How many Amps for....

[kruzn4evr]

I must be gettin' old and goin' blind!...I can't seem to find the Amp rating for the 5870 GPU's....help me out please
Thanks

[SugarJ]

I think it's 17A, but I'm not sure. A quick google said the cards draw 188w max. Even if they draw 225w (75 from each connector and 75 from the mobo), you'd need 19A max.

A 500w should be ok in a dual core system, but I'd want a 600w min in a quad core.

Edit: From XFX:
XFX Radeon HD 5870 System Requirements

• PCI Express or PCI Express 2.0 compliant motherboard with one X16 graphics slot
• 500 Watt or greater power supply with two 75W 6-pin PCI Express® power connectors recommended (600 Watt and four 6-pin connectors for ATI CrossFireX™ technology in dual mode)
• Certified power supplies are recommended.
• Minimum 1GB of system memory

[kruzn4evr]

Thanks SugarJ , I thought I was safe with around 20a per card but wasn't 100% sure, the build I'm doing is a Classified/D0 920/H50/Dom GT's 2000Mhz/3-4 HDD's & 1 SSD/2x 5870/BluRay & reg. DVD/Silverstone TJ10B and a Strider 1200w, the Strider has 28 and 20 amp rails so I wasn't 100% sure it would be enough amps.

[Zero82z]

A 5870 will draw about 120W maximum while gaming. That works out to about 10A. I'd estimate 12A if you want to be safe (144W, which is plenty). 5870s actually draw less power than 4870s.

[SugarJ]

Originally Posted by Zero82z

A 5870 will draw about 120W maximum while gaming. That works out to about 10A. I'd estimate 12A if you want to be safe (144W, which is plenty). 5870s actually draw less power than 4870s.

Source? I can see 120w through the 2 6-pins, but not in total. Skymtl's review shows a difference of 180w between load and idle, and the stock 5870 is supposed to draw about 7-8 watts at idle. Sapphire Radeon HD 5870 Vapor-X 1GB Review

[Zero82z]

Originally Posted by SugarJ

Source? I can see 120w through the 2 6-pins, but not in total. Skymtl's review shows a difference of 180w between load and idle, and the stock 5870 is supposed to draw about 7-8 watts at idle. Sapphire Radeon HD 5870 Vapor-X 1GB Review

DirectX 11 in the Open: ATI Radeon HD 5870 Review (page 7) - X-bit labs

Power draw is measured with a current shunt placed inline with the PCI-E connectors and the two +12V pins coming from the 24-pin ATX connector.

[SugarJ]

Sure, but it says right there that max draw under furmark was 161.3 watts. The 107 watts was under 3dMark06, which is a DirectX9 benchmark if I recall correctly, and won't tax a card as much as Vantage or a DirectX10/11 game. I'll stick with SKYMTL's number, I think it's more realistic.

Needless to say, Kruzn4evr's 1200 watt won't have any issues driving 2,3, or even 4 of the 5870's. :)