| dreamcast210 said: OK. Got a question about power supplies. I got a 500w supply thinking that's fine. But now I'm seeing in specs for different cards things like "2 x 6pin". What do I need know about the specs of a card to make sure it works with my power supply? |
Well here is a quick breakdown of the PowersSupply connectors.
The 4+4, 4+2 (or 8PIN) will be the for you CPU.
The 6 or 6+2 (or 8pin, not the same as above) will be for your GPU.
The 4-PIN molex is for you old style IDE Drives, but are mostly used for Case fans and other miscelaneous internal compononts, you should not have to worry about the number of these anymore.
The Sata Power is for Hard Drives, SSD's, and Optical Drives.
The power rating determines MAX output of the PSU. A Silver can run at high heat and output 70% of rated volume, Gold, is 80-85% and Platinum is 90%+
You typically want Gold-Rated PSU as that is best bang for buck.
When you order a modern PSU it generally has 4 6+2 pin connetors for your GPU. You can find out for sure by checking the specification on the sitre you ordered it from. If you look at it a get a bit confused by the specs you can post a link and I will take a look and let you know if you ordered an appropriate one.
Typically though, so long as you ordered a known name brand PSU you should be fine for anything outside of SLI for graphics cards (linking more than 1 GPU together).
Edit*
There are also figures such a power output on the 12 Volt Rail and similar nomenclature. You do not have to worry about this information unless you plan on running really high end equipment, multi-SLI GPU's, and or heavy overclocking. If you are buying a new PSU it will have enough power on the needed power rail.
