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brainofj
New member
Can anyone recommend a descent pc case with a 550w power supply, i will e using an amd athlon processor with a barton motheroard and up to 1gig of ddr memory.
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joe4324
New member
Question:
550Watt? I'm very curious to know why you need so much power. thats a beast of a power supply!
my DAW is actually running in a pretty generic case with a chea 300w PS in it, the system isnt a slouch either, I've been wanting to upgrade the Case for a while but it works flawlessly so I just dont want to touch it.
I'm a big of Antec cases btw.
550Watt? I'm very curious to know why you need so much power. thats a beast of a power supply!
my DAW is actually running in a pretty generic case with a chea 300w PS in it, the system isnt a slouch either, I've been wanting to upgrade the Case for a while but it works flawlessly so I just dont want to touch it.
I'm a big of Antec cases btw.
wheelema
Boner-obo
Here is a link to some power supplies. The biggest is a 660 watt brute just in case you're suffering from power supply envy. My DAW is running a 250 watt PS without issue (1 HDD, 2 CDRW, 512MB RAM, external (AGP) video adapter). Since the large PS are intended to support servers with bookoo co-processor cards, I wouldn't expect them to be all that quiet.
I personally think that Ahanix cases bear examination.
Luck.
I personally think that Ahanix cases bear examination.
Luck.
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brainofj
New member
Why a 550w? Im buggered if i know. My mate is a pc tech and he is building it for me. I don't know much about the power supply issue, im just following orders but i will ask him and let you know what he says........thanks
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something cool
New member
I'd say don't bother with 550 W unless you're gonna be running one of the brand new power-hungry nVidia graphics cards, and be more concerned about getting a *quiet* psu/case combo. If you're like me and record fairly near to (or even just in the same room as) your computer, that noise from all the fans can make quite a difference.
Link to get you started:
http://www.siliconacoustics.com/silentquietpowersupply.html
Link to get you started:
http://www.siliconacoustics.com/silentquietpowersupply.html
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brainofj
New member
The 550w was suggested to me as i will be adding more stuff eg: more ddr ram etc. I am getting a silent power supply, will find out when i try it, if it is silent as they say.
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mpthreer
New member
well i dunno, but check out these power supplies, i do know you have to have a whopping system that looks like las vegas to eat up a 550 watt power supply, unless your running a server pc with a big raid/hard disk system and dual processors and all kinds of shit, but i think a 400 watt ps should do you good, check this one out==
its supposed to be silent
http://www.newegg.com/app/viewProductDesc.asp?description=17-103-213&catalog=23&manufactory=BROWSE
peace
its supposed to be silent
http://www.newegg.com/app/viewProductDesc.asp?description=17-103-213&catalog=23&manufactory=BROWSE
peace
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Sangram
New member
550 watts means nothing.
There are 4 specs for the supply
+5V
+12V
+3.3 and +5v combined
All of these have ampere and watt ratings attached to them, the higher the better.
A no-name 400 watt PSU will just about touch 200 watts on the +3.3 and 5V rails combined, and still manage only about 10 amps on the 12V rail.
Thats' 320 watts total. The rest is hidden in the negative supplies and wastage (5V rail can be rated at 40 amperes - 200 watts, but cannot meet the rating when there's a load on other rails as well). So Power supply ratings are mostly bunkum.
You should look up a little PSU calculator, there's one that's easily available on the web.
Also remember - Athlons use the 5V rail for power, Pentiums use the 12V rail. Another thing to throw in the mix. A GeForce Ti 4600 (old card) pulls about 35-40 watts, most of it from the 3.3. volts rail. A hard disk draws 12 watts off the 12 volt rail, and 5-10 watts of the 5 volt rails. four hard drives means serious power draw.
A fan takes about 3 watts. about 100 watts already down. The XP CPUs draw about 70 watts. That's not much headroom. Then there's memory, pulling about 5-10 watts per stick.
550 watts in a high-power PC is really not really overkill, leaves a lot of room for future upgrades. Since ATX is not going to die that soon, it is a component that can outlast processors and motherboard generations. I would say go for it.
There are 4 specs for the supply
+5V
+12V
+3.3 and +5v combined
All of these have ampere and watt ratings attached to them, the higher the better.
A no-name 400 watt PSU will just about touch 200 watts on the +3.3 and 5V rails combined, and still manage only about 10 amps on the 12V rail.
Thats' 320 watts total. The rest is hidden in the negative supplies and wastage (5V rail can be rated at 40 amperes - 200 watts, but cannot meet the rating when there's a load on other rails as well). So Power supply ratings are mostly bunkum.
You should look up a little PSU calculator, there's one that's easily available on the web.
Also remember - Athlons use the 5V rail for power, Pentiums use the 12V rail. Another thing to throw in the mix. A GeForce Ti 4600 (old card) pulls about 35-40 watts, most of it from the 3.3. volts rail. A hard disk draws 12 watts off the 12 volt rail, and 5-10 watts of the 5 volt rails. four hard drives means serious power draw.
A fan takes about 3 watts. about 100 watts already down. The XP CPUs draw about 70 watts. That's not much headroom. Then there's memory, pulling about 5-10 watts per stick.
