Help with choosing a power supply

[hoxlund]

What I have seen many times in compaqs and HP's are systems that have just the right amount of juice to run out of the box, but then run into big probs whenever trying to add a drive etc. This was especially tru with older emachines and packard bell (but I assume they dont count as reputable sources )

well since i work retail, any new computer we get i open up just to see how good of a job they did on the wire job and just brand of parts they use

ive seen newer compaq's and HP's as low as 150watt power supplies in them, your absolutely correct, they give you just enough power to run the system with there parts in them

[aviationwiz]

[hoxlund]

in the 2 bottom 5.25" optical bays i plan on puttin one of these:

http://www.jab-tech.com/customer/produc ... 152&page=1

whats cool about the case i have is that the mobo part is on 1 side and psu, optical drive, hard drives are on the other side of case, as you can see my cellphone up close to it, this thing is massive

[dodecahedron]

Unfortunately, many system builders, even the bigger ones do not share this view.

What I have seen many times in compaqs and HP's are systems that have just the right amount of juice to run out of the box, but then run into big probs whenever trying to add a drive etc. This was especially tru with older emachines and packard bell (but I assume they dont count as reputable sources )

i just bought for my sister an IBM ThinkCenter M50 computer. Pentium 4 2.8 HT machine.
i was shocked when reading the online specs page
http://www5.pc.ibm.com/europe/products. ... enDocument
power supply - 230W !!!

[hoxlund]

yep, just enough power to run the computer, no room for expansion

they want you to go to them for upgrades

but your sister is probably the type of person that isn't going to add a $500 video card, or 3 hard drives

[dodecahedron]

nope, not likely.
we just added a CDRW drive.
i doubt she'll ever use up the 40GB on that hard drive of hers.

[LoneWolf]

Just bought the Enermax Noisetaker AX 470w to replace my 4-5 year old Enermax 430w. Not because the old one was bad, but because I needed the separate 12v rails, as load was beginning to get a bit high. I'm very happy with it, though I'd rather have 5.25" connectors than the two serial ATA ones (I could always use an adapter if I wanted that in the future). Enermax isn't cheap, but you get what you pay for, and you get a three-year warranty too.

[hoxlund]

for my next power supply, i don't see myself buying anything else but a modular one

[wicked1]

I was at a friends house this week and we noticed the computer was randomly rebooting and getting silent when it did it. I figured power supply. It is a new (3 months) 2.8 ghz HP system. The fan wasnt working. I took it apart to replace the fan and it was a 200W power supply!!! It had so much resin inside it that it had seized the fan up. That was a first for me. Ive seen dust and goo but not resin from ummm herbal sources. I put in a delta screamer back up and running fine and the case temps dropped as expected. Then he went out and picked up a new ati vid card so he could get doom 3 playable instead of 1 fps and then it wouldnt boot. Didnt surprise me 1 bit with that small of a PS and 2 opticals. Hes ordering an antec 480 now. Couldnt talk him into a real power supply like my antec 550's

[hoxlund]

just to let you know, water cooling does not function as a water bong too

[LoneWolf]

Heck, I started getting strain on my three-year-old Enermax 430w this past year. Occasional reboots, which I've finally tracked down to around the time I put my Radeon 9700 in. I think I was just demanding too much off the 12v line.

I put that PSU in another system (still in perfect shape) and bought a new Enermax Noisetaker AX 475w PSU. Dual 12v rails, one for the system board, one for drives. It's been perfect for me, and there's a three-year warranty on it.