We purchased over a thousand desktops from a certain vendor, and they came standard with a 185 Watt power supply. They are P4 2.4 ghz 533, 512mb RAM, with Intel 845g chipset intel boards in a Micro ATX case. I think the unit is underpowered. Anyone have any hard specs to help?
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185 Watt Power Supply in a Pentium 4? 1
- Thread starter dannyd74
- Start date
ski
Technical User
- Oct 11, 2000
- 2,467
You'll have to list their exact hardware specs in order to do a proper PS evaluation.
That said, they may work ok.
But if they begin restarting automatically, then you'll know what the cause is.
Also, you should probably not plan to upgrade them with add'l. drives, faster video cards, more RAM, etc., as the existing PS may get overwhelmed.
That said, they may work ok.
But if they begin restarting automatically, then you'll know what the cause is.
Also, you should probably not plan to upgrade them with add'l. drives, faster video cards, more RAM, etc., as the existing PS may get overwhelmed.
- Thread starter
- #3
The system board is a D846GRG manufactured by Intel. The memory is 2.5v PC2100 and there are two sticks for a total of 512mb. The PCs come standard with a floppy and CD-ROM. Most units will use the onboard video, LAN, and audio. My concern is for the units that will have all three PCI slots populated and might even be using a USB keyboard and mouse-all requiring even more power.
These units are probably barely meeting specs to keep running. If you add anything that will eat up power like a second optical drive or a hard drive and some kind of video capture card you may really be pushing your luck. You may ask your vendor if some of them you want to add stuff to can have a power supply upgrade to say a 300 watt power supply. A lot depends if it is a standard size power supply and if a larger power supply will fit in the case. A new case would be less than $100, and a power supply can be less than say $45. This is something that you should discuss before hind-sight kicks in. I can't imagine a P4 with a 185 Watt power supply, but they get this to work with the smaller SFF (Small Form Factor) computers like a Shuttle XPC.
When it comes to mouse and keyboard, I like the keyboards that work on both PS2 and USB. They often come with a small adapter plug as an option so you can use them either way. I like the new optical mouse myself.
If you do not like my post feel free to point out your opinion or my errors.
When it comes to mouse and keyboard, I like the keyboards that work on both PS2 and USB. They often come with a small adapter plug as an option so you can use them either way. I like the new optical mouse myself.
If you do not like my post feel free to point out your opinion or my errors.
- Thread starter
- #5
IslandCustom
IS-IT--Management
Running dozens and dozens of Dells here...they're all surprisingly -- in my opinion -- underpowered. Then again, as desktop workstations they don't have very much to do but access the hard drive and very, very occasionally the CD. Have only seen one PS failure in the last 5 years. I understand Gateway's small form factor PC's are also very short on the PS end.
I also think 185watts is inadequate but as ceh4702 has said this is similar to Jetway/shuttle/MSI small form factor power supplies that operate similar hardware configs, they do report higher than average failure rates but mainly down to high end graphics ie: FX5900/Radeon 9800 etc being added.
I think this is a procurement problem and the inability of the original purchaser of not knowing his hardware.
But when all's said and done, ARE THE PSU'S FAILING? if you have brought and run over a thousand units then you would know by now by now if the PSU's are failing at a disproportionate rate to the norm.
Lastly, the quality on the PSU's is probably as important as there wattage, give me a branded 300watt PSU over a so called generic cheap 400watter every day.
PS.
There are several PSU consumption calculators freely available on the net if you want ammo.
Martin
Replying helps further our knowledge, without comment leaves us wondering.
I think this is a procurement problem and the inability of the original purchaser of not knowing his hardware.
But when all's said and done, ARE THE PSU'S FAILING? if you have brought and run over a thousand units then you would know by now by now if the PSU's are failing at a disproportionate rate to the norm.
Lastly, the quality on the PSU's is probably as important as there wattage, give me a branded 300watt PSU over a so called generic cheap 400watter every day.
PS.
There are several PSU consumption calculators freely available on the net if you want ammo.
Martin
Replying helps further our knowledge, without comment leaves us wondering.
- Thread starter
- #8
Martin,
If you can point me in the direction of those calculators, it would be much appreciated. 185 watts should be plenty of power for the average desktop, but we're adding high end graphics cards, usb wireless mice, and gig NIC cards to a few select machines. These are critical machines, and we've already had an instance where the computer went "dead" in the middle of the night. We tried to blame the problem on the Appian Hurrican video card over-heating, but I'm not convinced. My case is that for average use, 185 watts is more than enough. In critical "can't be down" PCs, I think we need a better PS. Again, any addition input is much appreciated as I take on the engineers in the near future..
If you can point me in the direction of those calculators, it would be much appreciated. 185 watts should be plenty of power for the average desktop, but we're adding high end graphics cards, usb wireless mice, and gig NIC cards to a few select machines. These are critical machines, and we've already had an instance where the computer went "dead" in the middle of the night. We tried to blame the problem on the Appian Hurrican video card over-heating, but I'm not convinced. My case is that for average use, 185 watts is more than enough. In critical "can't be down" PCs, I think we need a better PS. Again, any addition input is much appreciated as I take on the engineers in the near future..
franklin97355
Technical User
Obviously when you plan to add additional hardware to a computer you need to spec that into the equation when you order the computer. Looks like the engineers forgot to do that.
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1
- #10
- Thread starter
- #11
The biggest problem is, different manufacturers use different ratings to label PSUs as. Some list the continuous wattage it can handle, while others list the peak wattage it can handle.
For example, I've bought some In-Win cases lately and their own branded PSUs are listed at 250W, but as the fact is, their PSU can handle more than most 300W PSUs available just because they label differently. The In-Win PSU is actually 250W continous, 350W max! Obviously the In-Win is better, even though the ratings say otherwise!
So when you say you have a 185W PSU, you really don't know much about the PSU; it could be 185 max / 140 continuous, or it could be 185 continuous / 250 max or something. That's a big difference in what it can handle.
And just to know, those numbers on that calculator link are conservative, such that the numbers are peak wattages not continuous wattages, like a harddrive takes more watts to initially spin up, then much less for disk accesses (like 20Watts then 8 watts).
Confused yet? Good, because you're really seeing the problems inherant in the flawed ratings manufacturers provide you with. Only way to be safe is just grab a 350 watt or higher PSU.
For example, I've bought some In-Win cases lately and their own branded PSUs are listed at 250W, but as the fact is, their PSU can handle more than most 300W PSUs available just because they label differently. The In-Win PSU is actually 250W continous, 350W max! Obviously the In-Win is better, even though the ratings say otherwise!
So when you say you have a 185W PSU, you really don't know much about the PSU; it could be 185 max / 140 continuous, or it could be 185 continuous / 250 max or something. That's a big difference in what it can handle.
And just to know, those numbers on that calculator link are conservative, such that the numbers are peak wattages not continuous wattages, like a harddrive takes more watts to initially spin up, then much less for disk accesses (like 20Watts then 8 watts).
Confused yet? Good, because you're really seeing the problems inherant in the flawed ratings manufacturers provide you with. Only way to be safe is just grab a 350 watt or higher PSU.
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