750w modular PSU to much?

[cafe]

When I buy psu's I usually end up getting some 750w 80 plus gold

usually for it to run cooler and be more quiet

It isn't about WHAT you need when it comes to psu's because if you only get what you need they will end up either having something wrong with them as most 80 plus bronze do

or they are not effecient enough to be a tad quiet and end up annoying the piss out of you

I would end up getting a 80 plus gold then something that would suit for future things also, so maybe a 750w

[Wats]

bro, a 650 watt psu could run crossfire and a basket of hdd's.

[the_devil52]

You only really need about 500W but PSUs slowly degrade so if you're planning to keep it for a while you need a bit more wattage. I reckon at least a 600W PSU would be best if you want to add drives or overclock. If you want better efficiency get a PSU rated for about 100-200W more than you need.

[Winther]

No. 750W is NOT "too much".

1000W is not "too much".

2000W is not "too much".

There really is no such thing as "too much". They will all run your system. Even when idling at 20W. The only reason you don't need to buy a super high wattage PSU is because they're not really necessary, and you're spending more money on them and getting no extra system performance in return.

One exception to this is if you are a silence freak, since a PSU will tend to run cooler (thus keeping fan speeds down) if it is: A) More efficient, and B) further from it's maximum rated wattage. Might even keep your case a bit cooler too.

Longevity is also another reason you might want to overspend a little (although efficiency affects this more because of cooler temps)

I will always recommend to go "overkill" a LITTLE BIT on a PSU. Partially because in the world of power supplies it's better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it. Partially because I'm not going to upgrade my power supply until it DIES. I want to have some breathing room incase I decide to install a peltier cooler, or 50 fans, or a set of landing lights. I don't want to go waste money buying a new PSU if I want to run CrossFire or SLI in my next build. People tell you "oh 400w is fine", but they aren't thinking ahead. How often realistically do people buy a new PSU? Only when they have too. If you buy one new super quality, super efficient PSU with a bunch of extra wattage, it's not going to be tossed at teh next upgrade cycle. I've bought 3 power supplies in 12 years. TWELVE YEARS. I only just recently bought the last one because I am a silence freak and it was a good deal, but I didn't NEED it. Because I bought PSUs that were better than they needed to be in the first place, and I never had to worry about them.

Overspending a little bit on a power supply is not really overspending at all if you only have to buy one ONCE.

Brian, I dont wanna sound like I dont believe you or that I know more about computers than you do. But the PSU that melting and the PSU that took out the entire PC, where they actually good quility Gold certified units?

I find it hard to believe that a 500watt gold certified PSU with 5 year warrenty would just die within 5 years unless the system drew too much.. I mean a PSU like that should be able to handle a system drawing almost the whole 500wats, lets say atleast 450watts?

and this is a question not a correction :)

[Winther]

my 650w PSU died recently. just died idk why, even though i run crossfire. i considered id go bigger, so i got and 850w gold ceft for 100 bucks on top of my RMA, i decided this because of

my crossfire,

overclocking the cpu and gpu.

you thought about over clocking in the future??

and buying a bigger PSu is a good Future investment. something to think about. u might be new to pcs now. but what about 4-5 years from now. saving money ;)

I can see now that me and some others didnt really answer his question, but still. The point that a 500watt is good enough is valid.

But answering the actual question, no a 750watt PSU will not bottleneck the PC. though I would suggest getting a gold certified unit instead, but thats personal opinion.

I did the same with my new system as Chris_nz.. I wanted a really good PSU that would last me atleast this system and the next, so I got a 750watt eventhough a 500 would be more than enough. But the fact is that most computer parts are getting more power efficient so unless you might go for tripple sli/crossfire I dont see any point in going over 750/850watts

[Winther]

When I buy psu's I usually end up getting some 750w 80 plus gold usually for it to run cooler and be more quiet It isn't about WHAT you need when it comes to psu's because if you only get what you need they will end up either having something wrong with them as most 80 plus bronze do or they are not effecient enough to be a tad quiet and end up annoying the piss out of you I would end up getting a 80 plus gold then something that would suit for future things also' date=' so maybe a 750w[/quote']

I would hardly say most 80+ Bronze PSU end up having something wrong with them.. The 80+ certification is efficiency not quality, not directly atleast.

[Helltech]

Its never a bad thing to go a bit overboard on a PSU' date=' the bigger it is the less stress is going to be put on it which in theory could mean a longer life. Though like others have said a 500W should be good enough, its just not a bad thing if you do buy a bigger one(just done get too silly!).[/quote']

A bit overboard is ok, but a lot overboard actually makes you have less efficiency. As shown in a TechTips video.

Thanks :) I whenever i see peoples specs they somewhat have the same specs as me' date='and uses a larger PSU,does having a slightly larger (in watts) PSU change the computer in anyway?[/quote']

No the computer doesn't change. As long as you have about 75w to spare you aren't going to be putting any stress on the PSU.

