Power Shortage?

[demon9k]

First of all I don't want any arguements about my 'crappy' power supply, there have been enough of them.

I am currently thinking of upgrading and buying two new Raptor's for windows in RAID 0, however my PC has already got loads of components taking power from my 400W Qtec power supply and I am afraid I might run out of juice when I put these new hard drives in.

So my question is, how much power will I need to run all this:

P4 2.8Ghz
9800 Pro - Will be upgraded to x800 XT most likely
DVD-RW
DVD-Rom
CD-RW
2 *120Gb Hard Disc
2 * 36.6Gb Hard disc (new parts)
4 * 80mm fans
Aero 4+ CPU cooler
Front Bay Fan Controller
Floppy Disc

Also can anyone recommend me a power supply for all this, cheers.

[Ravon]

Im running a set up very much like this on a 300 watt supply, but will be upgrading to a 480watt soonish.. personally i would get a better psu.. you can never have to much juice

[Willei]

I'd recommend a decent quality 400w unit for a system like this one. If you're buying a cheap one, then make it 500w

[wod]

go for a 550watt antec or enermax psu, top quality

[demon9k]

?80-?100 though

I only have so much student loan

[csuzw]

I think you can get a qtec 550W for about ?40 - then again I doubt its half as good as the Antec one - its sweet - I wish I'd got the one with fan control though.

[demon9k]

Well according to the website of the manufacturer who made my motherboard.

Driven by strong design philosophies and innovation, GIGABYTE new developed technology known as the Dual Power System (DPS) is introduced for 6-Dual series motherboard. The DPS technology is an ingenious design that gives you a power circuit with a total of 6 phases - providing 3 extra phases power circuits which is twice the amount recommended by the standard motherboard design guideline. In a DPS (Dual Power System) designed motherboard, an additional 3-phase power circuit DPVRM (Dual Power Voltage Regulator Module) daughter card is added on the motherboard. This effectively provides a more durable and stable power circuit to sustain a larger electric current of up to 150A. The DPS (Dual Power System) technology is conceived and specially designed for future processors that demand a higher working frequency and a more stable and durable power circuit.

So many thats why I have had so much success with a Qtec power supply? My motherboard is keeping the power nice and stable for me. Giga-Byte motherboards r teh r0xx0r. Might just get a Qtec 550W power supply, should do the trick.

[csuzw]

1 thing to note - I'm pretty sure a qtec 550W doesn't deliver anywhere near the power that for instance Antec 550W does. I don't know what the difference is but they are rated in different ways.

[demon9k]

Well I have a Qtec 400W just now and it runs my rig apart from the raptors which I have not tried in it. So if I get a 550W Qtec it should run my rig plus two raptors I would think.

[Ciaran]

The mother board has no way of controlling the power supplied to the HDD and cd drives.This means the Qtec is still outputting unstable power to them.

[demon9k]

I wouldn't have thought they would need as steady a power supply as the processor and memory. The fact that I have absolutely no trouble with my current power supply is a big factor in my decision, however if someone can recommend a certain power supply below say ?40 ish that will do the job I might change my mind.

[csuzw]

Unless you are overclocking stability doesn't matter too much. For non overclocking purposes there is absolutely nothing wrong with qtec's. Except for when they break