Power supplies and the next generation...

[aliquidparadigm]

So recently I've been looking in to buying a power supply (or at least future shopping for a power supply) and I wanted to buy one that will be future-proof; given that all new video cards are coming with 2-PCIe connectors and my current PSU only has one, I thought I might need to upgrade. Turns out that I probably won't since I've still got 36A running on the 12v rail, and that should be enough to power a single R600 (x2800xt?). The problem is going to be running something like this (or the GF8 series) in dual-card mode. I've recently been hounding Newegg to get their shit together and implement a search filter for PCIe connections, and they've gotten around to it in the last couple of days.

Anyway, I'm looking to future-proof my PSU for running a pair of R600s in the future when it isn't so ridiculously overkill to do so; what is the minimum wattage that a person should be able to consider when looking around? I imagine that the 8800GTX should be a fair marker for comparison. It just seems outrageous that I would need a kilowatt PSU to get buy with a dual-card setup.

Alright, and again welcome to the site.

36A should be a comfertable amprage for an 8800 GTX (wich takes 15-18A on it's own).

The R600's power consumption is still unknown and probably will remain so until Feburary. I would not be surprised however if it was to take 20A or more alone on the +12v rail(s). So inlight of that i would reccomend nothing less than 42A PSU, but that is just according to speculation at the moment.
If u want to run 2 of those, u would need 70A on the +12v rail(s). Thats abt a 900-1000w PSU.

On the other hand, if the R600 dosent take above 22A, it may be possible to buy a 30A PSU and an extra "Addon" PSU, wich is an extra PSU that has the sole purpose of powering ur insanely power hungry modern graphics card. The Thermaltake GPU PSU costs only 50$ and is a good idea if u dont want to buy 2 X2800XTs right away and a 1000w PSU. But a 1000w PSU may cost less than a 500w PSU and an Addon, so think wisely.

I reccomand the Thermaltake or the Corsair brands.

[Mike]

What's the rush? Why not just wait for R600 to be released, then buy whatever you need? Your current PSU sounds more than capable of tiding you over till then.

[aliquidparadigm]

Oh it is, but I'm a compulsive future-proofer, and my current PSU will last me for a fair while... well, theoretically. However, with the way things work, when Newegg gets a lot of stock of something and they're looking to move them (read: x2 5200's from $453 to $278 in two weeks?), they drop the price and make it very, very easy to buy something. (c:

[KARacing]

Are the 1kW+ PSUs out there really pushing that kind of wattage or is this just a bunch of marketing hype? I can't imagine that at that level they are very efficient - 65-70% at best.

[aliquidparadigm]

Originally Posted by KARacing

Are the 1kW+ PSUs out there really pushing that kind of wattage or is this just a bunch of marketing hype? I can't imagine that at that level they are very efficient - 65-70% at best.

83%: http://www.pcpower.com/products/view...hp?show=T1KWSR

[KARacing]

WOW - that is pretty good - better than I had seen elsewhere - but $500 for a PSU seems kinda high - I will have to do a more thorough comparison...

Thanks for the lead..

[aliquidparadigm]

They sell a 750w product that should be sufficient for whatever you want to use it for, short of a fucking dual-2900xt, dual fx-74, with 4GB+ of DDR2 RAM beast with at least four HDDs. And, actually, that might even be do-able. I know it would be do-able to run that with dual-x1950xtx's, so you might be able to squeeze the additional couple hundred watts out of that system.

As I'm sure you can tell, that box is an insane power whore, and it's only going to take about 450 watts (without video card), so as long as you can keep your GPU power drain below 300w (actually, the peak wattage on it is 825, so you might get a drop more than 300w video performance), you should be gravy.

If you want a link to something that will give you a ballpark figure of how much power your rig will take, use this: http://www.extreme.outervision.com/p...ulatorlite.jsp

Make sure you always use the High End Motherboard option, because I'm not sure what they consider high and low.