Can my 450W PSU Temporarily power a R9 290?

[Ludwig]

Hey there, I have an ASUS R9 290 coming in the mail soon and I was just wondering if my PSU can power it up temporarily so that i can confirm that it's functional. Below are the specs for my rig:

 

Corsair SF450 

i5 6600k @ 4.0ghz 

CRYORIG C7

1TB 10k RPM HDD

Sandisk SSD Plus 240GB

Crucial 16GB RAM x1

GIGABYTE Z170 ITX

 

If it's relevant, i'm running 2 1080p monitors and a standard keyboard and mouse w/ LEDs. Thanks loads! 

[You_are_a_cunt]

I'd say no. 290s are pretty power hungry and with the OC on the CPU you're running awfully close to the PSU's upper limit.

[Ludwig]

3 minutes ago, revsilverspine said:

I'd say no. 290s are pretty power hungry and with the OC on the CPU you're running awfully close to the PSU's upper limit.

yeah i was expecting so too. if i just try to boot will that hurt my components? 

[MVPernula]

The SF450 is a solid PSU, but I think you're out of luck.

 

Go to outervisions psu wattage calculator and type your parts in and press "calculate".

When I did your parts I hit roughly 465w, and I know the site doesn't give you 100% accurace but it gives you an idea.

 

You can try, but at intensive use it might die on you.

[Alesek]

if you only want to test the gpu, then I'd put the cpu to stock, unplug the HDD, unplug everything that is not needed and then run only gpu intensive benchmark. And even then if it crashes, you cant be sure if it is psu or the gpu. But if it doesnt, you know the gpu is good

[You_are_a_cunt]

Just now, Ludwig said:

yeah i was expecting so too. if i just try to boot will that hurt my components? 

50-50 odds there. if the PSU is cheese-grade, it might try to provide the power the components are asking for. Or it won't run at all.

In theory, the GPU is drawing minimum power when outside of demanding tasks (aka it's drawing just enough to display things. When you're gaming, the usage goes up and the power draw goes up). Also, in theory, you can use the 450W PSU as long as you're not playing anything demanding.

 

I personally would get a new PSU ASAP, before testing the theory

[HKZeroFive]

People tend to over exaggerate power consumption. A R9 290 system, even when running something like Furmark and heavily overclocked, will only consume around 400W max and should run on a good 450W power supply just fine (the Corsair SF450 is basically the best SFF unit out there). Sure, it may be cutting it close but it's an unrealistic, worst case scenario. I've seen people run R9 290Xs on crappy 400W power supplies just fine although it's not recommended.

 

Look up power consumption benchmarks and see for yourself.

[Ludwig]

2 minutes ago, Alesek said:

if you only want to test the gpu, then I'd put the cpu to stock, unplug the HDD, unplug everything that is not needed and then run only gpu intensive benchmark. And even then if it crashes, you cant be sure if it is psu or the gpu. But if it doesnt, you know the gpu is good

yeah that was what i was planning on doing. but it's still risky aye? i dont want to suddenly heard my components sizzling as it's trying to boot.

i'm planning on selling the card so i just want to see if it's functional to the very least that it displays.

 

[Alesek]

Just now, Ludwig said:

yeah that was what i was planning on doing. but it's still risky aye? i dont want to suddenly heard my components sizzling as it's trying to boot.

i'm planning on selling the card so i just want to see if it's functional to the very least that it displays.

 

it will boot as it doesnt take much power during that. it wont run demanding games though. Its not risky, the only thing that can happen is that your pc shuts down or restarts

[Ludwig]

Just now, HKZeroFive said:

People tend to over exaggerate power consumption. A R9 290, even when running something like Furmark and heavily overclocked, will only consume about 400W max and should run on a good 450W power supply just fine (the Corsair SF450 is basically the best SFF unit out there). Sure, it may be cutting it close but it's an unrealistic, worse case scenario.

 

Look up power consumption benchmarks and see for yourself.

so you're saying its not hardware suicide? i would be putting the CPU back to stock and disconnecting everything that i can from the PSU and motherboard that i don't need but i don't think it would make much difference in terms of power draw. the essentials are pretty much in my build and the only things that i can afford to disconnect are the HDD and case pins for power, reset, etc (since the R9 290 doesnt fit in my case) 

[Herman Mcpootis]

https://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2014/03/03/asus-radeon-r9-290-directcu-ii-oc-review/2

a 3570K with the r9 290 you're gonna buy eats around 390-400w of power on load, you should be fine with the SF450 for now.

[HKZeroFive]

Just now, Ludwig said:

so you're saying its not hardware suicide? i would be putting the CPU back to stock and disconnecting everything that i can from the PSU and motherboard that i don't need but i don't think it would make much difference in terms of power draw. the essentials are pretty much in my build and the only things that i can afford to disconnect are the HDD and case pins for power, reset, etc (since the R9 290 doesnt fit in my case) 

Not at all. You've got a good quality power supply and although the R9 290 is considered to be a power hungry card, it won't overwhelm the SF450. I've edited my initial comment to say that I know many people who've had their R9 290Xs run on crappy 400W power supplies without a hitch (there's a few of them on this forum). Guru3D and AnandTech's own benchmarks say the same.

[Ludwig]

1 minute ago, HKZeroFive said:

Not at all. You've got a good quality power supply and although the R9 290 is considered to be a power hungry card, it won't overwhelm the SF450. I've edited my initial comment to say that I know many people who've had their R9 290Xs run on crappy 400W power supplies without a hitch (there's a few of them on this forum). Guru3D and AnandTech's own benchmarks say the same.

brilliant! so it would run 'fine' for me to boot up into the windows and run some synthetic tests and some games (witcher 3, overwatch, battlefield 1, etc) ?

would it be a stretch for me not to disconnect my HDD from the system? im guessing that the power draw from it doesnt really make a ton of difference in terms of the already high risk i'm putting into my components doing this. 

obviously OCing either the CPU or GPU is out the window if i dont want my rig to be, right? 

[Vode]

44 minutes ago, Ludwig said:

yeah i was expecting so too. if i just try to boot will that hurt my components? 

You should not game with it. Sure you can boot but what's the point? Especially do not game while overclocked with this config...

 

I'd say spend ~60 bucks for a Seasonic S12II 620W and you're golden.

 

[HKZeroFive]

15 minutes ago, Ludwig said:

brilliant! so it would run 'fine' for me to boot up into the windows and run some synthetic tests and some games (witcher 3, overwatch, battlefield 1, etc) ?

would it be a stretch for me not to disconnect my HDD from the system? im guessing that the power draw from it doesnt really make a ton of difference in terms of the already high risk i'm putting into my components doing this. 

obviously OCing either the CPU or GPU is out the window if i dont want my rig to be, right? 

Obviously, if you want to stay on the safe side and not overclock anything, that's fine too. But yes, a good 450W unit is more than enough to run a stock i5 6600K and a R9 290 on. You should be able to run those games and synthetic benchmarks just fine.

 

Taking out the HDD is unnecessary.

[Ludwig]

Awesome! Thanks for your 2ces everyone, wish me luck as I attempt to not blow up my computer. 

[JoostinOnline]

Probably, but it depends on way more than your GPU. Plug all your parts into PC Part Picker and see what the estimated maximum power draw is. 

 

I'd do it, but I just don't want to.