Is this too much

Fire58Mech · Mar 15, 2004

I have a 330 watt antec true power power supply

I'm getting worried that I'm running to much on it.
I'm running the following:
-Biostar mother board(not sure if this matters or not)
-AMD 2000+ prossecor
-one CD-R drive
-one CD-R, CD-RW,DVD drive
-floppy drive
-cold cthode light
-3 high performance fans
-Geforce vid card( not sure if this matters)
-2x hard dirve- 1= 7200rpm

The reason I ask is bacouse when I play some high demanding games It randomly restarts. I wondering if all this is too much for the psu when I have a load on it.
EDIT
- plus one wireless LAN adapter powerd by usb port

=ACID RAIN= · Mar 15, 2004

I would say yes, it is too much. For the athlon XP I wold say nothing less than 400 watts is required. I would not say this is due to heat, because heat usually causes lockups, not reboots (just clearing that up).

I would recommend an Antec truepower 430w for your system. That will be plenty of juice, and will give you room for overclocking or upgrades down the road. Anything higher for your system is overkill, and anything lower is iffy.

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=17-103-908&depa=0

Fire58Mech · Mar 15, 2004

In an effort to save money, I have an old power supply that has bin sitting in a IBM for about 8 years. If I use this for fans, CD rom drives, floppy drive, cathode light- would this leave enough power in the new psu for the hard drives and motherbaord to operate smoothly?

=ACID RAIN= · Mar 15, 2004

You'll be really cutting corners with that plan. In the end, no, it won't be enough.

The cdrom doesn't spin 24/7. Niether does the floppy. When you game, those items are idle. The fans don't pull any power at all really (unless you run 15 or more...lol). The cathode pulls some power, but not much at all either. Basically, the CPU and the rest of the system that is working hard when you game is what you want to power, so I would say buying another power supply is not optional.

Of course, you could drop gaming until you get another power supply, then you won't reboot as often

.

It will get worse though, over time. it always does. The power supply is your weakest link right now, and as long as it is being taxed heavily, it will degrade faster.

dead_man311 · Mar 15, 2004

i think if you add the second power supply the 330 should be fine , since you got it try it

my GF is runing a Athlon XP 2200 , her Amptron 825 , cd burner , DVD , Floppy drive, ATI 7000, and 3 LED fans All off a cheap 250 watt power supply

=ACID RAIN= · Mar 15, 2004

Well perhaps so, but then again you are running a different unit than him. Even if it was the same brand, it is still a different unit, if you see what I mean. It could be that his has a load problem, and can't handle the current the machine is pulling from it. He said himself that it is already rebooting now, so even if he pulls a few components off of it, he will still be marginal at best.

I don't know about you, but I prefer a little excess rather than marginal amounts of power. The power supply it what keeps your machine going, and if you don't have enough of it, it will eventually fail, it is inevitable.

Fire58Mech · Mar 15, 2004

I have the power supply now, so I'm not buying anthing else yet. What brand + watts should I start to look for just in case.

dead_man311 · Mar 15, 2004

since Fire58Mech has the second power supply, just try it out. see how it works, then if that dont work. look in to a new power supply

=ACID RAIN= · Mar 15, 2004

Fire58Mech said:
I have the power supply now, so I'm not buying anthing else yet. What brand + watts should I start to look for just in case.

I see nothing wrong with Dead_man's advice, but if you still have issues, I supplied a link above to what I felt was the best to start off with. I said in another thread that the majority here tends to stick with antec, fortron, and sparkle, in that order I believe. Secondarily, enermax is ok too (another person's research in said thread). I would stay with those IMO.

dead_man311 · Mar 15, 2004

my next power supply will probly be a Antec, there are alot of people with them here and say there great

itshondo · Mar 15, 2004

look at my sig, all that runs off my Antec True 330- and it's fubarred, 2 blown caps inside. 12v rail @ 11.80 steady.

Did you install Motherboard monitor to check your voltages? I'd also recommend you check your 12 volt and 5 volt rails with a multimeter.

530 watt Sparkle Power from Newegg (79.99 shipped) on the way...

Fire58Mech · Mar 15, 2004

sorry I should have thought to put this up with my original post.
Voltages according to MBM5 are;
3.3v=3.36
5.00v=5.05
12v=12.19

It stays preety much steady a across it. My bios reads the same as well.

I just looked at this old pwoer supply.It's older than I thought. There are only 3 adapters coming of it that will fit my fans ect. . I jimmy rig it for a while and have it run everthing except the mobo. I'll reprot back on how well it works. I'm of to give it a test right now.
Thanks for all the help !!

TheTick · Mar 15, 2004

I like sparkle for performance- price wise ... and Ive been starting to hear on some not so nice things for Antec

Fire58Mech · Mar 16, 2004

okay I'm reproting back.Here are my findings.
I hooked up the old power supply to the extras and let only the MOBO run of the new psu. heres what it does now that really gets me. It no longer restarts but just the game crashes and says it has an error of some kind. My backround does not work after This uless i send it into sleep and wake it back up, or restart it. When I turn the game into safe mode it seems to wrk better. As long as I keep the vidoe stuff way down. I'm running a GeForce 3. Could this be that i have to invest in a better vidoe card becouse my vidoe is not up to starders?

Is this too much

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