Is 450 Power supply required for an AMD 64 3000 CPU? I have a 350 that
I bought a year ago that is pretty good one. I would like to use it.
Thanks for any help.
There is nothing inherant about Athlon 64 that requires any
particular wattage power supply (within reason, 150W would
be pushing it except for specially engineered low-powered
system).
Typically the motherboard will supply CPU power via the
power supply 12V rail, so if you were to have an Athlon 64
system plus several hard drives, and/or a video card drawing
a lot of amps on 12V (more common with the newest higher-end
cards, those with the 4-pin molex connector onboard), then
your 12V amperage requirement goes up.
Any Athon 64 currently sold will need fewer than 10 amps on
12V. Add 1-2 amp per HDD for good margin, another amp or
two for fans (if that), .5 amp per optical, and up to
(roughly) 4 amps for high-end video card. The puts a good
minimum around 12 amps 12V, 20A for a high-end gaming box
with a lot of drives in it.
Mainly though, know whether your power supply is accurately
rated. Some "supposedly" decent brands like Enermax aren't
rated for sustained output, as such a 350W Enermax isn't
going to be able to power as much long-term as a 350W
Fortron (for example).
