? unless your planning to add 4 hard drives 3 cd drives 6 usb devices and a couple of 7950GX2`s in SLI it would be a complete waste.

Intel Core 2 Duo E6300
DS4 mobo.
GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC5300 667MHz Value DDR2 Dual Channel Kit
BFG 3DFuzion GeForce 7600 GT 256MB GDDR3

a good branded 400 watt power supply would power that with ease.

i just put your system through psucalc here

http://extreme.outervision.com/PSUEngine

350 watt psu would cover it.

ive been getting really annoyed of late as allot of people are buying PSU`s WAAAY over what they need for now or the future and usually due to bad advice. that psu calc site is a very very useful and resonably accurate tool and i recomend people use it before buying a PSU thats £40 and 300 watts more than they need.

I do already own a Enermax 380W ( well i think is ) 5 years old now.
But i will have about 4 SATA hard drives running on it

mtjdavis · 26 Oct 2006 at 04:25

um, noob question but whats a DF4 mobo?
And are they good for sli??

Matrix · 26 Oct 2006 at 04:39

mtjdavis said:
um, noob question but whats a DF4 mobo?
And are they good for sli??

Gigabyte GA_965P_DS4 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard (MB-062-GI)
There meant to be very good a lot to peeps here seem to have the Gigabyte GA_965P_DS3 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard (MB-061-GI)

I'll be getting a DS4 myself i think.
DS3 & DS4

mtjdavis · 26 Oct 2006 at 04:42

hehe, new it was a noobish q.

was considering a gigabyte, so its all good

Matrix · 26 Oct 2006 at 04:43

mtjdavis said:
hehe, new it was a noobish q.
was considering a gigabyte, so its all good

If you don't know just ask. I've asked many a dumb questions here

mtjdavis · 26 Oct 2006 at 04:49

Just on a different note, is it likely that a dodgy PSU will cause games to crash after 25-30 mins?

Matrix · 26 Oct 2006 at 04:54

mtjdavis said:
Just on a different note, is it likely that a dodgy PSU will cause games to crash after 25-30 mins?

I'm thinking it could be a number of reasons, CPU getting to hot? Graphics card getting hot?. Faulty Ram, or maybe PSU.

I'm sure there will be a lot better guys here to help you better than me. But it could be a few reasons not just one.

mtjdavis · 26 Oct 2006 at 04:57

hmm, guess i should make new thread or change title??

im pretty sure its the PSU (was burning the other day)

Matrix · 26 Oct 2006 at 04:58

mtjdavis said:
hmm, guess i should make new thread or change title??

im pretty sure its the PSU (was burning the other day)

Well maybe it is if it was doing that, Can you get another PSU off a amte or anything and try it?

A few years back mine did that then sent a blue volt right through my system wiping it all out :mad:

mtjdavis · 26 Oct 2006 at 05:02

hehe, i've had experience
my mate had an old pc from work so he crammed load of stuff in it without changing PSU, PSU was about 150W
and it well, blew
took out most of his stuff, luckily he had a spare pc

hp7909 · 26 Oct 2006 at 05:42

mtjdavis said:
Just on a different note, is it likely that a dodgy PSU will cause games to crash after 25-30 mins?

Doesn't have to be a dodgy one. If cheap & or underpowered it means when the system is demanding more power like when running games it causes the system to crash.

I say cheap ones because they are built poorly & 'falsely' marketed. A well know 'dodgy' brand (which OcUK used to stock & glad to see its not there anymore) rated their system at 650Ws which it couldn't even achieve! Worse still, the amount of power it drew from the mains to produce a measly output of 350W was ridiculous :eek:

I'd go for either a Tagan, Enermax, FSP (Sparkle) or Seasonic. 430Ws should be the minimum. But if looking at overclocking & or SLi or CrossFire better invest in a good 600W or above PSU

pastymuncher · 26 Oct 2006 at 10:14

Don't buy a bloody Hiper psu!! I always defended them until last week when mine let go with a bang and lots of stinking black smoke. It also took a DFI Lanparty NForce 4 Sli-DR Expert that i had only just got with it. You can get far better psu's for a little more money as i am now finding out because i have been searching around and reading lots of reviews for the past week.