1 word, Corsair.

RoyBatty wrote:

1 word, Corsair.

+1 They are the standard by which others are judged. Get one in the 500W range and call it a day.

+3 Corsair.
I like the TX650W (CMPSU-650TX or CMPSU-650TX-C) for things like that.
30 amps +5v. - The original not V2. The original has one huge 12v rail. No balancing worries.

A word on your Antec:Re: PSU - bust the myth
Don't use it unless you replace the Fuhjyuu caps.
Antec Smart/True powers are usually -all- Fuhjyuu caps.
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Hmmm... I'm skimming through Corsairs, and I haven't seen any with more than 25 amps on the +5v rail. Even in the 650+ watt range. Are they just underrated, or is this cause for concern?

No, the video card should draw 12v and that could should also.

maximus wrote:

Hmmm... I'm skimming through Corsairs, and I haven't seen any with more than 25 amps on the +5v rail. Even in the 650+ watt range. Are they just underrated, or is this cause for concern?

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The other option is finding a board with the 4 pin 12V power plug.

PhilsComputerLab wrote:

The other option is finding a board with the 4 pin 12V power plug.

Somewhere else on Vogons recently we came to the conclusion there's no guarantee sA boards with the P4 connector will actually use the 12V line, even when the P4 connector is plugged in.

Also in another reply on Vogons I did a bit of searching the net to find info on 5V/12V power draw of high-end AGP graphics cards and posted a simple table of some graphics cards and their power draws from each of the 5V and 12V lines, the little list included FX, GF6 and Radeon 9k and iirc R9800 drew relatively much power from 5V. Iirc later cards used mostly 12V. In this regard, GF7600 might be a better option compared to GF6800 as the former used mainly 12V while GF6800 was more heavy on 5V.

One note is that courses of info weren't plenty (the 5V/12V power draw I found on xibitlabs or something along those lines, typing in a hurry here).

Perhaps GF7600 would be a better option to either Radeon9800 (or GF6800) and in my experience performance between 7600GS and GF6800 (vanilla) was very similar. I used both a 7600GS and 6800 in 2 A64 rigs with 2.2GHz and otherwise virtually identically specced systems and could only tell the difference between the cards when opening up the side panels.

I've got a XP 3200+ with 12V connector on the bench, might take a look at the readings then.

By the way looking at some reviews, I didn't expect that even 1000W psu had SO low 5V wattage. Ok that you nowdays need 12V power but with 1000W to route on the rails a bit more on the other, come on..

The Athlon XP 3200+ is ~80W TDP (~16A from +5V).

The 9800XT draws 60W, and of these ~22W (~5A) are drawn from +5V:

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/graphics/dis … owercons_7.html

That's ~21A from +5V at full steam from CPU & GPU.

PhilsComputerLab wrote:

I've got a XP 3200+ with 12V connector on the bench, might take a look at the readings then.

I'd be very interested in knowing the results 😀

It might also depend on the motherboard though, each board may behave differently, perhaps even boards from the same model (but perhaps different revisions).
I'm not even sure it was an official spec, and if not then motherboard manufacturers could basically do whatever they wanted with that P4 connector.

[edit: I just realized my motherboard in the post below had a 4pin 12V connector for the CPU VRM, and your board doesn't. So my experience might not be as relevant as I thought it was.]

I had a (edit: somewhat) similar system as my primary PC a few years ago.
ABit AN7
Athlon XP-M Barton at 2.1GHz/200 (I think this matches 3000+ spec) - don't remember what Vcore I used
2x 512MB DDR400 CL2
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro
2x IDE hard drives, I think only 1 optical, but maybe 2

It ran beautifully with a Fortron FSP300-60PFN(12V)
3.3v 28A
5v 30A
3.3v+5v combined max 180W
12V 15A
5Vsb 2A
As implied that's a 300W PSU. It seems a little small on paper, but it worked perfectly. All the rails were a smidge above the nominal rating and held up over the long term. It was a totally reliable machine. Even suspend to RAM worked... unlike my modern PC.
At the time those PSUs were cheap and common on eBay. I don't know if they still are.
Those PSUs do have bad caps though and should be recapped before use.

From the xbitlabs data, apparently your 9800XT actually puts less load on the 5v rail than the 9800 Pro does. The XT shifts more load to the 12v rail than the Pro does. That may be helpful.

I was disappointed when my 9800 Pro died, because everything in that system worked so well together, like all the parts were made for each other. I really liked that PC up until SSE2 and H.264 became a problem.
It doesn't get used much anymore but it has a 7600GS in it now, still with the same 300W PSU. Actually that card might be preferable since as Tetrium mentioned it makes things easier on the 5v rail, and it's faster and more compatible with some later stuff (which might not ever be loaded on an AthlonXP anyway).

