AMD - Piledriver chitchat

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

10% is still far higher than a lot of systems use though - 10% of 500W is still 50W, whereas modern systems may idle at 15W or lower. And even so we don't see that many platinum PSUs at sensible power ratings or prices.

But even when they make the lower wattage PSUs,they are expensive and when they don't sell well they stop making them.

You would think a picoPSU and a power block should not be massively expensive,but even my 120W picoPSU with a 60W Seasonic power block was around £30 secondhand!

[Xlucine]

10% is still far higher than a lot of systems use though - 10% of 500W is still 50W, whereas modern systems may idle at 15W or lower. And even so we don't see that many platinum PSUs at sensible power ratings or prices.

Efficiency is calculated using the supplied power at that load, so a 90% efficient PSU providing 50W would only lose 5w or so

[scaryjim]

Efficiency is calculated using the supplied power at that load, so a 90% efficient PSU providing 50W would only lose 5w or so

The point is that a PSU only has to pass at certain values, so a platinum rated 500W PSU isn't guaranteed to be 90% efficient below 50W DC load. Most PCs idle at < 50W from the wall, i.e. after efficiency losses, and since most PSUs struggle to hit 80% efficient at very low loads you're actually looking at DC loads of less than 40W (much lower, in some cases). Pick up a 750W Platinum PSU and that's only a 5% load, well outside the guaranteed efficiency range.

Besides, I don't get why people think 85% or 90% efficient is good: if you ordered a pint of beer and only got 85% of it you wouldn't be too happy...

[DanceswithUnix]

Efficiency is calculated using the supplied power at that load, so a 90% efficient PSU providing 50W would only lose 5w or so

Absolutely, but I think we need a better metric for the general population to understand which can drive the power waste down. Something like "10W in Farmville".

We have lots of CPU and GPU synthetic benchmarks, I don't remember ever seeing one for power measurement.

[Agent]

People are forgetting that DC-DC PSUs and the power blocks are massively overpriced though.

Plenty of cheap ones on Ebay. They are effectively clones, but I've used a few. They are made up of so few (and exposed components) you know what you're getting really. For example: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/DC-24pin-1...item43c8934a0e

Power brick is another matter. Just keep an eye out for friends throwing old laptops away. I even managed to pick one up last time I went to the local council tip - they had a separate area for electronics like laptops. Free power bricks if there are any kicking about

[watercooled]

For smaller systems, I've used and tested (under load with a 'scope) one of these http://www.amazon.co.uk/Genuine-CWT-.../dp/B004HCCVLI which seems to be a great little PSU for a decent price, they even use pretty heavy gauge 16AWG cable.

Of course, it pays to be aware of the huge amount of fake AC-DC power bricks on Ebay/Amazon though.

[Agent]

Nice price if it really is a genuine CWT.

[watercooled]

So, I assume those clones seem OK to you? I might give them a shot myself next time I'm looking for something like that.

As much as I like the 'original' ones, they're arguably still built down to a cost and are really quite expensive to buy for what they are, as CAT said.

TBH I wasn't too impressed with what I think is a genuine accessory: http://linitx.com/product/4pin-12v-a...icopsu80/13551
Yeah, it's really only that long. I'm not exactly sure what I expected, but it's just uselessly short, I don't think I've even encountered any motherboards where the AUX connector is so close to the 24-pin.

[AETAaAS]

Something I've been keeping an eye out for has finally surfaced; an aftermarket FS1B/AM1 cooler. Not that I'm worried about the cooling requirements but rather the height of the standard cooler and the some of the narrower mITX cases kicking about; some cutting off as soon as the IO shield does.



Image credits: Toms Hardware and Techpowerup

[scaryjim]

65W TDP support for AM1? Do they know something we don't?

As I've said once before, I reckon this http://www.scan.co.uk/products/north...-graphic-cards would fit an AM1 board if you used the GPU moutning kit, due to the 2 hole mounting mechanism. I've actually still got one of those spare I think, but no AM1 set up to test it with.....

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Is it me or am I being unreasonable,when I think Mantle is more about AMD improving the competitiveness of its CPUs,more than graphics cards per-se?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Plenty of cheap ones on Ebay. They are effectively clones, but I've used a few. They are made up of so few (and exposed components) you know what you're getting really. For example: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/DC-24pin-1...item43c8934a0e

Power brick is another matter. Just keep an eye out for friends throwing old laptops away. I even managed to pick one up last time I went to the local council tip - they had a separate area for electronics like laptops. Free power bricks if there are any kicking about

The problem is that unless I can get some reviews of them,the Chinese ones can be hit and miss,the higher wattage you go. IIRC,I read some bad things about some of them,ie,overheating plus Ebay is not the best for warranties too!

Power bricks are a bit worse,since anything above 100W(even if it is the easier to get 19V ones and not the 12V ones),tend to be not cheap. I toyed with the idea of getting a 160W picoPSU(or equivalent) but the power blocks were expensive,and the cheapest 200W one would be basically me modifying a Dell jobbie manually.