Where'd you get this "75w to spare" idea from?

Back from the idea that you should always have at least 10 percent to spare and most people considered 750w PSUs to be a good middle ground.

[sn0re]

how about when the RAM,CPU and Video Card work to its fullest in graphic intensive games?Wouldn't a 650w to 750w PSU work fine?

[hellfire2330]

look just future proof your system and when i did that i got a 1000watt for the hell of it

[Brian]

No. 750W is NOT "too much".

1000W is not "too much".

2000W is not "too much".

There really is no such thing as "too much". They will all run your system. Even when idling at 20W. The only reason you don't need to buy a super high wattage PSU is because they're not really necessary, and you're spending more money on them and getting no extra system performance in return.

One exception to this is if you are a silence freak, since a PSU will tend to run cooler (thus keeping fan speeds down) if it is: A) More efficient, and B) further from it's maximum rated wattage. Might even keep your case a bit cooler too.

Longevity is also another reason you might want to overspend a little (although efficiency affects this more because of cooler temps)

I will always recommend to go "overkill" a LITTLE BIT on a PSU. Partially because in the world of power supplies it's better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it. Partially because I'm not going to upgrade my power supply until it DIES. I want to have some breathing room incase I decide to install a peltier cooler, or 50 fans, or a set of landing lights. I don't want to go waste money buying a new PSU if I want to run CrossFire or SLI in my next build. People tell you "oh 400w is fine", but they aren't thinking ahead. How often realistically do people buy a new PSU? Only when they have too. If you buy one new super quality, super efficient PSU with a bunch of extra wattage, it's not going to be tossed at teh next upgrade cycle. I've bought 3 power supplies in 12 years. TWELVE YEARS. I only just recently bought the last one because I am a silence freak and it was a good deal, but I didn't NEED it. Because I bought PSUs that were better than they needed to be in the first place, and I never had to worry about them.

Overspending a little bit on a power supply is not really overspending at all if you only have to buy one ONCE.

No they were not Gold certified as the specification did not exist at the time and there weren't a lot of affordable 80+ certified units at the time. These incidents happened about 5 and 7 years ago, and at that time the efficiency of your PSU wasn't even a consideration. Nobody cared too much about what kind of power supply you had, just how many watts it produced. This was before I knew really anything about power supplies. We used to always just find the one with the best wattage rating from a manufacturer we'd heard of that we could afford.

As for the PSUs in question, one was a basic greybox 450W my brother owned and the other was a another basic greybox 350W a friend had. I think from Antec and ThermalTake... They were decent enough basic power supplies, just had been running for a few years and the caps got old. This is around the time when the video cards were getting hotter and just eating up the watts like nobody's business. Both power supplies died not long after video card upgrades, fans and additional hard drives were added, pushing them close to their max capacities.

But yes, a 500w Gold unit is light years ahead of those old greybox units in terms of circuit design, components used and cooling systems, and will probably last longer because of it. High temps and voltage spikes/drops still happen though, and for my money that extra 100w buffer is worth its weight in gold.

[Dave :)]

You're not going to be 'future proofing' anything by buying a larger than required wattage unit. Every generation, power consumption is decreasing, requiring less wattage for the equivalent performance.

[Ghost]

You're not going to be 'future proofing' anything by buying a larger than required wattage unit. Every generation' date=' power consumption is decreasing, requiring less wattage for the equivalent performance.[/quote']

To build on this or rather say it in a different way.

If you buy a premium PSU now then you will be less likely to want to upgrade when newer more efficient PSUs are out.

[TotallyKaos]

Yea, if you want to SLI or CrossfireX in the future you could go with a 750W PSU, but if u are not planning on adding a second card its a waste of money to buy a 750W PSU, get like a XFX Pro Core 550W or a Corsair CX500W and u will be just fine running that system ;)

no it doesn't work like that, if you have a system with that videocard, your system will need a 500watt or greater PSU, the videocard itself will only need about 135 watts (maybe less or more)

[tacticalpanic]

your better off spending the exstra money on getting a gold psu rather than a bronze that has more wattage than you need.

i went bonkers and bought a AX860i thats utter overkill for my system , but I know that I am buying multiple gpu's when the 800 series comes out this year.

[Bob]

if you have the money get a 750w then you will have room to expand in the future if you decide to do SLI.

[Aron_the_canadian]

its all relative

[Toby]

As others are saying, get the 750w for Crossfire, or 500w if you prefer a single card (less power, less heat, less noise).

And for the record, a 500w PSU won't have to "work so hard" with a single 7870. There are rigs running two 7850s with 550w PSUs, so a single 7870 will be child's play for a 500w.

I was also going to mention the continuous decline of power requirements, but Dave beat me to it. I wouldn't be surprised if you could run a couple of 9870s with 500w, at the rate we're going.