Help choosing a PSU

[lynks101]

Hey fellow tech nerds, I have googled this until I'm blue in the face, I've watched all the Tech Quickies on PSU's but can't find the answer I'm looking for.

 

I have a Kodi / Plex server, with a Asus Prime B450M-A, a mighty AMD Athlon 3000g, 16 GB ram, a sata SSD boot drive and 12 HDD's spinning at 7200k.  Operating system is latest version of Linux Mint.

 

Now the PSU I have been using is a Corsair HX650W, from an old gaming PC build, but the old girl is now over 10 years old and Its time to put her out to pasture.

 

But what do I replace my old PSU with? At boot, all the hard drives spin up and whole system draws 330watts of power.  But quickly spin down again and idle at 52watts, during normal use it draws at most 70watts, even using handbrake, it only draws 90watts.  

 

So what PSU do I get, logically to cover the initial start up, I'd need a 400w power supply, but then when it idles it's only using 12.5% of that 400w, so wouldn't exactly running at its most efficient and won't be covered by the 80plus certification.  Which if I'm right start at 20% load.

 

So the question ... What PSU do I get? Will I have to live with the fact that any PSU I get won't be operating as efficiently as it could be?  I was looking at a 400w bequiet pure power 11 or I remember seasonic doing a fanless 400w that was rated platinum.

 

Any advice would be appreciated.

 

 

 

[Amogus sus]

To be safe you need to have a good PSU over 600 wats if u want to ever upgrade you dont have to upgrade your PSU As well

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/K3Jtt6/be-quiet-pure-power-11-cm-600-w-80-gold-certified-semi-modular-atx-power-supply-bn298

[ki8aras]

because of the high power draw at startup you will never be able to utilise your psi's peak efficiency, so if its efficiency you're after a titanium 450 psu should be your best bet cuz its the closest you can get to the actual powerdraw

[AndreiArgeanu]

A PSU with a 80+ titanium guarantees at least 90% efficiency at 10% load but the issues is most if not all titanium rated psu's start at 600W though, an 80+ Plus Platinum PSU like the Seasonic one you mentioned will probably still be able to offer over 80% efficiency at 10% load, it's just that it's not tested for that. It might be best to just get the Fanless Seasonic PSU you mentioned regardless.

[lynks101]

Thanks for such speedy replies, I've been looking for the seasonic and it's showing as "end of life" on my preferred PC parts supplier, on other sites it's upto 3x the price of the bequiet. I also couldn't find a titanium model less then 600w.

 

I'll stick with a 400w as it should never need to be upgraded, 650 would be complete overkill. 

 

Many thanks again

[Juular]

56 minutes ago, lynks101 said:

won't be covered by the 80plus certification.

Nothing is covered lol, it's not certify the PSU to work in some range, they simply make measurements on certain points, sometimes they don't even do that, just slap the badge if you pay only for reusing the result of another PSU you think is close enough, 80 Plus doesn't care. Neither you'll notice the difference in yearly electricity bills between the systems with 80+ Bronze PSU and 80+ Titanium one sitting at 70W power draw. You're overthinking it, 80+ badge is strictly a measurement of efficiency, not quality.

58 minutes ago, lynks101 said:

At boot, all the hard drives spin up and whole system draws 330watts of power.

So you need a PSU with ~300W of power on 12V rail and ~100W on 5V rail, any decent modern 400W+ PSU would be okay.