Having used a similar setup (3200+, 9800Pro), I can confirm that a new budget PSU won't be enough. I used a 450W Zalman GS Series with 18A 5V rail and it was barely enough to feed the system even when it was idle - I would often leave the working PC for a few minutes only to come back to a frozen screen.

Later I switched to Inwin/Powerman PSU I had at hand with 35A 5V rail, which I'm happily using to this point (it's been over a year). The motherboard (GA-7n400S) has 12V power connector, however, I don't think it uses it to power the CPU, otherwise my previous PSU would hold better, but I can't be sure.

shamino wrote:

... It ran beautifully with a Fortron FSP300-60PFN(12V) 3.3v 28A 5v 30A 3.3v+5v combined max 180W 12V 15A 5Vsb 2A As implied tha […]
Show full quote

... It ran beautifully with a Fortron FSP300-60PFN(12V)
3.3v 28A
5v 30A
3.3v+5v combined max 180W
12V 15A
5Vsb 2A
As implied that's a 300W PSU. It seems a little small on paper ...

Not really, total system draw in Athlon XP/Athlon 64/P4 times wasn't that high:

Power Distribution within Six PCs - SPCR 2005

A decent modern 300W PSU can deal with any of the above (all mobos drawing from +12V rail for CPU) with ample of room to spare.

The problem comes when a relatively power hungry CPU like Athlon XP 3200+ draws from +5V, that's when a modern PSU's +5V rail may not be up to the task, even though the total combined power of the PSU is well above the total system draw.

A huge 1000W total combined power PSU, but with a weak 15A rated +5V rail, will be defeated.

A tiny 200W total combined power PSU, but with a strong 30A rated +5V rail, will tame the 'beast'.

shamino wrote:

... Even suspend to RAM worked... unlike my modern PC ...

In ACPI S3 STR (Suspend To RAM or 'sleep') state all the PSU main rails are off and RAM is kept alive by switching to draw from the +5VSB standby rail. If this rail isn't up to the task (weak and/or overloaded), STR crashes.

TELVM wrote:

shamino wrote:

... Even suspend to RAM worked... unlike my modern PC ...

In ACPI S3 STR (Suspend To RAM or 'sleep') state all the PSU main rails are off and RAM is kept alive by switching to draw from the +5VSB standby rail. If this rail isn't up to the task (weak and/or overloaded), STR crashes.

The system with that problem uses an AcBel API4FS06, which is rated 3A on 5Vsb.
I blame the motherboard (AM3 Gigabyte). I had different random issues with 4 Gigabyte products I bought/exchanged around the time of this board. I decided to live without S3 rather than doing another exchange, but it perturbs me more nowadays.

maximus wrote:

I did find one unit that claims 30 amps on +5v rail:

Thermaltake TR2 W0070 430W ATX12V v2.3 Power Supply

As usual, the reviews are a roller coaster, and I'm not convinced that the advertised power is even enough.

That PSU should be just fine. I use the older version with an Athlon 1400 and GF4 Ti4600: the PurePower W0009R 420W. 11 years later, it still works fine. I should probably pull it and inspect it for bad caps though.

PCBONEZ has already replied and linked to the thread about bad Fuhjyuu caps in power supplies. Because of the comments in that thread, I decided to pull my old Antec SmartPower and inspect it. Sure enough, bad Fuhjyuu caps. It's a very real concern. Fortunately, I was able to swap that PSU before it could do any damage to the rest of the system.

maximus wrote:

Thermaltake TR2 W0070 430W

PFC （Power Factor Correction） None PFC

Efficiency 70% (min.) at full load and 115/230Vac input

^ From a distance soundss like it might be a living fossil, a brand new old-style PSU with half-bridge topology and group regulation. I like the two fans in tandem.

If the lythic caps inside aren't too bad this could be an interesting PSU for retrocomps.

It may be the same (or similar) PSU reviewed in 2008 by Hardware Secrets:

http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/thermaltake-pu … -supply-review/

I could buy for an Athlon XP 3200+ or a Athlon 1400, the psu model Tagan TG580-U22 , used but seems in good condition. Also it should not be built too many years ago. Is it good? I had the 430W many years ago and I remember was really HEAVY and generally it seems high quality.
I've also seen some redundant server oriented psu for 400-600W range, quiet expensive but seems high quality. Are they better or for a home pc are useless?