I was about to upgrade my brothers pc when I realised that his PSU may not have enough power to run the MSI R9 390 8GB. These are his current components:
CPU: AMD fx 4130 black edition
MOBO: Gigabyte GA-78LMT-USB3
GPU: sapphire r7 260x oc
HDD: WD blue 500gb
ODD: Samsung 18x DVD
RAM: 2x Corsair value 4gb
PSU: Corsair CX500M
fans: 12mm led fan, 12mm coolermaster fan and a 8mm fan
Some PSU calculator sites say that the recommended PSU wattage with the new video card is 499 or 500 watts. Will the 500 watt power supply he currently has do the job?
EDIT:
I live in the Netherlands and he gave me a budget of 400 euros.(450USD)
I wouldn't risk it, get something at least 650W+
This PSU'd do: http://pcpartpicker.com/part/rosewill-power-supply-hive650s
Thanks for your fast response! I wasn't sure but you confirmed my concern.
I guess that's why I'm called "The Pouncer" lel
I just thought it was because of that incident with the primary school kids but okie
lelelelelel
1 Like
Absolutely not! You want to be running at 40%-60% at your most common loads. That is where you get the most efficiency out of your power supply. Always being at 100% won't do that, and it's also dangerous. For instance, if you're just web surfing, you're going to have a lighter load than when you're gaming. You need to figure out what you do most often on your computer when choosing a power supply.
Oh, and don't put too much stock in 80 Plus certifications. It's marketing bullshit. Check review sites for their efficiency at certain loads. You'll find those ratings mean nothing.
well im not realy sure if upgrading to such a "highend" gpu would realy make that much sense on his current platform.
Unless he want to upgrade his cpu and mobo aswell at some time.
The FX4130 zambezi will simply hold back that 390 or GTX970 way too much.
1 Like
Fair point, I'd upgrade the CPU side first. Depending upon the budget, might be able to balance the two and do both.
I´ll look into it but we´re probably going to buy a 750watt powersupply because we are going to upgrade at some point anyway.
@Rutger9800
Mistery ^.-. I am running 2*R9 290 in CFire at 4K, with a i5 750K, which is the one before Sandy Bridge (i.e. has crap performance). I don't really have any issues, before then at 2K I bottlenecked badly in CF, but with one, not really... The CPU limitation is reduced as you increase the resoloution...
Also Rutger I am running my 290s with a 650W PSU, probably shouldn't do that, but they use about 250W each, that leaves 150W for everything else... Will get a bigger PSU eventually, I tried, but I had to RMA 3 EVGA PSUs because they were crappy and noisy. I think you should be fine.
It is all about priorities >.<, MOAR POWA.
well that i5 has still better per core performance then a zambezii chip for that matter.
i think that it would be better so save a bit more money,
And do a bigger upgrade in the future.
But thats just my opinnion ofc ☺
Would it really be a huge bottleneck? Because my brother gave me a budget of 400 euros (450USD) and said he wanted to upgrade so he could run COD:BO3 at nice quality. What would give him the biggest boost?
Maybe you could find something like this, in your country.
http://pcpartpicker.com/p/bb4rjX
could be a good upgrade imo.
Maybe you could find a used R9-290 for cheaper where you live.
That would ofc be great instead of a 380.
1 Like
Sorry for my late reply, I've been away, but I discussed it with my brother and we came to the conclusion that if we wanted to upgrade the CPU, MOBO, PSU and GPU that we need to divide the budget over all those components. If we did that wouldn't those components be ready for another upgrade in 2 years?
My actual question is: Do we really need to upgrade the CPU?
ps he really does not have more than 400 euros
Yes, if you upgrade that GPU to anything better than a 380 I wouldn't expect it to play nice. The CPU'll probably hold it back even with a 380.
I'd say get what misteryangel suggested.
Thanks for your reply, we're going to save some more money and upgrade it properly later on.