[geeks] Of video cards and power supplies...

[Nate]

On Jul 14, 2009, at 6:49 PM, Lionel Peterson wrote:

> In other words, the nVidia card put an unexpected load on the PS, a  
> load that a differently-designed PS could handle?

I'm not sure yet... I decided to put my ear to an intake vent in the  
case just now while running some tests, and in fact there is still  
some noise, but I think what I'm hearing now is exclusively coming  
from the video card (as "theovalich" had posited).

This means either:

A) the noise was actually the video card before, but louder, and I was  
mistaken that it was coming from the power supply

or

B) noise was being produced by both the video card *and* the Seasonic  
power supply, and the noise from the power supply was the louder of  
the two, and with the new Delta power supply the only noise I can hear  
is the quieter noise from the video card

> Personally, I would have avoided a PS by Corsair

It wasn't really a Corsair power supply, it was a Seasonic power  
supply packaged by Corsair.

> my personal experience with Supermicro-supplied PS and Antec PS  
> (both bundled with chassis and sold retail)

Saying "Antec PS" is meaningless - Antec doesn't design/make power  
supplies, they package/brand them.  Antec packages and brands power  
supplies from Seasonic, FSP, CWT, Heroichi, and of course Delta.  It  
all depends on the particular model.

> have proven themselves as 'known Good Enough' PS and I stick to them  
> whenever practical.
>
> I appreciate quiet as well, but I think I would have up-sized the PS  
> as my first response[0], I never would have gotten that deep into  
> it, but I'm glad you did, and thanks for sharing.

It wasn't about "upsizing", but about swapping mostly comparable  
capacity power supplies with very different designs and how they each  
cope with a very high and problematic 12V load on one of the rails.   
And I have to admit, I've been fascinated by the new DC-DC power  
supplies that can operate at zero load and have above 80% efficiency  
at all loads.

- Nate