upgrading powersupply?

[Hobbes874]

How would you recomend upgrading powersupplys from a 250w (crap) to a 350w or 400w?? what are good brands for less than $50 and how will it not fry everything in your comp? help!!

[RAY16]

www.pcpowerandcooling.com/

[Yian]

I have been trying to "silence" my computer for quite sometime, and yesterday I got myself an ultra quiet, 99% continuous power output, 400W powersupply.

And guess what? It turned that my power supply wasn't really the source of the noise. It was my case's fan. It is a big as fan built in front of the case and I have no clue how to upgrade "that."

All the money I spent.... but hey, now I have a "true" 400W power supply now!

[WhoGivesARatsAss]

What power supply did u get Yian.. lastly, 350W is more than sufficient.. but if u want to add water cooling, ramsinks, extra gpu coolers etc etc.. get a 430W one and ur life will be in peace forever.. coz practically even the 64 bit cpus wouldnt require more than 350W power supply and p4s only require 250W ones.. so.. u can see how far u are upgrading.. but thats just the power supply

[sushi128]

remember about powersupplies: quality over quantity.

a good antec 330watt will do WONDERS over a generic 500watt (although some generic brands might surprise u).

[Yian]

Originally posted by WhoGivesARatsAss
What power supply did u get Yian.. lastly, 350W is more than sufficient.. but if u want to add water cooling, ramsinks, extra gpu coolers etc etc.. get a 430W one and ur life will be in peace forever.. coz practically even the 64 bit cpus wouldnt require more than 350W power supply and p4s only require 250W ones.. so.. u can see how far u are upgrading.. but thats just the power supply
Water cooling! My God if I have money for that, I get myself a new case with quiet fans! Hahahahaha My computer is so loud I can't record anything with my microphone.

I think most people still has this concept that all the parts in the computer can be added up to a Watt, so 400w is enough for something...430w is enough for something... But it really depends. Like most video cards and stuff use +3/+5V, while CPU uses +12V. If you have a 550W power supply but it's max output on +3/+5V is only 80W, then you basically didn't get shit... That's why we should always read the tag on the side of the power supply, just to make sure it is right for you...

[Yian]

Or maybe it works the other way around, about the way they consume their power ( I can't really remember... I suck ), but people get the point.

[WhoGivesARatsAss]

Thanx :)

[ZANDAMORPHIS]

Originally posted by Hobbes874
How would you recomend upgrading powersupplys from a 250w (crap) to a 350w or 400w?? what are good brands for less than $50 and how will it not fry everything in your comp? help!!

Get a raidmax or Kingwin...they are all great powersupplys and pretty cheap... nowadays...get a 400watt atleast..
a 350 watt would do but why not be safe huh?

[ZANDAMORPHIS]

Originally posted by Yian
I have been trying to "silence" my computer for quite sometime, and yesterday I got myself an ultra quiet, 99% continuous power output, 400W powersupply.

And guess what? It turned that my power supply wasn't really the source of the noise. It was my case's fan. It is a big as fan built in front of the case and I have no clue how to upgrade "that."

All the money I spent.... but hey, now I have a "true" 400W power supply now!

take the damn thing out you proly dont even need it anyways!... i sure dont on mine...they are really no point unless u oc ur shit...just put an 80mm queit fan in the rear of the case...should work fine

[sushi128]

well, if u find out how much each rail can handle, you'll see the better of the power supplies. quality PSU's usually have a rating for the total wattage, as well as a rating for the combined +5/+12 v rails. and 350w is more than sufficient if it's a good one.

[Hobbes874]

Originally posted by ZANDAMORPHIS
Get a raidmax or Kingwin...they are all great powersupplys and pretty cheap... nowadays...get a 400watt atleast..
a 350 watt would do but why not be safe huh?
I dunno I was just imagining my comp catching on fire because it fried itself by using to mcuh power or something, i dunno :(

[sushi128]

LOL. a powersupply doesn't give power that isn't sucked out of it by your rig. it won't fry anything :)

unless it's defective, and starts sendin 20v down the 5v rail.......

