PCI-e 16x Power Supply and Geforce 8800 GTX Dual DVI

[UKDutyPaid]

I have an HP Compaq dx2200 Microtower PC (http://h10010.www1.hp.com/
wwpc/us/en/sm/WF06a/12454-12454-64287-321860-3328893-1844701.html)
with the Intel® Pentium® 4 processor 630 3.0 GHz HT.

I've bought a GeForce 8800 GTX Dual DVI TV (http://www.nvidia.com/page/
geforce_8800.html) PCI-e x16 from eBay for £40! Well I think it's a
good deal anyhoo considering the card still lists on Google for £270
(http://www.google.co.uk/products?q=GeForce 8800 GTX).

I've checked out the card and I can't see anything wrong with it. It
looks brand new no scratches on the pins, but there is one small
problem.

When I received it, I noticed that it requires 2x 6 pin PCI Express
power connections, which might be why it went so cheaply. I imagine
that the last chap might not have known how to hook it up to his PC,
or didn't want to or known how to upgrade the PSU in their machine so
sold it on at a loss to the next guy.

The PSU in my HP isn't up to it at all, and there aren't enough spare
Molex connectors for two 6Pin converters anyway. I wouldn't be able to
connect any internal drives and even if I could (using splitters) the
poor little 250watt PSU whic is probably already struggeling and due
for an upgrade anyway. It's already powering a Motherboard, P4 3.0Ghz
CPU, 2x IDE 5400rpm & 1x SATA 7200rpm HDDs, Audigy 2 zs, 2Gb 5300 RAM,
USB Printer, USB scanner, USB DVDRW, Firewire 800 card and a 1TB ext
Firewire HDD, and now I want co plug this monster Dual graphics card.

I did some more digging and found an article which stated (in 2006)
that Nvidia recommends at least a 450Watt PSU (http://reviews.cnet.com/
graphics-cards/nvidia-geforce-8800-gtx/4505-8902_7-32132889.html).

I'll simply expect a house fire then shall I?

So I'm in the market for a new PSU and I don't want some sort of jet
engine or lawn mower screeming or humming away in the corner of the
living room. The current PSU is quite a noisy thing and I'm sure than
anything with the word 'Quiet' in the title will be a better buy than
the HP supplied unit, but I can't help myself and get carried away and
end up over specifying on things and spending cash for no reason so
I'm here to ask for your collective help.

I have searched about a bit and found this Zalman 500W Heatpipe Cooled
PSU (http://www.zalman.co.kr/ENG/product/Product_Read.asp?idx=195)
which comes with 6 Pin Power Connectors for Two PCI Express Graphic
Cards, which I imagine will be able to connect to the one GeForce GTX
Dual which requires 2x 6 pin power connectors. It's a 500W which is
above spec for Nvidia but considering the other bits and pieces, an
extra 50w is needed for this machine. I leave this computer on 24/7
and don't particularly enjoy paying for electricity thinking about
this (http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/build-solar-PC,review-29585.html)
back to the topic. Zalman appears to be a commonly recommended brand
for quiet installations in the over clocking and home built PC
community.

The cheapest I've found this for £77.81 (http://
www.eclipsecomputers.com/product.aspx?code=PSZ-500HP) which includes
VAT and delivery, it's more than I expected to pay but Google's
feedback system rates teh supplier as low. I managed to slap some
sense into myself when I was close to clicking the buy button on the
750W version at over £100.

Is this about the price you'd pay these days for a quiet 500w cpu with
2x 6pin PCI-e connectors?
Would you go for another PSU which fits the bill?

I don't particularly want to start a flame war with this 'brand' is
better than that 'brand', but any constructive points would be
helpful. It's been over ten years since I last built a PC and back
then my 600Watt ATX PSU cost me £45 including shipping, it felt like a
lot more.

Nick

 

[UKDutyPaid]

I have an HP Compaq dx2200 Microtower PC (http://h10010.www1.hp.com/
wwpc/us/en/sm/WF06a/12454-12454-64287-321860-3328893-1844701.html)
with the Intel® Pentium® 4 processor 630 3.0 GHz HT.

I've bought a GeForce 8800 GTX Dual DVI TV (http://www.nvidia.com/page/
geforce_8800.html) PCI-e x16 from eBay for £40! Well I think it's a
good deal anyhoo considering the card still lists on Google for £270
(http://www.google.co.uk/products?q=GeForce 8800 GTX).

