Is 300w enough for my setup? Should I be worried?

[Cowboy]

Running a m-ITX rig with a mildly OC'ed i3-530 and a GTX 560Ti from ASUS ("Superclocked") on a 300w Silverstone SFX PSU (80+ bronze certified)

Is it enough? Do I have some more room for OC?

[ilya]

You probably don't "need" one, but your system can probably pull the full 300W from the unit under extreme loads. If you fold with both CPU/GPU or find yourself heavily stressing your entire system a lot, I would look into a unit with more rated wattage.

Just look at the TDP's of your GPU and CPU. 170W+72W=242W, add some for the rest of the components and a little more for an OC. (itx motherboards usually don't pull much though)

[_dangtx_]

no more than 150 watts for the system alone, save you went mental on the juice.
could be as low as 100-125 though.
and for the 560, regular 3d gaming,.,,maybe 165 watts?

HIS Radeon HD 6850 IceQ X Turbo 1 GB Review - Page 21/27 | techPowerUp

so depending on your psu, if it can hold 300 watts day and night yes if not maybe get something beefier.

[Arinoth]

Personally i would be, you're driving a lower high end card which is already overclocked on a power supply which is also having to supply power to an overclock processor. I'd bump up to at least 450W otherwise i could see that psu biting the dust if the entire system is ever loaded for a long duration.

Originally Posted by ilya

Just look at the TDP's of your GPU and CPU. 170W+72W=242W, add some for the rest of the components and a little more for an OC. (itx motherboards usually don't pull much though)

TDP doesnt take into consider overclocking, i wouldnt be surprised if the GPU is pulling 200W+ overclocked on full load and the processor pushing near 100W again fully loaded and overclocked.

Also folks, dont forget most PSUs are only 80% efficient near full load, so essentially his power supply would actually pulling an extra 20% most likely with that set up driving the power supply HARD.

[Cowboy]

its a $70 purchase, so I better be damn sure I'll need it...

[Stock]

I think you're kind of pushing it though I don't know how many peripherals you have tacked on. At load your system is already around 250-275W, and with 80% efficiency it's closer to 250W if anything. An i7-920 system paired with the 560ti at load uses just over 300W. You could probably do a small OC on the CPU but the tradeoff for heat/noise from the power supply is up to you.

[_dangtx_]

why dont you invest in a 10-20 dollar kill a watt? will save you white hairs in the long run


how? what i do is i plug it in, and power it up. i look at idle juice being pulled at the wall of course.
id the idle numbers are higher than what id expect, i wont load either cpu/gpu and shut it down. if they look
normal, then i start up prime, look at the numbers then try 3dmark.
say your psu can do 300 watts on the 12v line..mkay?
and prime+3dmark shows no more than 300 at the wall? youre cool. given its a good psu.

[ilya]

FSP300-60GHS Power Supply Review | Hardware Secrets

You have a pretty solid unit, as long as you're not CPU+GPU folding or doing something else that stresses your system beyond heavy gaming, you'll be fine.

[Cowboy]

peripherals include a mouse + keyboard, charger for iphone + Kindle, and USB DVD drive, occasionally a printer too... and I have 2 USB ports leftover.

Running an SSD and a 7200rpm 3.5" drive.. along with 1 fan and a corsair H50... 2 sticks of ram... nothing else I think..

[Bond007]

Obviously your PSU will run your setup, but you are at the limit. Your running a nice video card and don't think its worth the risk of killing it. Grab a quality PSU of 450w minimum. I would go around the 500w mark.