550 watts in a high-power PC is really not really overkill, leaves a lot of room for future upgrades. Since ATX is not going to die that soon, it is a component that can outlast processors and motherboard generations. I would say go for it.
brainofj said:
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Sangram
New member
mpthreer said:
The Zalmans are good supplies, very tightly regulated, and pretty low noise.
I just have a small problem with the rail ratings, they look a little low. If you're not overclocking it should be fine.
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TripleJ
New member
Just get a 400w Zalman Silent and you'll be fine.
I'm running an Aopen 250w (Aopen are a great brand) PSU for this machine:
Athlon 2000mhz (1800 OCed)
512MB DDR
2 7200RPM hard Drives
2 Optical Drive
Few Fans
Few PCI Cards
GF4
I'm running an Aopen 250w (Aopen are a great brand) PSU for this machine:
Athlon 2000mhz (1800 OCed)
512MB DDR
2 7200RPM hard Drives
2 Optical Drive
Few Fans
Few PCI Cards
GF4
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brainofj
New member
Here is the actual set-up i will have - AMD *Retail* Athlon XP 3200+ *400 FSB* Barton (2.20GHz) with AMD Heat Sink Fan
120Gb Maxtor Diamondmax Plus 9 (7200rpm, 8MB Cache)
512Mb PC3200 (PC400) DDR Memory (Elixir Major) Retail
Abit KV7 KT600 DDR400 400fsb x8AGP +Lan+USB2+ATA133+2xSATA+6CH Audio
I will also be using a ge-force titanium card for now. The power supply i got is a Q-Tec 550w , the power supply was quite cheap 23 british pounds. Seemingly the noise is below 33db, is this quiet enough?? I will find out soon as it will be built by the weekend.
120Gb Maxtor Diamondmax Plus 9 (7200rpm, 8MB Cache)
512Mb PC3200 (PC400) DDR Memory (Elixir Major) Retail
Abit KV7 KT600 DDR400 400fsb x8AGP +Lan+USB2+ATA133+2xSATA+6CH Audio
I will also be using a ge-force titanium card for now. The power supply i got is a Q-Tec 550w , the power supply was quite cheap 23 british pounds. Seemingly the noise is below 33db, is this quiet enough?? I will find out soon as it will be built by the weekend.
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mpthreer
New member
i think we forgot about the case lol
Right now with my system i have a chieftec design but all modded out with a window, i think its too big and flashy now that i have it. A guy i used to go to school with and go to lan party's with has a lian li case, if you check their site ( http://www.lian-li.com/proclass.php ) then it is obvious their cases are badass. I personally would go for the all aluminum, what would you sound tekkie's out there go for the best material for a case to be made out of for your home studio?
peace
Right now with my system i have a chieftec design but all modded out with a window, i think its too big and flashy now that i have it. A guy i used to go to school with and go to lan party's with has a lian li case, if you check their site ( http://www.lian-li.com/proclass.php ) then it is obvious their cases are badass. I personally would go for the all aluminum, what would you sound tekkie's out there go for the best material for a case to be made out of for your home studio?
peace
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mpthreer
New member
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=11-112-044&depa=0
i am interested in a case like this for my audio pc...
i am interested in a case like this for my audio pc...
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TripleJ
New member
brainofj said:
ditch the 'qtech' and get an antec. Or Zalman. Or Aopen
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rfarris
New member
I have a P4 running at 3.6GHz with 1 GB of DRAM, four SATA hard drives, a DVD burner, a CD burner, and a 3DLabs Wildcat 760 CAD-level graphics card in a case that has five fans of its own. I also have a monitor on the input power to the (480W) power supply.Sangram said:
Under normal conditions (like now) my PC draws about 130W, under intensive load it draws about 150W, and at startup (when maximum current draw occurs) it draws about 220W.
I second the nomination for a Lian Li case, with Antec a close second.
DAFFYDRUNK
New member
I thought that Antec Sonata super quiet case looked interesting but that thing's over $200. The regular version is a little over $100...
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Sangram
New member
TripleJ said:
I agree wholeheartedly. A 550 watt Qtech at 33 dB is neither too quiet, nor is it really a name brand supply. It wouldn't be too bad, but 33 dB doesn't sound like a quiet supply to me.
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Sangram
New member
rfarris said:
That sounds about right, if you were working on DAW apps (which hit the hard disk occasionally, and don't use much video power). The CPU would be pulling close to a hundred watts of power, the RAM about 30 watts, so yeah, at 90% efficiency that's good. That entire load is coming off the 12V and 3.3 V rails (P4s use the 12V rail for CPU juice). I would think you can run your entire setup off a quality 400 watt supply, or less if you weren't clocking up the CPU.
Is 550 overkill? I don't think so. Is Qtech the right supply? I don't think so. With generic supplies there is too much variation in the rails, plus the 550 watts may really be only capable of doing 470-480 watts. Which should still be enough, mind you.
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brainofj
New member
Well then, i suppose i have enough info on this subject now to make a good choice. I already have the q-tec power supply so i am going to try it anyway, then get one of the other fans mentioned just to hear the difference. What db reading do the other fans mentioned come in at anyway?
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Sangram
New member
Vantec stealth fans are 21 dBa. My CPU fan at 2200 rpm is about 20 dBa, at 3500 rpm (current setting) about 29 dBa. A stock AMD HSF is about 35 dBa.
