Gigabyte Geforce GTX 960 4 gig randomly crashes

[albn99]

Symptoms: I installed the Gigabyte Geforce GTX 960 today, and discover it causes some instability including random reboots. It was rather annoying. Prior to this, I had no issues with the previous card, which is an ASUS HD 7770. I had to remove the new video card and go back to this one (stable as ever now) to investigate what might be going on, including asking you fine folks.

What I tried:: Updating drivers, including the motherboard drivers.
Uninstalling all the old video card drivers.

What I suspect it might be: ...but I am not 100% certain. I am going to guess it is my power supply because not enough juice means the PC goes night-night. What puzzles me is my power supply says it is 850W, so it should be enough. Upon closer inspection and looking up what kind of PSU I have, the KENTEK 850 Watt, it apparently is not a very good quality power supply. I am by no means an electrician, so I do not want to guess here.

What do you guys think it might be? If it is the power supply, will this one do as a replacement? https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B018JYHBE6/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER If not, what would you suggest?

Specs on items that take juice:
AMD FX-6100
GA-78LMT-USB3 mainboard
AMD HD 7770
1 IDE HDD
1 SATA HDD
6 120mm fans
Giant aftermarket CPU cooler

Thank you in advance for your assistance.

Update: The new power supply fixed the problem. Ran tests and everything. Thank you so much for your help. Now I can enjoy my new video card. The old one went right to the trash. I am not even keeping it as a spare.

 

[R_1]

http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2042228/psu-legit.html

they discuss that power supply here, the kentek one.

the 700W from evga is a massively better unit

the hd 7770 needs 1 less amp than the GTX960
https://forum-en.msi.com/faq/article/power-requirements-for-graphics-cards

 

[simon12]

Yes its definitely the power supply I made the same mistake myself years ago, budget PSUs by crap brands can label them as there peak power they can maintain only for a few seconds and what they can actually supply in normal use could be a fraction of this, any decent make will say the Ws it can actually supply continuously. You only need a decent 400W power supply.

 

[albn99]

Thank you both for the quick answers. Out of morbid curiosity, if a decent 400W would run all my components OK, why do I see 1000W+ floating out there, and what would be needed to use that much?

Finally, Since I used this cheap PSU for the new video card, could I have damaged the card? I am wondering if I damaged my other components as well..

You both added very helpful information, and I apologize I could not pick both as giving the answer.

 

[simon12]

1000W+ is for running multiple cards especially older gen ones that could use up to 300W each. Unless a power supply fails in a spectacular fashion ie with smoke and sparks its unlikely but not impossible to have damaged anything.

 

[albn99]

1000W+ is for running multiple cards especially older gen ones that could use up to 300W each. Unless a power supply fails in a spectacular fashion ie with smoke and sparks its unlikely but not impossible to have damaged anything.

Thank you. I learn something new everyday. I feel really dumb not doing my homework in something as basic as choosing a decent power supply. This could also explain why my wife's computer was not working and randomly crashing, since that utilized the same cheap power supply.

Hard lesson learned, indeed. Folks, do not make the same mistake I made.