I've checked out the card and I can't see anything wrong with it. It
looks brand new no scratches on the pins, but there is one small
problem.

When I received it, I noticed that it requires 2x 6 pin PCI Express
power connections, which might be why it went so cheaply. I imagine
that the last chap might not have known how to hook it up to his PC,
or didn't want to or known how to upgrade the PSU in their machine so
sold it on at a loss to the next guy.

The PSU in my HP isn't up to it at all, and there aren't enough spare
Molex connectors for two 6Pin converters anyway. I wouldn't be able to
connect any internal drives and even if I could (using splitters) the
poor little 250watt PSU whic is probably already struggeling and due
for an upgrade anyway. It's already powering a Motherboard, P4 3.0Ghz
CPU, 2x IDE 5400rpm & 1x SATA 7200rpm HDDs, Audigy 2 zs, 2Gb 5300 RAM,
USB Printer, USB scanner, USB DVDRW, Firewire 800 card and a 1TB ext
Firewire HDD, and now I want co plug this monster Dual graphics card.

I did some more digging and found an article which stated (in 2006)
that Nvidia recommends at least a 450Watt PSU (http://reviews.cnet.com/
graphics-cards/nvidia-geforce-8800-gtx/4505-8902_7-32132889.html).

I'll simply expect a house fire then shall I?

So I'm in the market for a new PSU and I don't want some sort of jet
engine or lawn mower screeming or humming away in the corner of the
living room. The current PSU is quite a noisy thing and I'm sure than
anything with the word 'Quiet' in the title will be a better buy than
the HP supplied unit, but I can't help myself and get carried away and
end up over specifying on things and spending cash for no reason so
I'm here to ask for your collective help.

I have searched about a bit and found this Zalman 500W Heatpipe Cooled
PSU (http://www.zalman.co.kr/ENG/product/Product_Read.asp?idx=195)
which comes with 6 Pin Power Connectors for Two PCI Express Graphic
Cards, which I imagine will be able to connect to the one GeForce GTX
Dual which requires 2x 6 pin power connectors. It's a 500W which is
above spec for Nvidia but considering the other bits and pieces, an
extra 50w is needed for this machine. I leave this computer on 24/7
and don't particularly enjoy paying for electricity thinking about
this (http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/build-solar-PC,review-29585.html)
back to the topic. Zalman appears to be a commonly recommended brand
for quiet installations in the over clocking and home built PC
community.

The cheapest I've found this for £77.81 (http://www.eclipsecomputers.com/product.aspx?code=PSZ-500HP) which includes
VAT and delivery, it's more than I expected to pay but Google's
feedback system rates teh supplier as low. I managed to slap some
sense into myself when I was close to clicking the buy button on the
750W version at over £100.

Is this about the price you'd pay these days for a quiet 500w cpu with
2x 6pin PCI-e connectors?
Would you go for another PSU which fits the bill?

I don't particularly want to start a flame war with this 'brand' is
better than that 'brand', but any constructive points would be
helpful. It's been over ten years since I last built a PC and back
then my 600Watt ATX PSU cost me £45 including shipping, it felt like a
lot more.

Nick

After a bit more research, realised that the Amperage wasn't large
enough so going for the 750...

 

[Bob Knowlden]

I'm not sure what to recommend. 750W seems like more than you'd need for a
single 8800GTX, if it's a good supply. (Poor supplies don't have much
current available on the +12V lines.)

If it follows the guidelines for PCI-E, it could consume no more than 75W
for each 6 pin connector, plus 75W from the PCI-E slot, or 225W (less than
19A at 12V).

While they don't do business in the UK, my favorite site for checking what's
available is www.newegg.com. One that I see there is the Corsair TX650. It
meets one of my prejudices: it has a single 12V rail (good for 52A). (A few
years ago, graphics cards that required PCI-E power connections did badly
with some multiple rail PSUs, due to the way the current was allocated. The
cards would draw too much current from one of the rails. That's probably of
the past by now, though.)

There's a configurator at www.corsairmemory.com. It suggests that the TX650
is a good choice for a system with a Core 2 Quad Extreme and an 8800 Ultra,
at the highest overclocked settings.

Will a standard PSU fit in your HP PC? I recall the old days when Dell used
nonstandard PSU wiring on their desktop PCs. (I believe that it simplified
their support; they didn't want to deal with service calls on machines that
were no longer Dells on the inside.) I don't know if HP did anything
similar.