[ZANDAMORPHIS]

Originally posted by sushi128
LOL. a powersupply doesn't give power that isn't sucked out of it by your rig. it won't fry anything :)

unless it's defective, and starts sendin 20v down the 5v rail.......

hardy har har

[sushi128]

thinkin that was sarcastic......

in any case, components only draw the amperage it needs, so it'll never draw too many watts. an unstable current is the only factor to consider in toasty parts....

[Hobbes874]

Oh ok :D i've never had to change a power supply before and i'm not too fluent in how it works lol

[Yian]

I haven't asked this before but... Hobbes, why do you need to change your power supply?

[Yian]

Originally posted by Hobbes874
I dunno I was just imagining my comp catching on fire because it fried itself by using to mcuh power or something, i dunno :(
...and a tale for everyone. It is real and I witnessed it. I had a friend using a computer with a power supply pre-installed in the case, and he was keeping telling us that he felt unsafe and gonna get a good power supply but he never got time to do it. One day when we turn the thing on, the fucker....

exploded...

Not like the explosion you see in the movie (with clouds of fire expanding and both of us jump out of window waving arms and legs in slo-mo...), but it was scary enough. It pop opened the side cover of the case and the entire computer caught on fire. Thank god the shattered pieces were contained by the case, and everything in the computer was fucked except the modem. One heavy piece pulled his Geforce4 out of the AGP slot without consulting us to loosen the screw first, and the card broke in half from where the GPU is. A big crack indeed.

We hit the retail store and the store gave us a refund and after some arguing he supply the parts we need for a new PC at a 50% off price on all the item. He then checked the tag on the power supply, walked to his storage area, and start pulling out all the shit that used the same thing.

The reason it exploded still puzzled us, but hey this is a good example. If a coke can can explode, why not a cheap power supply?

[sushi128]

same thing happened when my friend's house was wired with 220, and the PSU was still switched at 115. not pretty

[Hobbes874]

lol great story yian. saw a pic of a guy's comp in some forum somewhere and it had a black area near it's rear and the guy said it was from the computer overheating and catching fire lol
Well i have to change my power supply to add a new video card, supossedly my computer doesn't have enough power to power the card :( eh, oh and one other thing how easy is it to install a new power supply?

[sushi128]

connect the cables into whatever fits. if it doesn't fit, it's never GONNA fit, so don't jam anything.

[ZANDAMORPHIS]

Originally posted by Hobbes874
lol great story yian. saw a pic of a guy's comp in some forum somewhere and it had a black area near it's rear and the guy said it was from the computer overheating and catching fire lol
Well i have to change my power supply to add a new video card, supossedly my computer doesn't have enough power to power the card :( eh, oh and one other thing how easy is it to install a new power supply?

as long as you dont have an el cheapo case that wont come apart too easy it should be as simple as takeing off the top of the case and the sides and unscrewing the back screws out of the power supply...its a real easy task...well was for me anyways... lata

[Hobbes874]

cool sounds like a plan to me! :D

[IkYiolul]

sounds like me...powersupply catching fire, but keeping the same case. I've done so much work on this thing, Im not gonna get rid of it for a long time. As to go with getting the new PSU, go with 350, thats about all you need...at least thats what I think the answer you were looking for was.

[Hobbes874]

Now i've found that my PS is about and inch and a half shorter than all other PS's thus I don't think they'll fit :( unless I have the PS somewhere else, i dunno

[Odm]

Is it hard to tell which is which? On my old computer even I could identify all the parts. Of course, the power supply was easy to find because it was black and smelt like smoke. Stupid IBM makers made it so it looked like it would change automatically. Turns out it doesn't...

[aphremen]

Yian's story was most likely caused by a bad chemical mix in one of the big ass capacitors. In other words, his PC busted a cap on his ass. Took him to school. You know what I'm saying.

If a laptop busts a cap, it's a drive-by. :D