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After a month I have finally identified my computer issue: my power supply is not up to the task of gaming. I thought it was but alas no.
10 months ago I bought my 585 watt PSU bundled with my lovely case for around 100 dollars. I used Newegg's tools to estimate my power usage and it gave me 520 watts. I thought the extra 65 watts would be enough. Mea Culpa.
I just purchased a 750 watt PSU from a more reputable manufacturer. The end is in sight. No more losing games that I should have legitimately won because of a crash.
In other news I just got back from mountain biking. It was much more fun than I thought it would be. I was not very fast uphill but I was much more comfortable going downhill than the rest of my family so even though I walked up most of the hills I was easily able to catch up to them.
Also I have gotten quite a bit better at SC2 as evidenced by my win ratio minus the losses due to crashes. Of my last nine games I have only lost two. I think this is because my macro is picking up and I am getting a lot better at scouting. When I go back at watch my replays my APM is often twice that of my opponent. All useful actions as well, no spamming. I am remembering my larva injections and getting a high worker count. Also my continued scouting lets me find expansions and with luck, deny them. It feels good to win without cheese. I don't know how effective my build will be at higher level but I will cross that bridge when I get there.
Cheers
-=Hyyde=-
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Congratulations on your new computer and improvement. So are you crashing at all with the new PC?
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I just placed the order, it should arrive Wednesday. Until then I have to suffer through it  Sorry for any ambiguity.
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I had the same problem with my old psu. Ended up replacing the gpu first because that is what I thought the problem was, but I was wrong. My roommates almost killed me when we lost an hour long 3v3 because my computer just couldn't handle it. Yay for us!
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Yeah, I am/was having 3 distinct crash types. When I searched for the issue it said my GPU, CPU and RAM were all at fault though no tests confirmed this info. Finally realized it was the PSU after some diagnostics as well as forcing a crash to confirm. Bittersweet moment.
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Im sorry this is all i can think about when reading the title: ![[image loading]](http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/images/smilies/items_20/PowerSupply.jpg)
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Yeah, buying a case bundled with a power supply is a recipe for disaster. Power supply calculators are usually wrong as well, generally overestimating what you need.
Best thing to do is to research what CPU and GPU you have and find out how much current they draw on the +12V Rail. Then add 50% on top of that and look for a PSU within those specs. Any good 550W PSU can handle most single GPUs up to a GTX 570 or so. Unfortunately a lot of units cheap out and blatantly lie about their capabilities.
Depending on what you have I'd guess a 750W unit is overkill, but if you ever plan to Crossfire or SLI in the future it will probably be able for that. Having a good PSU will last you years as well, and its good to know it won't blow up on you 
GL with your gaming.
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Thanks, as far as my system specs go I have a Radeon 5830 and the last get 4 core AMD CPU (Can't remember the proper name for it). I will be upgrading it a couple years I think and I would love to reuse to PSU. Get my value out of it, but so long as it does not crash I will be happy.
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On July 12 2011 01:30 Hyyde wrote:
Thanks, as far as my system specs go I have a Radeon 5830 and the last get 4 core AMD CPU (Can't remember the proper name for it). I will be upgrading it a couple years I think and I would love to reuse to PSU. Get my value out of it, but so long as it does not crash I will be happy.
It wasn't so much that your PSU didn't have enough wattage but more that the PSU bundled with the case was a POS. A 5830 + 125W AMD 4core shouldn't even stress a 550W PSU. What brand PSU did you buy?
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United States11308 Posts
For the record, newegg's PSU calculator is designed to sell PSU's not to be good. Anyways, wattage != quality.
The newegg calculator tells me I need something like 50% more wattage than I'm using.
extreme.outervision.com has a much better calculator.
Oh, and for the record, Myrmidon and skyR in the Tech board tend to know a metric asston about PSU's including which ones are good and bad.
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when building a new PC, never go cheap on the PSU. don't have to go for an extravagent, expensive PSU, but getting a cheap PSU is asking for trouble.
you don't want a bad PSU giving unclean, inconsistent power to all of your PC components which can potentially lessen their lifespan
you should also want a decent wattage buffer too because it'll be less stress & heat on the PSU. having a wattage buffer allows a PSU to perform more optimally and will help prolong its lifespan.
better quality PSUs will be able to handle their max advertised loads, but I'd still always want a wattage buffer between a PSU's max wattage output and the expected load needed to power a PC.
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United States11308 Posts
A "wattage buffer" already exists in the form of your PC not pulling full load power when it isn't under full load. Unless you're keeping it under 24/7 high loads on the CPU and GPU, you aren't going to be running anywhere near what your PSU can handle most of the time. Even an average gaming load isn't usually a "full" load.
Buying way more PSU than you need is just plain and simple overkill.
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EPT
