Yet another, "is my PSU big enough?" question.

torin3 · Aug 16, 2008

Ok, I had a system with an IP35-E board in it and an 8800GT card. The original PSU (Rosewill) fried, so I got a Corsair 450W PSU. It was running along fine, until I decided to upgrade again to use a MSI P6N Diamond, so I could run multiple video cards to use for folding.

I did a fresh install of the OS, and the motherboard isn't overclocked at the moment, but I keep getting blue screen errors. I'm suspicious that this from having not enough power, but I thought I'd double check here before buying a new PSU again.

I've got the motherboard.
2 X 8800GT cards running
1 SATA HD
1 SATA DVD drive
Fans: 2 stock video card fans, 1 120mm CPU fan, 2 case fans (80mm & 120mm)

Also, since I'm planning on eventually running 4 video cards on this, how large of a PSU should I get? If I remember right, the video cards draw about 100W each, so I'm thinking probably at least 700W would be a good minimum to start at.

Thanks in advance!

Ninja edit: The reason I'm thinking it is a lack of power is the blue screens tend to hit when I'm opening programs, and it doesn't seem to be any specific program, just increasing the load some incremental amount.

ratbuddy · Aug 16, 2008

torin3 said:
Ok, I had a system with an IP35-E board in it and an 8800GT card. The original PSU (Rosewill) fried, so I got a Corsair 450W PSU. It was running along fine, until I decided to upgrade again to use a MSI P6N Diamond, so I could run multiple video cards to use for folding.

I did a fresh install of the OS, and the motherboard isn't overclocked at the moment, but I keep getting blue screen errors. I'm suspicious that this from having not enough power, but I thought I'd double check here before buying a new PSU again.

I've got the motherboard.
2 X 8800GT cards running
1 SATA HD
1 SATA DVD drive
Fans: 2 stock video card fans, 1 120mm CPU fan, 2 case fans (80mm & 120mm)

Also, since I'm planning on eventually running 4 video cards on this, how large of a PSU should I get? If I remember right, the video cards draw about 100W each, so I'm thinking probably at least 700W would be a good minimum to start at.

Thanks in advance!

Ninja edit: The reason I'm thinking it is a lack of power is the blue screens tend to hit when I'm opening programs, and it doesn't seem to be any specific program, just increasing the load some incremental amount.

I think nitteo would know what he's talking about in that regard: see this post http://www.overclock.net/4362032-post24.html

edit: Have you memtested the RAM yet?

torin3 · Aug 16, 2008

ratbuddy said:
I think nitteo would know what he's talking about in that regard: see this post http://www.overclock.net/4362032-post24.html

Hmm, interesting.

edit: Have you memtested the RAM yet?

On the old motherboard yes, not on the new motherboard.

It seems to have very few overclocking options, I can't even find a way to adjust the VCore yet. It may be that it doesn't like the mem divider it is on. I'll play around with that and see if it helps. Actually it doesn't have a divider, it looks like it just lets you set the ram and CPU speed seprately. I'll have to look up a guide for it. It probably doesn't help that it is a 680i chipset.

silent bob · Aug 16, 2008

OK I ran Power Supply Calculator and it shows that if you want to run :
4 pci-e 4x
QX9650 @ 5ghz 1.5v
2 sticks DDR3
1 hd 1dvd
4 80mm and 2 120mm

by those calcs you need a 649 w psu

ScottinIndy · Aug 16, 2008

As far as the current setup, Have you tried pulling one of the video cards and seeing if the blue screen issue disappears. That would help narrow it down in regard to if it's a power issue.
As far as power needs for 4 video cards, Alot will depend on what 4 cards, If all are going to be 88gt's, I would probably go 800-850 watts.

RangerXLT8 · Aug 16, 2008

No way a 450 Corsair will run Dual 8800GT plus everything else in the system. I say get a good 800 watt unit.

grndragon57 · Aug 16, 2008

A SLI 8800 GT system requires a 450 watt PSU with 24 amps on the 12v rails. The Corsair 4450VX has 33 amps on the 12v rails.

torin3 · Aug 17, 2008

ScottinIndy said:
As far as the current setup, Have you tried pulling one of the video cards and seeing if the blue screen issue disappears. That would help narrow it down in regard to if it's a power issue.
As far as power needs for 4 video cards, Alot will depend on what 4 cards, If all are going to be 88gt's, I would probably go 800-850 watts.

I didn't have time before I left work to check it out for sure, but yeah, that was going to be what I was going to try next.

RangerXLT8 said:
No way a 450 Corsair will run Dual 8800GT plus everything else in the system. I say get a good 800 watt unit.

Well, I've got a 700 watt PSU (OCZ) in my home system. I'll take it into work and give it a try and see if that clears it up. If so, I'll get a better PSU. Actually the 450 will probably work in my home system in the meantime. I'm down to 1 video card there (g80 8800GTS) and a few hard drives with not much else running on it.

Only annoying thing is I'll need to take out the CPU HSF to get the PSU out of the case...

torin3 · Aug 18, 2008

torin3 said:
I didn't have time before I left work to check it out for sure, but yeah, that was going to be what I was going to try next.

Well, I've got a 700 watt PSU (OCZ) in my home system. I'll take it into work and give it a try and see if that clears it up. If so, I'll get a better PSU. Actually the 450 will probably work in my home system in the meantime. I'm down to 1 video card there (g80 8800GTS) and a few hard drives with not much else running on it.

Only annoying thing is I'll need to take out the CPU HSF to get the PSU out of the case...

Well, I've been up and running for 2 hours with no blue screen, and I've been pushing my system pretty hard with installing software and the like, which Friday got me several blue screens, but today I haven't had one yet.

Looks like the Corsair 450W wasn't quite up to it. Which is weird, because as it was pointed out above Nitteo is running 4 cards on 430W PSUs.

Well, I'm picking up a 1Kw OCZ from the classies, so that will go in my work computer when it arrives.

Yet another, "is my PSU big enough?" question.

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