Power Supply..

I'm currently building a PC to play games, last thing I've not decided
on is a power supply, simply because I don't know!

I've seen them with prices ranging all over the place from £10 for a
400w to £70 for a 400w (UK).

What I'm wondering is, if I go for a cheap PSU, apart from noise and
heat will it affect the performance of my PC? The case I've opted for
(http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/produ...duct_uid=51465
looked quite nice and also cheap) has 3 fans with it so heat shouldn't
be so much of a problem?

Anyway, all I'm really asking is, will going for a cheap Power Supply
as long as it's got a strong wattage affect the performance of my PC?
I'll probably only have the cheap Power Supply for a short while if
it's too loud / will damage my PC over a long period of time etc.
Anyway, info appreciated.

Cheers!
Sam C

Hi Sam,

The biggest problem with cheap power supply is that when they go bad
they tend to take your motherboard, HDD and CD-ROM along with them...

Andre Courchesne
http://www.net-forces.com

(SamC) wrote in message news:< om>...
> I'm currently building a PC to play games, last thing I've not decided
> on is a power supply, simply because I don't know!
>
> I've seen them with prices ranging all over the place from £10 for a
> 400w to £70 for a 400w (UK).
>
> What I'm wondering is, if I go for a cheap PSU, apart from noise and
> heat will it affect the performance of my PC? The case I've opted for
> (http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/produ...duct_uid=51465
> looked quite nice and also cheap) has 3 fans with it so heat shouldn't
> be so much of a problem?
>
> Anyway, all I'm really asking is, will going for a cheap Power Supply
> as long as it's got a strong wattage affect the performance of my PC?
> I'll probably only have the cheap Power Supply for a short while if
> it's too loud / will damage my PC over a long period of time etc.
> Anyway, info appreciated.
>
> Cheers!
> Sam C

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SamC wrote:

> I've seen them with prices ranging all over the place from £10 for a
> 400w to £70 for a 400w (UK).
>
> What I'm wondering is, if I go for a cheap PSU, apart from noise and
> heat will it affect the performance of my PC? The case I've opted for
>

Spend the extra for a good-quality power supply.

An inexpensive (cheap) product will be lacking high-quality voltage and
current regulation. It will most likely also lack short-circuit
protection. Good short-circuit protection will help keep the magic smoke
inside the power supply.

Power supplies from Antec are well-regarded. Personally, that's all I use
in my systems.

- --
Ron Cook n1zhi

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(Andre Courchesne - Consultant) wrote in message news:<. com>...
> Hi Sam,
>
> The biggest problem with cheap power supply is that when they go bad
> they tend to take your motherboard, HDD and CD-ROM along with them...
>
> Andre Courchesne
> http://www.net-forces.com
>
> (SamC) wrote in message news:< om>...
> > I'm currently building a PC to play games, last thing I've not decided
> > on is a power supply, simply because I don't know!
> >
> > I've seen them with prices ranging all over the place from £10 for a
> > 400w to £70 for a 400w (UK).
> >
> > What I'm wondering is, if I go for a cheap PSU, apart from noise and
> > heat will it affect the performance of my PC? The case I've opted for
> > (http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/produ...duct_uid=51465
> > looked quite nice and also cheap) has 3 fans with it so heat shouldn't
> > be so much of a problem?
> >
> > Anyway, all I'm really asking is, will going for a cheap Power Supply
> > as long as it's got a strong wattage affect the performance of my PC?
> > I'll probably only have the cheap Power Supply for a short while if
> > it's too loud / will damage my PC over a long period of time etc.
> > Anyway, info appreciated.
> >
> > Cheers!
> > Sam C

Cheers for the help, Andre. I've been researching into it today and
found a very good article on Firing Squad. (this is my first time
building a PC and Power Supplies are seemingly somewhat of an unknown
to most people) Anyway, the Firing Squad article has explained what to
look for in a PSU, but unfortunately I've found I'll also need one of
the more expensive ones and not just a cheap generic one. Along with
your comment I'm now scared out of the cheap PSU idea. Nevertheless,
less mince pies and I can afford it!

Thanks,
Sam C

I can't find the power needs of the specific components as the FS
article reccomended doing. So I'll have to drop that idea and just go
for a high enough wattage PSU.

