9800 GT and XFX Radeon HD 4770

[Schnerf]

Just a question concerning these two. My little brother has a PSU of 450W, I'm just wondering if theres a chance he'll be able to run any of these? I was thinking of buying him one for his birthday present. If you happen to know, whats the lowest watt I can run them on?

[rapmaster]

what spec and what brand?

[Schnerf]

For the graphic cards:

Gainward GeForce 9800GT 1GB PhysX CUDA
and
XFX Radeon HD 4770 512 GDDR5

[mattlef]

I think he means the PSU

[Schnerf]

Here you go:

Model No.:SP-400P1B 400 Watt

Ac input 210~240 vac 4,5A 50Hz Passive PFC
Dc output 25A 28A 18A 0,6A 0,6A 2,0A
Max Combined 100w 216W 7,2W 3W 10W
Wattage 380W 20W
Total Power 400W


That's everything that was written on it.

[Kilauea]

So, there is 18Amps on the +12V, that's quite minimal. Besides its a brand I have never heard of. I wouldn't go cheap on the PSU and surely get a known brand such as a Corsair 450VX or 550, that way you are sure that the whole computer is safe because a PSU is really the most important part of a computer even tho it serves "no apparent" purpose.

[Sagath]

Originally Posted by Kilauea

So, there is 18Amps on the +12V, that's quite minimal. Besides its a brand I have never heard of. I wouldn't go cheap on the PSU and surely get a known brand such as a Corsair 450VX or 550, that way you are sure that the whole computer is safe because a PSU is really the most important part of a computer even tho it serves "no apparent" purpose.

Well said. I dont know how many people Ive had to cram this knowledge down their throats. They dont understand why having a $50 piece of garbage powering $1000 worth of top end hardware is a bad idea.

And UPS's. $100 bucks for a decent UPS to protect 2000 worth of hardware seems pritty reasonable to me. Everyone always worries about surges, and gets a power bar, but what happens when you get a brown out? And brown outs happen way more often then surges do. Ditch the surge bar, and get a UPS. Jeeze.

[Sushi Warrior]

The way it's worded it seems to be 28A on the +12V rail, that can't be right.

[Kilauea]

Originally Posted by Sushi Warrior

The way it's worded it seems to be 28A on the +12V rail, that can't be right.

Its kind of hard to see, but I found a picture of the PSU and it really is only 18A:

[JD]

And the externally mounted fan just shows how absolutely cheap it is

Anyways, once the PSU gets sorted out, I'd go with the HD4770. Faster card I believe and probably cooler running too. You could also just grab a HD4850 though since they're usually the same price or cheaper and it's a bit faster stock.

However if you cannot afford a decent PSU, then I'd go with the HD4670 since it doesn't require any additional power, yet it's still a decent enough card.