Your Questions About Bestec
Chris asks…
What is the best power supply brand?
I’m looking to put a new graphics card into my rig, but will need to upgrade the power supply. I’m currently running a 250 W Bestec, so will need something in the range of 350 to 400 W to power a Core2Quad Q8300, 8 GB DDR3, and a Geforce GTS 250 (or similar budget DX10 card).
I am limited to buying from Tiger Direct at this time, so am looking for something they stock. The power supply manufacturer should be resistant to bad caps and the unit should be long lasting without a huge spark-filled explosion when a new upgrade goes in at the end of its life. What brands fit the bill?
Thanks.
eXtreme PSU Calculator gives me a recommended wattage of 316 W for Q8300, 4 sticks DDR3, 1 single GTS 250, 1 regular SATA HDD, 1 DVD-RW, and 1 80mm fan all running on 100% load. That’s where I get the 350-400 idea from. Definitely open to considering a higher wattage if needed though.
No chance of adding a second video card as I only have a mATX board with one PCI-E x16 slot. The rest are PCI-E x1. I’m more an office user and don’t do much by the way of gaming (freeware and older titles on sale), so I basically want to upgrade from onboard graphics now and ride out one card for the rest of the system’s life. My Dell Dimension 8200 (P4, 512 MB RDRAM, 60 GB IDE HDD, 256 MB AGP Radeon 9600) had a useful eight year existence. I’d like to see the same sort of life expectancy for this system.
admin answers:
Corsair is number one. Period. But that doesnt mean other companies dont make good products too, especially for such a low power requirements. Ultra, antec and coolmaster all make really good reliable psu’s. I personally like ultra because they make true modular psu’s where the 24 pin and 8 pin can come off.
+50 above the requirement is a good place to be. So, there is no need to get above a 400 unless there is a remote chance you will add a second video card.
Sharon asks…
Help with Video card and computer?
Okay I own an HP a6203w Desktop, I think it is what some call an HTPC, not sure though. It is a mid height tower, with room enough for one somewhat small video card. I have PCI-express x16 on it, and already have 4 gigs of ram on the computer. I am running windows vista. The computer came with a Bestec 250watt PSU. You can find more specs of my PC at the link below.
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/product?product=3554326&lc=en&cc=us&dlc=en&lang=en&tmp_track_link=ot_we/prodlink/en_us/3554326/loc:0&cc=us
I am looking for a cheap low end budget upgrade under 100 dollars for my graphics system. I am doing a new build next fall/winter but until then, my nvidia 6150se nforce430 integrated BS wont cut it.
I have been looking at the ATI 4350, the ATI 4670, the ATI 5570 the ATI 5550, and a few others. My three questions are….
Since some of these cards have no dedicated power cord, and the PCI slot gets 75 watts, as long as they are under that they should be perfectly fine correct?
Are there better options? I can’t afford a new PSU, 80 to 100 dollars even is kind of pushing it, but it is the max.
Lastly, if said video card does go out, what are the damages that will occur?
To the first poster and answer, I’ve been on tomshardware, newegg, and the ATI site, almost all those cards recommend that 400watt but that is for the full system and considering it is a higher end system with overclocking. I have looked at a few different diagrams and charts and almost all those cards are under 75 watts in power consumption, and since they don’t have a dedicated power cord going from them to the power supply, they feed off of the 75 watts given to the PCI slot.
I may not know much but I have read around to educate myself before posting this, I was just looking for more open ideas and criticism. Thanks though for the answer.
admin answers:
For you, I would definately recamend something like a ATi HD3650 series.
These are PLENTY powerful for decoding duties like HD video content and blu-ray, also, it runs with NO external power, just off the PCI-express x16 port power. It’s also a slim height card and short length for small cases. And barely gets hot.
I built a few dedicated media center PCs and home theatre PCs and if you want a fairly new modern card that isnt totally crippled in performance, one of the BEST options is a HD3650.
The one I had was a genuine AMD and it had a VGA out, a DVI out, and a dedicated HDMI out and the card did some audio processing.
I know most nvidia cards in the same price/performance range either needed external power to function correctly, or were horribly UNDERpowered for the versions that didnt need external power. Im talking about any of the low end cards like a 6150 or a 7200 or even a 8400.
The HD3650 has a unified shader architecture that is just right for hardware accelerating other programs like most Flash based content and even more stuff to come.
Helen asks…
Will a 9500 gt run on a 300 watt power supply?
minimum 350 watts with +12 volt current rating of 18 amp amps. neweggs power supply calc brought me right at 293watts. Bestec model atx 0300d5wb rev x3
input 100-127v~8a 200-240~4a 50-60hz
output +12v—/18a -12v — 0.8a +5v—22a +55b—/29 +3.3v—17A 300watt max +5 and +3v 160watt max. copied straight from the power supply. or should i just get the 9400gt? i dont want the family computer to blow up
admin answers:
You are gonna need one larger than 350 watts.. What are you going to power the rest of the computer with? The hard drives and cd/dvd drive has to be figured in there along with the mother board
David asks…
Blinking green light on power supply and computer wont start… why?
computer wont start. has had trouble for a while now coming out of hibernation. and now it wont start at all.
So my hp computer’s power supply in back… a bestec 250w… is blinking green when the plug is in.
i know that usually means power supply is broke…
when i go into the computer and unplug the 20pin connector from the motherboard and then plug in the power supply it no longer blinks green. it’s solid like usual. but if i go and plug in the 20pin connector and plug the cord in the supply again it blinks.
does this mean it’s the motherboard? or could it still be the power supply?
admin answers:
Cheapest way to verify that is to get another power supply and try it. If it powers on. Good. You fixed it. If it still does not power on then it’s the systemboard and you can return the power supply if needed.
Linda asks…
BEST possible graphic card for me?
Hello, I have a dell studio desktop 540 with intel q6600(G0 stepping 95w, no ocing) and only 1 HD. The system comes with a 6pin BESTEC 350W PSU(+12VA/12A, +12VB/18A). I was hoping if anyone can tell me what is the best possible video card i can have to run it safely at full load because I want to play Crysis. I was thinking about the new Radeon HD 5750 (max load 86w) or the Radeon HD 5770 (max load 108W). I would appreciate it if anyone can help me out. Thanks
admin answers:
Hmm.. If you are going to buy a high end card with your quad core I would probably buy a new psu. Maybe a good brand 500w.
My 9800gt + amd 6000+ (dual core 3.1ghz) nearly died from my 400w psu. However that was a no brand psu so i’m not sure.
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