P5AD2 Power Supply Question

[duglas]

Hi,

I have a THERMALTAKE Silent PSU with PFC 480W Silver power supply that I'm
hoping I can use with the P5AD2 motherboard.
http://www.thermaltake.com/purepower/W001011.htm

The powersupply has a 20 pin connector. The motherboard has 24 pins. I'm
aware from another thread that it is possible to use the 20 pin connector
with the 24 pins on the P5AD2. Given the below configuration would it be
better to buy a newer 24 pin power supply?

ASUS P5AD2
Intel P4 560 3.6
Corsair 4 x 512 mb DDR2 (667)
Western Digital 2 x 74 gb SATA 10,000 rpm
Nvidia 6800 Ultra pci-express (when I can get my grubby hands on one)
Creative Audigy 2 ZS
Leadtek TV2000XP "Expert" pci anaolg capture
LG 8x DVDR
Floppy

Please advise if the above configuration will run stable with the
Thermaltake 480 20 pin power supply.

 

[Bryon van Prooyen]

I think the 24pin connector is only mandatory when you are using high end
pci-express cards without using the external power connector on the video
card.

If the PCI-x16 card has an external power connector and you use it, you
should be OK.

Bryon

 

[duglas]

[snip]

Please advise if the above configuration will run stable with the
Thermaltake 480 20 pin power supply.

[snip]
If the PCI-x16 card has an external power connector and you use it, you
should be OK.

Cheers for the speedy response Bryon )
As the vid cards aren't in Australia now (That I'm aware of) I'm not sure
if it will have an external power connector. I think I might grab one of
the Antec power supplies with the 24 pin connectors so I don't have any
issues on build day or in the future.

 

[duglas]

[snip]

Please advise if the above configuration will run stable with the
Thermaltake 480 20 pin power supply.

[snip]
If the PCI-x16 card has an external power connector and you use it, you
should be OK.

Cheers for the speedy response Bryon )
As the vid cards aren't in Australia now (That I'm aware of) I'm not sure
if it will have an external power connector. I think I might grab one of
the Antec power supplies with the 24 pin connectors so I don't have any
issues on build day or in the future.

Seems thermaltake have a 20-24 pin cable adaptor.

http://www.thermaltake.com/purepower/a2169AdaptorCable.htm

 

[Bryon van Prooyen]

careful - I recently bought a Tagan TG480-U01 power supply and it came with
a 20-24 adaptor, they are only good if you have a 24 pin power supply and
want to hook up to a 20 pin mobo.

Wrong way around unfortunately!!

[snip]

Please advise if the above configuration will run stable with the
Thermaltake 480 20 pin power supply. [snip]
If the PCI-x16 card has an external power connector and you use it, you
should be OK.

Cheers for the speedy response Bryon )
As the vid cards aren't in Australia now (That I'm aware of) I'm not sure
if it will have an external power connector. I think I might grab one of
the Antec power supplies with the 24 pin connectors so I don't have any
issues on build day or in the future.

Seems thermaltake have a 20-24 pin cable adaptor.

http://www.thermaltake.com/purepower/a2169AdaptorCable.htm

 

[Paul]

careful - I recently bought a Tagan TG480-U01 power supply and it came with
a 20-24 adaptor, they are only good if you have a 24 pin power supply and
want to hook up to a 20 pin mobo.

Wrong way around unfortunately!!

That one looks OK. It has the right polarity for 24 pin on the
motherboard end.

The only thing strange about that one, is the 24pin connector is
missing the -5V wire. If you take the two JPG images of the
ends of the cable into Photoshop and zoom in, the fifth pin down
is missing on the 24pin connector. I don't think that is a big
deal, it is just a bit strange. (There really isn't a reason to
use -5V any more.)

Still, I would recommend buying a supply with the 24 pin connector
if you can find it. Using an adapter cable increases the voltage
drop between the PSU and motherboard, and in the case of the remote
sense wires (usually on +3.3V, on Antec Truepower used on three
supplies), the remote sense will stop at the end of the first cable,
which means the drop in the adapter cable is not compensated for.
The proper 24 pin will also make for a neater install.

