Just how much power do you think your system uses?

[freecableguy]

You may be surprised...

I have a Kill-a-Watt on the way but my calculations on total power consumption for my system is quite high. In fact, for those that think a PCP&C Turbo-Cool 510 SLI can handle overclocked/over-volted dual 512MB 7800GTX GPUs and a highly OC'ed FX-57 may be in for a rude awakening.

Assuming an FX-57 CPU at 110W full load TDP...

Now overclock to 3.6Ghz with 1.65v...
110*(3600/2800)^2*(1.65/1.4)= 214W

Assuming 7800GTX 512MB cards in SLI overclocked to 700Mhz core/1.65v...
2*80W*(700/550)^2*(1.65/1.5)=285W

Stock speeds: 110+160=270W which is completely managable by today's standards for PSU purchases.

Overclocked: 214W+285W=499W for CPU and GPU's alone...now add the motherboard, the memory, the sound card, the optical drives, HDDs, fans (eastly 10W each on average) and maybe a waterpump (20-30W nominal) and we can see that the once believed over conservative PSU rated in the 500-600W range is NOT enough.

For those running stock systems with stock clocks, there's a reason that nVidia certifies some manufacturer's PSUs as SLI ready. Just remember, those that have the "monster" PCP&C SLI 510W (630W peak?) may find themselves in situations where it can't provide enough juice in high-load applications (think 3D gaming at high-resolutions with full sound and eye-candy on).

I know that my system will stutter and then crash to the desktop while playing 3D games with a PCP&C 510 whereas my 1kW unit charges along.

Maybe the PCP&C 850 SSI and 1kW units aren't so "unneeded" afterwards..

http://www.pcpowercooling.com/produc...php?show=TC1KW

-FCG