Noob needs HD5870 power advice

[Traciatim]

The card requires you to have a 500 Watt power supply unit at minimum if you use it in a high-end system. That power supply needs to have (in total accumulated) at least 40 Amps available on the +12 volts rails.

Radeon HD 5870 CrossfireX

My own graphics card says you need to have a 500 Watt power supply for single cards, and a 600watt for crossfire. Yet here is my machine sucking a grand total of 220 watts from the wall. Even if you assume the only thing using power in my machine is the graphics card and crossfires it it would be pulling 440 watts from the wall, on my 82% efficient power supply that would still only be delivering 360 watts . . . something that most good quality 450 - 500 watt power supplies can do without breaking a sweat.

Anyway, we get it, the era of incredibly inefficient heater style cards is over, and over the next two generations of both CPU's and GPU's things are much much better now. Hence the 220 watts in my machine that does only slightly less performance to 650+ watts that you're sporting.

That's why I just gave up and recommended the OP not bother buying a PSU and 5870, but sink the extra cash in to a 6870, or even 7850 if possible, since both offer similar or better performance for much less power.

 

[Hard Line]

My own graphics card says you need to have a 500 Watt power supply for single cards, and a 600watt for crossfire. Yet here is my machine sucking a grand total of 220 watts from the wall. Even if you assume the only thing using power in my machine is the graphics card and crossfires it it would be pulling 440 watts from the wall, on my 82% efficient power supply that would still only be delivering 360 watts . . . something that most good quality 450 - 500 watt power supplies can do without breaking a sweat.

Anyway, we get it, the era of incredibly inefficient heater style cards is over, and over the next two generations of both CPU's and GPU's things are much much better now. Hence the 220 watts in my machine that does only slightly less performance to 650+ watts that you're sporting.

That's why I just gave up and recommended the OP not bother buying a PSU and 5870, but sink the extra cash in to a 6870, or even 7850 if possible, since both offer similar or better performance for much less power.

I do agree with your recommendation of getting a new card if possible. I may have performance close to top end current hardware, but I am paying for it in the electric bill.