This 450w one from Q-Tec
(http://www.qtec.info/products/product.htm?artnr=13024) seems to be a
fairly middle-range PSU, costing £25.

The machine it's for is so far a:

nforce2, Abit NF7-S (onboard sound and lan)
Samsung SD-612
512mb ram
80gb Maxtor Diamond Max 9
Radeon 9800 (possibly may have to drop down to a GeForce 4 4800 or a
Radeon 9600/9700 depending on funds)

The case also has a few lights and such in it (they look pwetty -
http://www.qtec.info/products/product.htm?artnr=13024) but I can't
imagine that'd take much power.


Any thoughts on the PSU will be much appreciated.

Cheers,
Sam C

Ok this is going to leave me with about five messages in a row, but I
messed up in the post above.. The link to the case is actually here,
on ebuyer: http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/produ...id=51465#pinfo

Oh dear, I don't believe this... it's also an AMD XP 2600+

right *that's* all! Whew.

Cheap PSU's will NOT put out their rated wattage in the real world. And if
you overdraw current from it by running lots of devices and fans, you can
fry your motherboard, memory, CPU, ...

--
DaveW



"SamC" <> wrote in message
news: m...
> I'm currently building a PC to play games, last thing I've not decided
> on is a power supply, simply because I don't know!
>
> I've seen them with prices ranging all over the place from £10 for a
> 400w to £70 for a 400w (UK).
>
> What I'm wondering is, if I go for a cheap PSU, apart from noise and
> heat will it affect the performance of my PC? The case I've opted for
>
(http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/produ...vd19wcm9kdWN0X
292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=51465
> looked quite nice and also cheap) has 3 fans with it so heat shouldn't
> be so much of a problem?
>
> Anyway, all I'm really asking is, will going for a cheap Power Supply
> as long as it's got a strong wattage affect the performance of my PC?
> I'll probably only have the cheap Power Supply for a short while if
> it's too loud / will damage my PC over a long period of time etc.
> Anyway, info appreciated.
>
> Cheers!
> Sam C

not that it's not impossible... but I have always been a budget cutter
when it comes to building PC's for myself, and some of my clients. If
the client wants barebones for as cheap as they can get it, then
cutting out the over powering power supply is always an option.
Considering how inexpensive power supplies have gotten over the past 5
years, it really wouldn't be a bad idea to at least get a "so-so"
brand. Most major retailers are careful about carrying "crap" and most
online stores that sell "crap" at least warn you first, mostly to
cover themselves. I say that while I have been through 3 power
supplies in 3 years, I'm not sure if its because of the environment my
PC is in, (its a home server - always on) or if its from the summer
time lightnight storms, or if it's just a cheap power supply going
bad. But the cost of all 3 power supplies raning from 250 Watts to
400, is equal to the cost of one "high quality" power supply. I am
only stating this as a means to share my experiences, and also to ask
about the best cheap brand of power supplies to other readers. Hope
this helps...

J Merrill
Sys. Admin
http://drivers.kidinc.us

On 12 Nov 2003 03:55:35 -0800, (kallmekid) wrote:

> I say that while I have been through 3 power
>supplies in 3 years, I'm not sure if its because of the environment
my
>PC is in, (its a home server - always on) or if its from the summer
>time lightnight storms, or if it's just a cheap power supply going
>bad. But the cost of all 3 power supplies raning from 250 Watts to
>400, is equal to the cost of one "high quality" power supply. I am
>only stating this as a means to share my experiences, and also to ask
>about the best cheap brand of power supplies to other readers. Hope
>this helps...
>
>J Merrill
>Sys. Admin
>http://drivers.kidinc.us

You've proven why one shouldn't skimp on the PSU. When the PSU isn't
scaled properly it will die after a short time (like every year).
Sure after 3 years the cost of parts happened to be the same in this
case, but if you want to run the system any longer it will be more
expensive, and then you also had to contend with downtime on three
separate occasions, not to mention any of the numerous
problems/inconveniencies which have the potential to occur during or
prior to the failure events, or the repair/replacement process.

No, it's never a good idea to skimp on PSU, power protection, or even
the chassis or backup strategy for that matter. These are the last
things to skimp on. There are other places to look to meet a slim
budget that make more sense. The powersupply in a well designed
computer should outlast the usefull life of that computer.