EggXpert

Specs:

Power Supply-

Rosewill RP550V2-S-SL 550W ATX12V v2.01 SLI Ready Power Supply - Retail

Hard Drive-

Western Digital Caviar Blue WD1600AAJS 160GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive - Bare Drive

Motherboard-

ECS G31T-M7 LGA 775 Intel G31 Micro ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail

GPU-

nVidia GeForce 8800GT PCI-E

Processor-

Intel Pentium E5200 Wolfdale 2.5GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor Model BX80571E5200 - Retail

Memory/RAM-

OCZ SLI-Ready Edition 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model OCZ2N800SR4GK - Retail

Other/Extra-

No extra PCI slots in use

x1 External Hard Drive (Seagate 500GB External) via USB 2.0

x2 CD-ROM Drives (Standard, Non-DVD)

x1 120mm Fan, x2 80mm fans

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Ok guys so I wanted to ask you about upgrading my GPU. Currently I am running a GeForce 8800GT. It's my old card but I actually upgraded everything else as per listed above. I got the Rosewill 550W PSU which is running great and very stable.

I want to upgrade my GPU to a GeForce GTX 260+ - Looking at the minimum PSU requirements as kindly posted by FascistNation in this post it can be seen that the GTX 260-285 requires between 500 and 550W.

I read that the minimum listed is actually lower than that? Any truth to that? Also does the minimum not take into account anything else in my build? So I would really like to know if my current 550W since it is the bare minimum could run a GTX 260-285 with success and without problems.

I know there are calculators out there but I'm not too sure how accurate those truly are.

Thanks for any help - I'm really grateful for this wonderful community here.

49968532

AnonymousCoward:

Ok guys so I wanted to ask you about upgrading my GPU. Currently I am running a GeForce 8800GT. It's my old card but I actually upgraded everything else as per listed above. I got the Rosewill 550W PSU which is running great and very stable.

I want to upgrade my GPU to a GeForce GTX 260+ - Looking at the minimum PSU requirements as kindly posted by FascistNation in this post it can be seen that the GTX 260-285 requires between 500 and 550W.

I read that the minimum listed is actually lower than that? Any truth to that? Also does the minimum not take into account anything else in my build? So I would really like to know if my current 550W since it is the bare minimum could run a GTX 260-285 with success and without problems.

Those are estimates for a fully-loaded system that uses the listed graphics card, and are a good deal higher than what the vast majority of systems running those graphics cards require. 

 Here's a wattage analysis of your system with the new GeForce 260 graphics card:

CPU: 65watts
GPU: 171watts
Hard Drive: 10watts
Optical drives: 25watts each, 50watts total
Motherboard: 20watts
RAM, fans, etc: 25watts

Total: 341watts, at max load. 

 So, yes, your power supply is fully capable of handling your planned upgrade. 

AnonymousCoward:

I know there are calculators out there but I'm not too sure how accurate those truly are.

Well,  your suspicions are correct.  Many of those calculators are innaccurate, sometimes laughably so.  Just recently someone was posting here on the forums about how the Newegg wattage calculator was recommending a 1600watt PSU for their mid-range AMD system. 

It's much more accurate to do the wattage calculation yourself, and it really doesn't take that long.  As soon as I get some free time, I'll either write up a guide here on how to calculate your wattage requirements, or just write my own wattage calculator. 

AnonymousCoward:

Thanks for any help - I'm really grateful for this wonderful community here.

Hey, we're happy to help.  Good luck with your upgrade. 

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CompWiz:

  As soon as I get some free time, I'll either write up a guide here on how to calculate your wattage requirements, or just write my own wattage calculator.

-waits-

-holds breath-

Will you give yours the option to choose the "teir" of the PSU for the estimate?  (sweet)

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Thanks a lot for the informative and helpful post Wiz. I will be grabbing one very soon then, can't say thanks enough to all in this community.

I will post my other questions as they come.

Thanks to all Eggxpert folks!

P.S. - The PSU calculator sounds amazing and would be a great resource. Best luck with the development Wiz.

GmsCool:

CompWiz:

  As soon as I get some free time, I'll either write up a guide here on how to calculate your wattage requirements, or just write my own wattage calculator.

-waits-

-holds breath-

Well, see, free time isn't exactly something I've got much of right now.  I'm currently running a big engineering club at my university, plus I've got a heavy schedule.  It's a lot of fun (you should see some of the projects we're running), but it's not exactly conducive to having extra time.  So, you may not want to hold your breath there. 

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