My own PSU is a PC Power & Cooling Silencer Crossfire. 750W, 60A on its
single +12V rail. ATI red. Works well with a single GTX280, in a Core I7
system with a 920 clocked to 3.8 GHz.

 

[Paul]

After a bit more research, realised that the Amperage wasn't large
enough so going for the 750...

Your first priority, should be determining whether the card works
at all. Do you have a friend, someone with a computer with a power
supply suited to run that card ? Could they test it for you ?
Could you have it tested at a shop ?

If you got it for £40, perhaps there is something wrong with it.

Another thing you should check, is whether your chassis is big
enough to fit it card. It is possible the card will bump into
a drive bay inside the computer.

*******

Xbitlabs does power measurements on cards. This will give you some
idea how many amps are required from 12V, to run such a video card.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/gf8800gtx-roundup_6.html#sect0

http://www.xbitlabs.com/images/video/gf8800gtx-roundup/8800gtx_full.gif

If I use the info from the right-most table in the GIF image.

43.91993 / 12 = 3.66A from the motherboard slot on the 12V rail, which
flows from the main power supply cable.

(42.9+40.768) / 12 = 6.97 amps from the two separate PCI Express connectors.

*******

The power supply inside the computer tower, could be a standard ATX
supply. In which case, you could buy a unit with higher capacity.

If the supply is a smaller type, there may not be a good upgrade
path. In that case, you can use a 12V booster supply.

FSP Group Booster X5 450W Power - Retail $80
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817104054

How that works, is you fit it in a spare drive bay. I think it fits
in a 5.25" drive bay. There is a PCI slot cover, which provides a
route to get AC power inside the computer case.

What that unit does, is it connects to an existing Molex connector. The
FSP unit senses whether voltage is present on the Molex. If voltage is
present, the FSP turns itself on. So the FSP is "slaved" to the state
of the existing power supply, without having to tap into the PS_ON# signal.

If your existing supply doesn't have enough Molex connectors, you buy a
Molex "Y" cable, to make a spare connector. The spare connector plugs
into the back of the FSP unit, so the FSP unit can tell when to switch
on.

The FSP unit will only be powering the two PCI Express Auxiliary connectors.
So 6.97 amps will flow from the FSP unit, into the video card. Your
existing 250W supply will be responsible for the 3.66A number, from
your existing power supply. You have to do some careful maths, to be
sure that will work.

If the power supply is a standard ATX, then you could shop for a new
one. Page 33 here, gives about 150mm wide by 86mm high or so. The
length of a supply can vary a bit. Some supplies are short, while
the 1000W monsters will extend so far, they'll get close to the
drive bay. So you want to check the dimensions of your supply, to
determine whether an ATX fits.

http://www.formfactors.org/developer/specs/ATX12V_PSDG_2_2_public_br2.pdf

The DX2200 is here. page 34 lists 84W as normal power consumption.

http://h18000.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/12426_na/12426_na.pdf

A P4 630 here, is listed with a TDP of 84W, which makes the HP info
hard to believe. (84W/12V)/0.90 = 7.77A from 12V2 CPU rail.

http://processorfinder.intel.com/details.aspx?sSpec=SL8Q7

If I guessed you had up to four hard drives, that would be 4*0.6A=2.4A,
1.5A for one optical drive, 0.5A for fans, 10.63A for the video
card, and then the 12V1 current in amperes minimum would be

2.4+1.5+0.5+10.63=15.03 amps from 12V1
and 7.77 amps from 12V2

If we look at a label on the side of a supply for a moment, this one
offers 18 amps on both 12V1 rail and 12V2 rail. And, as such, it
covers the 12V1 requirement. The supply has a total rating of
470W, so that might give you an idea of what a minimum supply
might look like.

http://c1.neweggimages.com/NeweggImage/productimage/17-273-004-07.jpg

The advert for that supply, list this for connectors.

PCI-Express Connector: 2 x 6+2-Pin

What that means, is the supply has two eight pin connectors,
but the end pins on each connector are hinged and come off.
That allows the eight pin connector, to be used in six pin
applications. So, basically, you have two universal connectors
to work with.

So that may help you select an ATX supply, assuming there is room
for one. If the computer uses a smaller form factor supply, then
the FSP booster concept is another solution.

