PSU for 3060/3060ti

Aethaeryn

I am seeing 3060s pop up in stores. . as well as bundles.

I could have picked one up today but would have had to drive an hour each way and there was a disclaimer about the price possibly changing on pick-up.

I noticed that I could get one closer bundled with a PSU. . (also Canada Computers but no disclaimer)

I have had a Corsaire 550W 80plus Gold since I got my GTX1060 (current card)

I saw the bundle had a 600W 80plus Bronze

It seems like 550 might be fine. . but I wanted to get thoughts on it before deciding how to go ahead.


Is the 550 Gold going to be about as good as the 600 Bronze?  It seems like the 50 Watts isn't a big deal but  I wasn't sure.  I have an Ryzen 5 3600 and 2 NVME SSDs on the motherboard and one HDD.

Aethaeryn

Actually if I got the bundle and a case I could put together another PC for my kid with a i5 2500

Ridelynn

Gold/Bronze don't really mean much. You can have a great Bronze that does better than a crappy Platinum - but most crappy PSUs aren't going to go out of their way to pay to have their units certified anything - or just outright lie about it.

A 3060 is only about a 200W card. Your 550 would be on the low end, but provided it's a good unit and not too old, should be ok. Corsair used to be a solid brand, but in the last 4 years or so have become more hit or miss...

PSUs are notoriously hard to review subjectively, and are only made by a handful of OEMs - with most of them out there just being rebranded from one of those OEMs. Seasonic is the only brand out there I universally trust, the rest I look for decent reviews.

You are right, 50W isn't a big deal... but age of the PSU matters as well, as they do degrade over time. 50W while brand new isn't much, but a 5 yr old 550 may only be able to "safely" put out 450 or 400, then it's a much bigger gap.

Cleffy

550w for a new PSU should be more than enough for your setup with a 3060. It's when a GPU has 2 or more 8-pin connectors, you have multiple processors, or you have an array of HDDs that you need something more powerful.
How old is it and what is the PSU model? There is a difference in who made the CS verse TX. I think age would be the bigger issue. 

Aethaeryn

The one I have is about 3 years old I think.  Seasonic G-series modular 

The one that is bundled with the card is EVGA 600 BQ, 80+ BRONZE 600W

I am not sure it is the best PSU. . by that I mean maybe it is on the low end.  For some reason it is $35 cheaper on newegg.ca  I wonder if Canada computers is trying to 'sell' the value of the bundle.

Quizzical

Aethaeryn said:

I am not sure it is the best PSU. . by that I mean maybe it is on the low end.

I'll go further than that and say that I'm sure that that isn't the best power supply.  The only real question is just how bad it is, and it may or may not be good enough.  It's not "definitely a fire hazard" bad like some of the truly awful power supplies.  But if it were my computer, I'd sooner trust the Seasonic G-550 that you already have than the EVGA one.  Right now, EVGA will sell you that power supply for $55 and free shipping.  That's awfully cheap for a "600 W" power supply.

One problem is that power supply vendors commonly send their best power supplies to review sites, but offer other, cheaper ones that aren't very good.  The hope is that people will read reviews and think it's a good brand because the high end units are excellent, and then buy a lower end one that isn't very good.  In order to know if a particular power supply is good, you have to find a good review of that exact unit, and for most power supplies, such a review simply hasn't been done.  Well, the other problem is that most of the good power supply review sites have stopped running reviews or shut down entirely, so new power supplies mostly don't even get reviewed anymore.

The difference between "gold" and "bronze" is just energy efficiency.  That will save you a little bit of money in future electricity costs, but that's about it.  What really matters is how clean the electricity that the unit delivers when you try to pull however much your computer will pull from it, and that's hard to find out.

Your processor is officially rated at 88 W turbo power.  Add in a 200 W video card and you're still under 300 W.  I usually budget 100 W for "everything else", which is typically an overestimate, at least if we're talking about components that draw power from the power supply.  (Monitors don't go through the power supply.)  If the video card stays inside of 200 W, you'll probably never pull 400 W from the power supply.  That would be fine on a unit that Seasonic rates as 550 W.

But the video card probably won't stay inside of 200 W.  If you get one at pure stock settings, it might, but the factory overclocked cards might well go way over that and pull 250 W or 300 W or something.  And I'd be leery of hooking up a 300 W video card to a 550 W power supply, even if you do have a relatively low power CPU.

Cleffy

In general, if a PSU is cheap they will use cheap components that may not last as long as more expensive brands. However, the days of terrible PSUs are over. Most PSUs on the market should reliably last 5 years. There are usually other benefits to more expensive PSUs like silent operation, better warranty, and better support.

The EVGA model is manufactured by Andyson which is a bargain brand PSU. Your Corsair was either made by ChannelWell or GreatWall. If your PSU is under 5 years old, I would keep the Corsair. Even if it's older than 5 years old. I would still probably keep the Corsair. If it was over 10 years old. I would consider a different PSU that isn't this EVGA model.

Vrika

Quizzical said:

The difference between "gold" and "bronze" is just energy efficiency.  That will save you a little bit of money in future electricity costs, but that's about it.  What really matters is how clean the electricity that the unit delivers when you try to pull however much your computer will pull from it, and that's hard to find out.

Energy efficiency is still the best quality meter you've sometimes got when there's no review of PSU model available, since achieving good efficiency is a lot about placing a bit extra/extra large components to make the PSU more effective. Also more energy efficient PSU produces less heat at same load and if all else is equal that means less heat stress.

When you can find a review or some info of the exact PSU model you're planning to buy it's good. But when you can't you're basically stuck at looking things like energy efficiency and length of the warranty.

Ridelynn

Vrika said:

When you can find a review or some info of the exact PSU model you're planning to buy it's good. But when you can't you're basically stuck at looking things like energy efficiency and length of the warranty.

Unfortunately, the efficiency has almost nothing to do with the quality, and a lot of manufacturers (especially the lesser named ones) outright lie. Warranty is good though - so long as you know it's a company that will honor it - although it doesn't necessarilyt mean it's a good PSU either -- as for most people, and companies, so long as the PSU can turn on, it's "Good", even if it's catching the rest of your computer on fire.

If you can't find a review - I would not buy it. Plenty of PSUs out there do have quality reviews, and there are enough utter junk PSUs out there that it just isn't worth risking your entire build to not do a bit of research and get a good one.

Cleffy

Tomshardware tends to do a very good job with reviewing PSUs. They do a variety of tests from power draw to efficiency to thermals, and supply the OEM. You can get a list of power supply OEMs and for what PSUs from Anandtech.

Researching PSUs is the most difficult thing when building. Personally I have just defaulted to get a Seasonic. But there are other OEMs that sell PSUs that are equivalent to Seasonic. It just takes time to research which ones and look at good reviews on them.

Ridelynn

The site I used, HardOCP still has old reviews archived, but he shut the site down a couple of years ago.

The the old crew from HardOCP split off and founded a new site - they don't have a ton of reviews yet, but what they have is among the best, including many PSUs.

https://www.thefpsreview.com/

Aethaeryn

Maybe I iwll just stick that PSU in with the old parts I have and build that 2nd PC after all.  i5 2500k with a 1060 should be good for my son and that PSU should be okay with that . . I will just keep it outside in case it starts on fire