PSU enough power ?

[Punkychan]

My specs :
Win Xp Pro / AMD Athlon 2.4 / 1.5 DDR PC 2700 memory / 2 IDE hard disk /
nVidia FX 5200 card /DVD-RW Drive...yeah only that.
PSU is 350 watt - does it has enough power to drive all these ?
I notice lately too much or too fast mouse clicks will auto reboot - cleaned all heatsinks and re-seated my coolers and double checked whatever things that would cause overheating.Thought was my video card but swapped cards still persists..doesn't really happens all the time but sor of pain in the **ss esp.when burning dvd and the it reboots in the midst of it.
Any idea ? I don't mind purchasing a new psu but don't have a spare for testing....or could it be something that is not a psu...?

 

[ming]

i think 350w won't hold for 2 hds with that graphics card. if you can, try using just 1 hd and see if the same thing happens.

 

[LordOfLA]

Go for 420wayy with ~20A output on the +12v

 

[GoNz0]

well if your going to buy a spare PSU, get one that will run your next series of upgrades, ie 500W+

lots neglect there PSU, when its the 1st link in the PC running smooty

 

[Punkychan]

You all mean that video card really consume that kind of power ?...oh I better be shopping for my new psu......

 

[mlakrid]

I have to disagree here...

I have a Pentium 4 2.8 Ghz
1GB Corsair memory
256 Mb 9600XT
3 HDDs
1 Optical Drive
1 CD-Rom

with that said if it is a no name PSU then MAYBE it could still be a PSU issue... you should get anything which will allow you to see the load on the 12v Rail and see where you are.. if it is anything more than 85% of the max for that rail then that is probably your problem...

post back after you know and we can help you better...

 

[Punkychan]

Mmmm...hard to say if it's a no name PSU since it comes together with the casing....well it used to wrk very well before and I even had another cd drive plus and 2 extra fans inside working well....until recently...unless it is dying out..that I don't know..had that thing for about 4 years already...

 

[mlakrid]

Mmmm...hard to say if it's a no name PSU since it comes together with the casing....well it used to wrk very well before and I even had another cd drive plus and 2 extra fans inside working well....until recently...unless it is dying out..that I don't know..had that thing for about 4 years already...

The portion in bold could be the deciding factor...

PSUs go bad either in the first 4-6 weeks or they work like a champ and then die suddenly... That could be the case for you as well...

I would go with a 500W as was already suggested and if you have built your own computers before, and plan to do so again I personally would go with a PC, power and Cooling PSU, they are the best on the market BAR NONE...

keep in mind they are expensive; however, they are still one of the top PSUs used in the industry in servers as well as home PCs for their reliability...

I would suggest THIS one... so long as you are not going to be going SLI or PCI-E...

Cheers!

 

[X-Istence]

Pfft, I ran 4 HD's, a GeForce MX440 off a 250 W PSU and that thing held like a champ! Never had any problems. If you look at what commercial PC's come with in terms of PSU's you would think there was not enough to go around. The new Dell servers we got at the school, only a 200 Watt PSU for a standard Intel Core 2 Duo server with 2 hd's!

 

[Shamus MacNoob]

350 watts is more than enough for that video card and setup even a cheap psu , I have run more than that many times over with setups for people that just dont want to spend money and never had trouble, I think your problem is maybe the age factor , rerplace it with another psu any psu will do.

 

[lancer]

I agree, you really only need a powerful psu if you have a powerful v/card, the hdd's and other componants really don't take up that much power.

 

[mlakrid]

To shed some light... I was reffering to if he was also going to upgrade that system, note that I also said a 350W PSU should easily be enough...

 

[lancer]

I know, I know... its ok, ssshhh its ok now

 

[_kC_]

handy site - http://www.extreme.outervision.com/psucalculator.jsp

 

[lancer]

now that is an extremely useful calculator, reps on their respective way...

 

[ray_gillespie]

I must agree Lancer, I can't believe I've never seen that before! Reps to you KC!

 

[Shamus MacNoob]

yes and you get what 300 for his setup on that site?

 

[Punkychan]

So...now you guys ..do you agree thats the psu problem not any other hardware ., ram sticks or something ?? sudden clickings ( you know that left/right click when copy/paste and esp. when you rushing to finish your work... )and it just give away.....black screen and instant reboot.
I've tried running on 1 hd only., looks the same...so what do you suggest ? new psu ?
Is there a way ( software ) to find whether my memory sticks still doing good or not ?

 

[Mainframeguy]

memtest86 - tests your sticks

 

[Punkychan]

Thanks...I'll Google that ....