By the way, the way they would be wiring the adapter cable, doesn't
actually eliminate the "pin burning" problem. The adapter will have
two wires stuffed onto one pin of the 20 pin connector, for the +12V
signal. The +12V is the whole reason for wanting a 24 pin power
supply. Since two wires go into the one pin, all the current for those
two wires go through the +12V pin on the 20 pin end of the adapter.
That means you have the potential to melt the end of the adapter
that plugs into the PSU (metaphorically speaking). Since the current
level expected with the current generation of video cards, is right
up to the limits of one pin, I don't think it is as bad as all that
(might get warm, won't melt). PCI Express +12V limit on the video
slot is 5.5 amps, plus Asus runs the fan connectors off the same
+12V. The single pin limit on ATX 20 pin is 6A. A video card
manufacturer will not run the pins on the video slot at their limits,
and the IXBT article had 4.8 amps on one card's +12V. So, there
probably isn't imminent danger using the adapter. It is just ugly.
Moving the chassis fans to run off a Molex disk drive power
connector will help. You could do the same with the CPU fan,
if you can figure out how to adapt it.

Paul

[snip]
Please advise if the above configuration will run stable with the
Thermaltake 480 20 pin power supply.
[snip]
If the PCI-x16 card has an external power connector and you use it, you
should be OK.

Cheers for the speedy response Bryon )
As the vid cards aren't in Australia now (That I'm aware of) I'm not sure
if it will have an external power connector. I think I might grab one of
the Antec power supplies with the 24 pin connectors so I don't have any
issues on build day or in the future.

Seems thermaltake have a 20-24 pin cable adaptor.

http://www.thermaltake.com/purepower/a2169AdaptorCable.htm

 

[duglas]

I think I might grab one of

the Antec power supplies with the 24 pin connectors so I don't have any
issues on build day or in the future.

Will this be ok?
TRUE550 EPS12V
http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=20551

 

[Paul]

I think I might grab one of

Will this be ok?
TRUE550 EPS12V
http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=20551

I tried to use another maker to answer the question. The first of
these is recommended for the P5xxx motherboards. It has a 2x3 pin
connector, which I guess is for video card power, on video cards
that use the new PCI-E Aux power connector (I think that is what it
is - the 2x3 was shown on a review site a while back.)
http://www.pcpowerandcooling.com/products/power_supplies/dimensions/mb_T51EX.htm

This one is an EPS. The 24 pin connector appears to be the same as
the Express one above. It has an 8 pin intended for a dual processor
and a 4 pin intended for a single processor. (Some PSU use an adapter
for that, or possibly the 8 pin will plug into the 4 pin on a motherboard,
if there is room.) The Antec True550 EPS12V has both those connectors
as well:
http://www.pcpowerandcooling.com/products/power_supplies/dimensions/mb_T51XE.htm

So, I would say the Antec would work, but what you don't get is the
2x3 connector, like the first of the PCPC products above. I really
don't know how popular that connector is going to be. Can you say
PITA when it comes to all these connectors :-(

The problem with the Antec web page, is there is no manual specifically
for the TRUE550 EPS12V. The manual is for the Truepower series of 20pin
power supplies. If you go to this page, the EPS12V has both four and
eight pin ATX12V connectors, so the four pin will work with your board.
And, by induction above, it appears the P5xxx connector is an EPS, so
the Truepower EPS, by nature of its name, has to be the same on the
24 pin. Click the colored links to see pictures of the connectors
(but I want signal names, dammit!).

http://www.antec.com/specs/true550EPS12V_spe.html

Too bad Antec was so lazy. Would it kill them to make up a single sheet
with pinout/signal names for the connectors ?

Paul

 

[X Offender]

You may be referring to my earlier thread on this topic. Just to let you
know, I built my new machine last week with a P5AD2 motherboard and a 500W
20-pin power supply (no adapter or anything), and I've had no power-related
issues as of yet.

My current setup:

Asus P5AD2 Deluxe motherboard
Intel P4 530 3.0GHz
Aspire 500W power supply
Kingston ValueRAM DDR2-533 1 GB
Western Digital 2x 250 GB SATA 7200 RPM in RAID 1 configuration
Gigabyte ATI Radeon X600 XT PCI-Express video card (doesn't have a separate
power connector)
NEC 16x Double Layer DVD+/-RW drive (ND-3500A)
Lite-On 52x32x52x16x Combo CD-RW/DVD drive
Floppy drive
(using onboard sound, LAN)

From my experience thus far, the one thing I'd suggest is that you
definitely invest in good CPU cooling. I started out with the stock
heatsink/fan, and am planning to upgrade, as the 3.0 GHz Prescott runs warm,
and heats up quickly under moderate to heavy load. It hasn't cause any
problems for me yet, but I would like to see lower temperatures. I'm sure
this will be even more of an issue with the 3.6 GHz version..