Well, I got lucky, and there is some model of DX2200 pictured here.
I don't know if this is the microtower. What I don't like, is the
250W supply in here is a Bestec (kaboom!). I would definitely
replace this! Check your dimensions and supply orientation,
and then visit your favorite web site and search for a replacement.
I did my search, by setting the number of PCI Express auxiliary
connectors to two, and that helped narrow the search. I like this
site, for the picture gallery on each item.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16883107184R&PageStyle=lite

Your total power should be about

12V_loads + four drives 5V rail + CDROM 5V rail + (USB +5VSB) + 50W mobo power =

12V*23A + 4*5 + 1*7.5 + 10 + 50 = 363.5 watts

So a 500W supply, with adequate amps ratings on 12V1, should do it.
Your motherboard and RAM probably don't use 50W, but that is my boiler
plate value for it. My calculation still has some over-estimation in it.

Paul

 

[SteveH]

After a bit more research, realised that the Amperage wasn't large
enough so going for the 750...

Something else you might want to bear in mind is as your PC's case is quite
small, does it have enough ventilation to shift the extra heat generated by
this card (assuming it fits)? I know it's own fan is supposed to blow air
out of the back, but it will almost certainly raise the temps inside the
case. You would probably find that a decent quality 550w PSU would be
enough. I've got an Intel Q6600, 2xHDD's, 3xDVDRW's, Soundblaster X-Fi and a
Radeon 4850 all running from a 500w Antec, no problems at all, and yours
should be less demanding tthan mine.

 

[Benjamin Gawert]

* UKDutyPaid:

I have an HP Compaq dx2200 Microtower PC (http://h10010.www1.hp.com/
wwpc/us/en/sm/WF06a/12454-12454-64287-321860-3328893-1844701.html)
with the Intel® Pentium® 4 processor 630 3.0 GHz HT.

I've bought a GeForce 8800 GTX Dual DVI TV (http://www.nvidia.com/page/
geforce_8800.html) PCI-e x16 from eBay for £40! Well I think it's a
good deal anyhoo considering the card still lists on Google for £270
(http://www.google.co.uk/products?q=GeForce 8800 GTX).

It is not a bad deal, however the prices you found may have been acurate
two years ago but definitely not today anymore. The 8800GTX is the first
generation DX10 card from Nvidia, and there have been faster and cheaper
successors in the mean time.

There are better ways to check for prices than google.

I've checked out the card and I can't see anything wrong with it. It
looks brand new no scratches on the pins, but there is one small
problem.

When I received it, I noticed that it requires 2x 6 pin PCI Express
power connections, which might be why it went so cheaply. I imagine
that the last chap might not have known how to hook it up to his PC,
or didn't want to or known how to upgrade the PSU in their machine so
sold it on at a loss to the next guy.

Very unlikely. Adapters to hook one PEG power connector to two
connectors or powering it from a drive connector do exists, are widely
known and cheap. And considering the age of the card I doubt that the
last owner did make a great loss on it. He probably has just upgraded to
something better.

The PSU in my HP isn't up to it at all, and there aren't enough spare
Molex connectors for two 6Pin converters anyway. I wouldn't be able to
connect any internal drives and even if I could (using splitters) the
poor little 250watt PSU whic is probably already struggeling and due
for an upgrade anyway. It's already powering a Motherboard, P4 3.0Ghz
CPU, 2x IDE 5400rpm & 1x SATA 7200rpm HDDs, Audigy 2 zs, 2Gb 5300 RAM,
USB Printer, USB scanner, USB DVDRW, Firewire 800 card and a 1TB ext
Firewire HDD, and now I want co plug this monster Dual graphics card.

Well, as you say the 250W stock PSU won't cut it. The dx2200 uses
standard ATX power supplies. However, you should seriously think about
upgrading it. Not only is the case very small and cramped, which
especially with the old, very hot Pentium4 processor doesn't help. Also,
it is very doubtful that with such a slow system the 8800GTX will be of
any benefit.

I did some more digging and found an article which stated (in 2006)
that Nvidia recommends at least a 450Watt PSU (http://reviews.cnet.com/
graphics-cards/nvidia-geforce-8800-gtx/4505-8902_7-32132889.html).

I'll simply expect a house fire then shall I?

No. Gfx card manufacturers always recommend an unnecessary strong power
supply to avoid having to deal with support cases where a 350W PSU which
would be more than sufficient in a standard config doesn't work because
besides the gfx card and mobo it also has to power 10 hard drives.

I leave this computer on 24/7
and don't particularly enjoy paying for electricity

Then it doesn't make much sense to put a gfx card that consumes more
than 150 Watts in this computer. Especially as it will probably spend
most time twirling its thumbs because of the weak computer.

Benjamin