Dumb Bad Axe power questions

[Schlotkins]

OK, I'm getting a bad axe board - I can't wait because I have to spend the cash on Wednesday. In any case, I have a 2 year old 400 watt Seasonic Super Silencer. It does 22A on the 12V rail and I think it has plenty of power for my to-be system. I know it's disappointing to hear, but I'm only going with a lowly x1600 video card, 4 gigs of RAM, and I want to overclock a E6600 to 3.0gig and call it a day. Oh, and I have 2 raptor 150gigs. So, I think 400 watts and 22A on the 12 rail is good enough.

The problem I am having (assuming I'm right that it's enough above) is the PSU has a 2x10 main connector, a 4 pin 12V P4 connector and no 8 pin PCIe connector. So, what the heck is the proper setup with this thing on the bad axe. There's a diagram on page 46 but it's not helping much. :)

Thanks!

[vapb400]

The 8pin connector is called EPS12v. There are adapters that will take your 4pin to 8pin, some motherboards (not sure on the Bad Axe) will allow you to function with just the 4pin plugged into half of the 8pin slot.

If you have any stability issues though, I would almost guarantee it is your PSU. You are cutting it close with the PSU.

[Shpoon]

If you're happy with the Seasonic brand, you could try their new S12 +energy series. They're efficient, and most importantly, very, very quiet. The 600W will easily handle all that, and should be a nice price, though I don't know your budget.

[Schlotkins]

Great guys... I'm just going to order up another unit to be safe with dual rails etc.

One final question: If I get a Bad Axe v3.04 and throw in an 805 for now, when I go to put in the conroe, I wouldn't need to reinstall xp or anything like that right? Both are 64 bit and both are dual core.

THanks!

[FEEXX]

Just in case of overlock i strongly recommend to set everything as default to avoid problems, but nothing else, once that is done you can start from 0 to play with clocks voltages and latencies. Even in you shift from solo core to dual if the mobo is ready just a bit of DIY and thats all.

[Schlotkins]

Thanks for the quick reply. I was under the impression that if you installed a signal core (no hyperthreading) and then went dual core, you had to reinstall xp for it to see both cores... good to know.

[mesyn191]

You sure you need 4GB of RAM? You're gonna need a 64 bit OS and drivers and program (or at least PAE aware) that'll actually make use of that much RAM or else its just gonna sit there producing heat. The money could be put towards a better video card, which if you game is far and away the most important thing in the system. If gaming isn't that important and you want to OC more you could always put that money towards better cooling too, I bet phase change or even a decent water cooling system will do wonders for your OC on Conroe and ecspecially the PD805 since those seem to be heat limited before they become OC limited.

I think you'd need to reinstall windows unless you're using a board with the same chipset too, best to do a reinstall with a new board even if it has the same chipset anyways IMO.

FEEXX's idea is also good, get it working before you try to OC.

AFAIK the Bad Axe board comes with a ATX12V 4 pin to EPS12V 8 pin adapter BTW.

[Schlotkins]

I don't do much gaming and my primary programs are SAS (next version is 64 bit) and photoshop which definitely will use the 4 GB in x64, so I think it will be worth it in my case. Plus it sets up nicely for Vista. :)

I'm getting a v304 bad axe so I should just be able to plop in the conroe so I should be OK there. The bad axe has 64 bit drivers and ATI has 64 bit drivers out as well. I think I'm going be OK on that front... at least I hope. :)

Thanks for all the helP!

[Mikesnav]

You don't need 64bit software to utilise 4GB.
>4GB, and you need 64bit stuff.

[FEEXX]

AFAIK the Bad Axe board comes with a ATX12V 4 pin to EPS12V 8 pin adapter BTW.

Yap but for instance i've a flashy Hiper 580 PSU and what a fkn' disaster......... :slap: reading that

".HIPER Type R 580W series does not support Intel Pentium Extreme Edition CPU (dual core) as it requires EPS12V (i.e. an 8 pin ATX +12V connector). Type R 580W series does not provide 8 pin ATX +12V connector. We do not recommend using any adaptor that allows conversion of any form of connectors into 8 pin ATX +12V connector." :stick:

http://www.hipergroup.com/English/products/hpu-4b580.html

What to do... believe or not believe...

I think i'm moving to an Ultra 550...

[jeffyjaixx]

how do we know if our psu is compatible?

for instance, i have a enermax noisetaker 485W, is that ok?

[vapb400]

99% of new PSUs are compatible and I am sure your noistaker will be. Seasonic has some compatibility issues but that is with the old DFI NF4 boards.

I don't think your noistaker has an EPS-12V connector but you can just use an adapter, its no big deal. Your PSU will be perfect unless you are planning a massive crossfire + hard drive system :)

[jeffyjaixx]

ooh no i only have one hd atm lol..

will i be able to do SLI or Xfire? I asked in another forum, and they said most likely yes, but depends on the card, so i was wondering which cards can i sli or Xfire, if in the future, i want to. thanks

[vapb400]

That would be cutting it close, you could probably do crossfire with the X1600 series x1800/x1900 would be cutting it close but its hopeful. You could definitely do 7600/7900 series for sli, they have low power consumption.

Give it a try, if you experience instability you know exactly what the problem is :)

[Schlotkins]

Ey, I probably could have gotten away with my old Seasonic with the Bad Axe. I upgraded to a newer Seasonic model with 24-pin and the EPS12v adaptor. I figure then I'm ready for the DX10 cards as well as the quad core chips.

[jeffyjaixx]

Thanks for the info :)

[mesyn191]

Well I know my PCP&C 510W SLI PSU will work with out the 8 pin connector so long as you don't use it in a dual socket mobo according to the rep I called at thier customer service line, from what he said it sounded like most PSU's would work just fine but he wouldn't give me a clear answer on that, just that thiers (PCP&C's) would.

[Vapor]

Well, the PCP&C 510SLI works, and I know this because I'm running it :)