Upgrading PSU Question

[IndeliblyInked]

I'm planning a gaming build that's showing 475 watts on one GPU but I plan on upgrading to SLI in the future. If I get a 650w fully modular one now, when I upgrade to SLI can I just leave all the cords together in the build and swap out the new unit?

Is this a better option than getting a higher wattage psu now in preparation of upgrading to SLI?

 

[lakimens]

I suggest you get a higher wattage now, because you'll be wasting double the money for your SLI upgrade.
Get a G3 850W now and when you get a second GPU, you won't need to get a new PSU.

 

[Aspiring techie]

What are the specs for your build? If you will be running two low end GPU's such as the GTX 1050, then you should be fine with 650w. If not, then you may want to consider something more substantial.
Also, it's a good idea to have a PSU that can power at least 100w more than you need.

 

[IndeliblyInked]

What are the specs for your build? If you will be running two low end GPU's such as the GTX 1050, then you should be fine with 650w. If not, then you may want to consider something more substantial.
Also, it's a good idea to have a PSU that can power at least 100w more than you need.

This will be for 1080ti so it goes up to 725w.

 

[Aspiring techie]

If you are planning on a 1080ti SLI in the future, I recommend getting at least an 850w. According to Tom's review the 1080ti consumes on average about 250w. Assuming that the rest of your system consumes about 120w, then the bare minimum you need is 620w.

725w is the bare minimum I'd recommend simply because with a system like that, you really should have at least 150w extra than you need to account for aging and other things.

 

[Tom Tancredi]

Also like to point out, most 'rigs' with SLI 1080ti are usually sporting a 1KW or 1200KW to also power all the COOLING you will need (you need MASSIVE cooling!!!) which is normally water cool for such high end rigs, and that is MORE power demands for that too.

Second point: MOST GAMES DO NOT SUPPORT SLI! Normally SLI is used because people are doing either 4K Gaming (which means they mod the heck out of some games like GTA 5 with UltraPoly Mesh AND true 4K Textures to have it LOOK 4K), HEAVY VR, OR because they are Quad screening or more (Penny Traders usually need SLI for the 6-8 Screen setups they use).

Thirdly, you need a BEAST of a Board, HDD AND CPU to KEEP UP with (not bottle neck) the SLI. Just because you get SLI doesn't mean it goes 'faster'. If your running say a i5-6xxx with 1080TI SLI, the i5 can only handle so many threads and is making the SLI wait. If your running a normal 5400 RPM disk drive, again everything is waiting for the drive to 'sent' all the data to be processed. Etc.

In PC side you really need to manage multiple pieces across the processing platform for the gains you want.

 

[Rexper]

Do not mix modular cables: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDsC_PNo84I

I suggest a high quality 750w power supply.