How much power is enough?

How much power is enough?

These days whenever you try to buy/build a PC, you constantly see demands and suggestions for large power supplies. 400W seems to be for low-end machines, Real Men need at least 500W, but if you intend to do gaming, better get at least 650W, etc. In one MB manual that I'm considering to buy I even saw a suggestion to buy a 1000W PSU if you intend to install a serious VGA.

Asked by: Guest | Views: 290

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bert [Entry]

"For years I have been saying a similar thing.

However, it may be worth putting your machine under a stress test - either video rendering or playing a high end game / just make the CPU and GPU go to 100% for as long as possible as it is random failures during gaming / tasks like this when I always suggest ""Is your PSU high enough"".

Also, I agree, there are some cheap ones which are rated higher than they can provide, but typically there is just unknown brands or unbranded and known brands - the known brands are not really better than any others.

The only thing to be on the look out for is 80%+ certified PSU's which if you use your PC 24x7, may have some cost savings.... and generally are of good quality."