[scaryjim]

Is it me or am I being unreasonable,when I think Mantle is more about AMD improving the competitiveness of its CPUs,more than graphics cards per-se?

No, you're absolutely spot on. Mantle is all about reducing the dependence on single threaded performance in 3D rendering, just like DX12 will be when it finally lands. That is absolutely about playing to AMDs CPU strengths, where you can get an 8 core CPU cheaper than Intel's cheapest 4-core CPU.

OTOH, all it will reduce is the latency for being able to composite and render a single frame. It won't effect how quickly the game engine can feed the GPU frames to render. I suspect that means that Mantle and DX12 will have the biggest impact on minimum frame rates when using lower-end CPUs. That should make for a smoother gaming experience, if not a faster one.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

No, you're absolutely spot on. Mantle is all about reducing the dependence on single threaded performance in 3D rendering, just like DX12 will be when it finally lands. That is absolutely about playing to AMDs CPU strengths, where you can get an 8 core CPU cheaper than Intel's cheapest 4-core CPU.

OTOH, all it will reduce is the latency for being able to composite and render a single frame. It won't effect how quickly the game engine can feed the GPU frames to render. I suspect that means that Mantle and DX12 will have the biggest impact on minimum frame rates when using lower-end CPUs. That should make for a smoother gaming experience, if not a faster one.

I thought so. I mentioned it somewhere else,and a whole load of people just jumped on me saying I was talking crap.

[Agent]

So, I assume those clones seem OK to you? I might give them a shot myself next time I'm looking for something like that.

As much as I like the 'original' ones, they're arguably still built down to a cost and are really quite expensive to buy for what they are, as CAT said.

TBH I wasn't too impressed with what I think is a genuine accessory: http://linitx.com/product/4pin-12v-a...icopsu80/13551
Yeah, it's really only that long. I'm not exactly sure what I expected, but it's just uselessly short, I don't think I've even encountered any motherboards where the AUX connector is so close to the 24-pin.

Well I hate to use the phase "mine has been fine", because a sample size of 2 is quite small ....but mine have been okay.
One of them actually looks *exactly* like the old official Pico I have kicking about, right down to the PCB.

The problem is that unless I can get some reviews of them,the Chinese ones can be hit and miss,the higher wattage you go. IIRC,I read some bad things about some of them,ie,overheating plus Ebay is not the best for warranties too!

Power bricks are a bit worse,since anything above 100W(even if it is the easier to get 19V ones and not the 12V ones),tend to be not cheap. I toyed with the idea of getting a 160W picoPSU(or equivalent) but the power blocks were expensive,and the cheapest 200W one would be basically me modifying a Dell jobbie manually.

The official Pico is hit and miss IMO. I've had 2 fail on me (one got replaced). It wasn't even being pushed either. The entire system was well under 80 watt at the time (it was the 120W unit) and it failed when starting it up. The second one I suspect was age related, but it was only around 4 years old.

It's the power brick that's the most important part. The Pico / clone really is doing a simple job of DC/DC voltage alteration. The clone I had used solid polymer caps and standard R47 fixed inductor (you'd struggle to screw one of these up!), along with a few chips for regulation, diodes and various SMD stuff.

At the end of the day if it blows, it's 12 quid. The chances of it taking anything out are pretty slim IMO.
For me, I wasn't going to spend the cost of the CPU/Mobo again on a PSU, which is what some of the real Picos can get to. But if you're using more expensive parts, I guess I can understand why you'd spend a bit more. It's all relative.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Well I hate to use the phase "mine has been fine", because a sample size of 2 is quite small ....but mine have been okay.
One of them actually looks *exactly* like the old official Pico I have kicking about, right down to the PCB.



The official Pico is hit and miss IMO. I've had 2 fail on me (one got replaced). It wasn't even being pushed either. The entire system was well under 80 watt at the time (it was the 120W unit) and it failed when starting it up. The second one I suspect was age related, but it was only around 4 years old.

It's the power brick that's the most important part. The Pico / clone really is doing a simple job of DC/DC voltage alteration. The clone I had used solid polymer caps and standard R47 fixed inductor (you'd struggle to screw one of these up!), along with a few chips for regulation, diodes and various SMD stuff.

At the end of the day if it blows, it's 12 quid. The chances of it taking anything out are pretty slim IMO.
For me, I wasn't going to spend the cost of the CPU/Mobo again on a PSU, which is what some of the real Picos can get to. But if you're using more expensive parts, I guess I can understand why you'd spend a bit more. It's all relative.

Like I said the power bricks are expensive once you start going much above 100W and want something half decent,unless you are willing to find that old Dell 200W jobbie and modify it.

Edit!!

The reason why I am interested in higher wattage DC-DC PSUs are down to builds like this:

http://forums.overclockers.com.au/sh....php?t=1071009

Second Edit!!

The Dell DA2 200W is the power block I am talking about.IIRC,it is made by Delta.

Third Edit!!

Another build:

http://www.silentpcreview.com/forums...ic.php?t=50001