What happens when I put a video card whose watt requirement surpasses my power supply?
Question by Buck Fush: What happens when I put a video card whose watt requirement surpasses my power supply?
I plan on purchasing an ATI x1300 pro 256 mb 350 watt video card, but my power supply says 300 watts. Will anything happen to my computer? I dont think the card will use the full 350 watts anyway.
Best answer:
Answer by The Lunatic
I think you’ll be fine as long as you don’t have your power supply plugged into too many things. If suddenly certain things stop working like your cd roms, hard drive or certain parts aren’t being recognized by windows, then you need to go ahead and get a new power supply.
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Posted November 19th, 2012 in 500 Watt Under $50. Tagged: Card, happens, power, requirement, supply, surpasses, Video, Watt, whose.
you would want to replace your power supply with much bigger power.
If you video card is not receiving the power it needs to run… it is not going to run. even if you video card does somehow, other parts of the computer: cdroms, dvd roms, floppy drive etc might not get the power they need.
So go and buy something over 400 watts.
it’ll do the trick
good luck
November 19th, 2012 at 7:20 pmYou will get a reverse bottle neck, the Graphics Card wont work right and you may end up damageing it if you try to run load, advise you upgrade your PSU.
November 19th, 2012 at 7:52 pmBig TROUBLE!!!!!! MELTDOWN!!!!!!! I service PCs and Macs.
FIRST of all, the power supply is alread putting up with the maximum watts needed by the SYSTEM! You would be piling ANOTHER 300 watt load on top of a 350 watt load!
The “Advertised” wattage of PC power supplies are over inlflated about 50%. That “300 watt” unit probably makes about 175 watts during the surge, for less than ten seconds, upon power up. It’s steady output is probably 150 watts, as tested under a steady load, MAXIMUM SUSTAINED.
It is barely able to give out what is required for your regular system load. If you have added any other drives, it is at the limit!
Tom’s Hardware, AnandTech, and several PC magazines, have berated the Power Supply manufacturers for cheating the consumer.
If you want to run that video card in a STABLE environment, so it doesn’t smoke from the power oscillations, you NEED to buy a genuine 550 watt supply!!! Don’t even think of getting a 400, 450, or 500 watt unit! Expect to spend about $ 90. It will be worth it, and will run cooler, quieter!
The typical Central processor needs 80 to 120 watts, the mainboard needs about 20 watts, unless video and sound, LAN, are on board, which pulls lots more watts, and each CD/ DVD, and Hard drive pulls a steady 25 watts.
Add in the fans at 5 watts EACH! Count the CPU cooler, and any case fans. Then, power for any case lights, at about 20 watts, unless you know for certain.
Each PCI card pulls about 3 to 10 watts There are calculators all over the web, if you’ll search google.com .
Power Oscillations occur when the switching PSU is over loaded for it’s rated regulators. Instead of shutting down, the regulators restart, reach full power, go into over load, ‘crowbar’ their output and shutdown. Then, the cycle repeats.
It is a 5 cycle per second oscillation, and totally blows everything on the mainboard and in the drives (on their controller boards).
It is your system, and you can try to flaunt the laws of physics, but, in the end, you will pay now, or you will pay later! Later, it will be the entire system, as I’ve seen before.
November 19th, 2012 at 8:20 pm