Will a 300 W video card work with a 270 W PSU ?

BicycleRow · 31 Oct 2016

Hey,

I was looking up some video cards today, and I stumbled upon the ASUS GeForce GT 710. It's a nice card, for the price, but my PSU is only 270 W and here it says that the card requires at least 300 W:
GeForce GT 710 | Specifications | GeForce

And my motherboard is an ATX, I think (Don't know if that matters). Here it is: HP and Compaq Desktop PCs - Motherboard Specifications, MS-7525 (Boston) | HPÂ® Customer Support
Also, it's a normal card, and my system requires a low-profile one. Can it somehow fit in and run without any issues?

swarfega · 31 Oct 2016

Hi. Its not just the wattage that you have to be concerned with but the type of connector the graphics card you are interested in is using.

You also have to take into account the power requirements of the other components in your system and total them up. You can use the pcpartpicker to do this for you. Once you have added all your existing components it'l total up the wattage they use. It will also alert you to any incompatibilities.

As this article says, you *may* get away with a 300w PSU but that won't leave you for any future expansion.

Are you planning to game with this graphics card? I wouldn't expect decent framerates with it from most modern games.

As the article says:

The GT 710 costs less to buy than a single top-tier game, so if you can afford to buy games, you really should be able to budget for a faster card than this.

RoasterMen · 31 Oct 2016

You're safe. I'm running a system with a 250W power supply and overclocked my GPU and it's running just fine.

300W PSU is overkill for your system.

If you need to upgrade your GPU to a mid-end one then you should consider getting a bigger power supply (in terms of wattage).

BicycleRow · 31 Oct 2016

I calculated the wattage on pcpartpicker and it said at least 250 W is recommended for my system with the GT 710. It may be a little bit more because I probably missed something.

As for the games, I'm not a huge gamer. I'll probably play some CS: GO, Hearthstone and LoL when I have time. And my monitor is only 1024x768, so I think it'll do the job for me. So, will it be able to run without any problems?

RoasterMen · 31 Oct 2016

It should.

TairikuOkami · 31 Oct 2016

You are missing the efficiency and reliability though. PSU should be the double wattage of the current usage.
PSU are relatively cheap and they last 10 years minimum. I would not buy anything less than branded 500W.
Not to mention, that a cheap 250W PSU can die at 200W and a more expensive 250W can last up to 350W.

bobkn · 31 Oct 2016

BicycleRow said:

Hey,

I was looking up some video cards today, and I stumbled upon the ASUS GeForce GT 710. It's a nice card, for the price, but my PSU is only 270 W and here it says that the card requires at least 300 W:
GeForce GT 710 | Specifications | GeForce

And my motherboard is an ATX, I think (Don't know if that matters). Here it is: HP and Compaq Desktop PCs - Motherboard Specifications, MS-7525 (Boston) | HPÂ® Customer Support
Also, it's a normal card, and my system requires a low-profile one. Can it somehow fit in and run without any issues?

I notice that the other posters missed an essential point: you write that your PC requires a low profile card. A full height card won't fit at all.

If you need a low-profile GT 710, they exist:

http://www.evga.com/Products/Product...02G-P3-2713-KR

The card doesn't need an auxiliary PCI-E power connection. The maximum power used by it is 25W. Your CPU (Intel E7400) has a TDP of 65W. I doubt that you'd need a 300W PSU with that combination.

A also see that the Pavilion was sold with a GT 220 card, which needs up to 58W. (I'm not sure that the PSU is the same, but I'd bet that it is.)

A suggestion: don't sink much money into an old Socket 775 system.