PC Tech Thread

That system is only going to be using about 250-300W though so 550W PSU will fall within that easily.

That figure of 450W for a 1060 sounds way too high. Could it be the power draw at the wall, therefore already taking into account any losses in the PSU?

I run an overclocked 6700k, two 1080s, three SSDs, an HDD plus whole load of USB crap off an 850W PSU. Never had any power related issues.

PSUs on the table, lads.

My hack is a proper bodge job but works fine... molex adapter to everything! Even GPU...

Although all this fear mongering made me buy a EVGA G2 thing out of worry...

You've misinterpreted the efficiency calculation.

An 80+ rated 400W PSW would be 82% efficient at 100% of its rated output wattage, so would be drawing ~490W from the wall to output 400W.

80+ rated 700W PSW outputting 400W at 85% would be drawing ~470W from the wall.

At about £0.12/kWh, your breakeven period for that 20W saving while running 24hours a day at 100% is 17 days, 8 hours 40 minutes per £1 extra spent on the 700W PSW. (Ignoring the chances of PSU failure)

Each level of the 80+ rating scheme generally requires about the same efficiency at 20% load as at 100% load. They didn't impose an efficiency threshold for 10% output until "80 plus Titanium". A 4790K-based system will idle at about 80W

Comparing 400W 80+Ti with 700W 80+Ti, the 700W PSW draws almost 8W less when outputting 400W. When outputting 250W, both supplies would be at about the same efficiency. At 80W output, the 700W would be drawing about 3.5W more.

tl;dr: buy the highest quality PSW that's on a special offer, the efficiency gains won't every pay off but the cost of a dead PSU is significant.

Ha!

Cheers all for the feedback.

No, just liked the look of it (literally, looks tidy) and have never tried water cooled before.

In terms of practicality I thought that it would reduce the number of fans I need overall- is this not the case?

Interesting, thanks.

I run an overclocked 6700k, two 1080s, three SSDs, an HDD plus whole load of USB crap off an 850W PSU. Never had any power related issues.

The SSDs and USB devices will be on the 5V rail. The CPU will be taking ~1.85V from the motherboard VRMs, which will probably be on the 3.3V rail. The HDD will use 12V and 5V, but peak load will be during loading, and your GPU probably won't be at max when you're loading.

The "450W" for the 1060 is a recommendation, based on a max draw of 20A on the 12V rail, which is 240W.

I can't maths as well as you but it looks like we're agreeing, get the higher ones that's still efficient at the required output. I'm assuming a similar quality rating on both PSU's. Aside from buying a low quality one which may die, I'm mostly concerned with it having enough juice as I learnt from experience how frustrating it is to have your computer shut down under high load. Also if you want to replace your GPU later for a more powerful model then chances are it will also need more power, so it's best to have some head room.

Well it has two fans attached to it as opposed to you having one fan on the CPU cooler. The case probably already comes with fans which will most likely be sufficient.

The stock CPU cooler will probably work fine, if you want something a bit better you can get a decent CPU fan for £15-£20.

The case looks like a bit of a squeeze, I think the water cooling may be good for keeping airflow. A big CPU cooler looks like it will block the rear fan.

Yeah, well, that's just like, your opinion man...

tl;dr: buy the highest quality PSW that's on a special offer, the efficiency gains won't every pay off but the cost of a dead PSU is significant

I agree with this totally - quality over everything else, including wattage. PSUs are possibly the most misunderstood PC component.

I'd highly recommend reading this page (it's nine years old, but still all true):
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article28-page3.html

Then the whole article, if you have the time/inclination.

I have a four year old 460w fanless Seasonic which has a real world efficiency of 95% at 400W. Of course it's not actually drawing 400W :)

@Fox has done a pint of drug.

I wish. Forgot an iMac is basically a laptop, soz @CYOA

Finally overclocked my i5... I didn't go crazy, just pushed it to 4.2Ghz. Set everything manual so turbo etc... disabled. It's locked at that speed, so power usage is constant.

One interesting side effect of manually setting all the power, my 1070GTX coil whine has 100% disappeared. (shrug) no clue but happy about that. Also got about 7% FPS boost in most games.

I'd highly recommend reading this page (it's nine years old, but still all true):

silentpcreview.com/article28-­page3.html

Hah, I used to read SPCR when that was published.

All the parts are ordered. Might have a little LEGO Party at the weekend if I'm lucky.

NEWS JUST IN.
I have actually found a nice looking monitor... which could replace my iMac.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Lenovo-65BBGBC1UK-ThinkVision-AH-IPS-Monitor/dp/B01N3OSLIF/ref=sr_1_16?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1479391000&sr=1-16&keywords=Lenovo+ThinkVision

Meh. That's not a very nice looking monitor though i like the thin bezels.

This is the one i've just purchased:

Much cleaner lines (though a larger bezel). 32" 4k loveliness. http://www.samsung.com/uk/consumer/it/monitor/professional-monitor/LU32E85KRS/EN

Why not just use a nice telly?

Better colour reproduction. Better port options (displayport for the PC and miniDP for the mac mini), USB hub on the side, good positioning options (height, tilt, 90 deg option etc) & it has v-sync etc.

Very true. Also, pixel density.

4k 32" TVs don't seem to exist.

that's boggin