GTX680 2 or 4 GiG? Onboard sound or soundcard [RESOLVED]

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Necromancer
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Re: GTX680 2 or 4 GiG? Onboard sound or soundcard [RESOLVED]

Post by Necromancer »

and? what did you order?!
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Ash2Dust
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Re: GTX680 2 or 4 GiG? Onboard sound or soundcard [RESOLVED]

Post by Ash2Dust »

Good reads, I'm in the process of selecting hardware myself with a blindfold. I'm passing on to my wife my I5-760, motherboard, RAM and PSU, to rationalize my upgrade.

I'm going to keep my pissy 580GTX just because it will cost a lot more to replace for a little more performance. I will probably never do SLI and its good to read that 500 watt PSU is roughly good for one GPU. Was looking at 450 watts but a basic certified 80 at 500 seems to make sense, just need to make sure it has the right connectors for everything.

Sound card, I'm looking at onboard ALC because I use 5.1 speakers and not headphones. But seeing Xonar mentioned in many places, I do have the option of adding that later. I have an original X-Fi laying around, but haven't used it in a couple years.
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Re: GTX680 2 or 4 GiG? Onboard sound or soundcard

Post by jddes »

Necromancer wrote:a 650W power supply should suffice for any future single GPU system.
as everyone said above, quality of the PSU is more important. it should last you many many years and a high efficiency will save you some money during the years of work.

I was curious about that claim of saving money because you have a more efficient PSU. So I ran some numbers:

Price of electricity: 0.05$/kWh (obviously depends a lot on where you life, but you can scale the results accordingly)
Power usage of PC using 100% efficient PSU: 500W
Power usage of PC using 80% efficient PSU: 500W/0.8 = 625 W
Time per day using the PC at non-negligeable power: 3h/day
Energy used per year for efficient PSU: 500 W* 3 h/day * 365 day/year = 547 kWh/year
Energy used per year for efficient PSU: 625 W* 3 h/day * 365 day/year = 684 kWh/year
Yearly cost for efficient PC: 27$/year
Yearly cost for efficient PC: 34$/year
Yearly savings: 34$/year-27$/year = 7$/year

Of course, your numbers might vary because of the rate of electricity or the time using the PC at full load, or the time you plan on keeping this PC, but it does not seem like very significant savings. Of course the noise argument stands.
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Re: GTX680 2 or 4 GiG? Onboard sound or soundcard [RESOLVED]

Post by Necromancer »

i decided to check your numbers based on our local rates:
additional 0.127075$ for every KW/h (after 17% tax but before additional scheduled raise of 6% in the cost of KW/h)

Yearly cost for efficient PSU:
3.945$ * 12 + 0.127075$*547h = 47.34 + 69.51 = 116.85$
Yearly cost for 80% efficient PSU:
3.945$ * 12 + 0.127075$*684h = 47.34 + 86.9193 = 134.2593
difference: 17$ a year.
typical PSU serves fro more then 5 years, thats more then 17*5= 85$ saved.
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Re: GTX680 2 or 4 GiG? Onboard sound or soundcard [RESOLVED]

Post by Ash2Dust »

It takes quality parts to achieve 80% which means less likelihood of frying motherboard or other parts. The system will last longer saving more money.
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