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Power Supply PS3 Power Supply ?

stevey500

Trash Compacter
Original poster
Feb 16, 2017
46
37
So, in the search far and wide for the best and most budget friendly (aside from the expensive GPU of course) way to piece a small form factor high performance rig; power supplies are all over the place. I have run into a handful of case options in the category of the Logic Supply MC600. These cases are small, workable, nothing too flashy but they add concern of power supply options.

Being that I'm running the 1080 mini and a 55-something watt tdp cpu, having some overhead wattage would be smart. I purchased a pcipsu power supply unit just to power the motherboard itself before I grabbed myself a big GPU; I was powering it with the 220W Dell 12v power supply until we had a power brown-out last week and burned up that Dell brick.

Digging in my misc. parts box in my basement this morning, I come across three different playstation 3 consoles and grabbed all of the power supplies out of them. I realize the output 3.3, 5, and a single large 12v rail. I did some quick math with what's labeled on the ps3 (classic fat 1st gen) power supply and man oh man, 380 watts in that relatively small PSU.



If I were to even begin attempting to use one of the PS3 power supplies, I would like to clear up some concerns in my head before I do so.

I would be using the PicoPSU to obviously power the motherboard/cpu coming from the PS3 psu, from there, I'd have to split off from the single 12v rail on into the 8pin PCIE connector (connecting the three +12v wires together.) Is this feasible? I'm unsure if current ATX power supplies all come off of the same rail circuit or not, is there a bad idea in doing this?

Looking at the Asus AOG small form factor computer shows me they are using TWO different external power bricks, one for the computer and one for the GPU, that doesn't cause issues having two completely separate 12v incoming lines?

Just trying to open my mind to more brickless power supply options in the SFF community.
 

Thehack

Spatial Philosopher
Creator
Mar 6, 2016
2,813
3,670
J-hackcompany.com
So, in the search far and wide for the best and most budget friendly (aside from the expensive GPU of course) way to piece a small form factor high performance rig; power supplies are all over the place. I have run into a handful of case options in the category of the Logic Supply MC600. These cases are small, workable, nothing too flashy but they add concern of power supply options.

Being that I'm running the 1080 mini and a 55-something watt tdp cpu, having some overhead wattage would be smart. I purchased a pcipsu power supply unit just to power the motherboard itself before I grabbed myself a big GPU; I was powering it with the 220W Dell 12v power supply until we had a power brown-out last week and burned up that Dell brick.

Digging in my misc. parts box in my basement this morning, I come across three different playstation 3 consoles and grabbed all of the power supplies out of them. I realize the output 3.3, 5, and a single large 12v rail. I did some quick math with what's labeled on the ps3 (classic fat 1st gen) power supply and man oh man, 380 watts in that relatively small PSU.



If I were to even begin attempting to use one of the PS3 power supplies, I would like to clear up some concerns in my head before I do so.

I would be using the PicoPSU to obviously power the motherboard/cpu coming from the PS3 psu, from there, I'd have to split off from the single 12v rail on into the 8pin PCIE connector (connecting the three +12v wires together.) Is this feasible? I'm unsure if current ATX power supplies all come off of the same rail circuit or not, is there a bad idea in doing this?

Looking at the Asus AOG small form factor computer shows me they are using TWO different external power bricks, one for the computer and one for the GPU, that doesn't cause issues having two completely separate 12v incoming lines?

Just trying to open my mind to more brickless power supply options in the SFF community.

12V is 12V. As long as it matches the ripple specs you're good to go. Issue with running a 1080 is GPUs have very high current spikes. Depending on the PSU, it may not be built to handle it.



As you can see, it has quiet a few spikes above 250W, and a couple hitting 300W.

Older PSU runs off separate rails and they worked fine. It used to be better to design a PSU with multiple rails. However, as GPU got more power hungry, we have changed to single rail power as it was hard to load balance the rails.

The Asus ROG is a bit iffy as they use 19.5V AC Adapters. Not sure what kind of set up they got.

Addon: I checked the efficiency on the PSU, and they kinda suck. ~75-80% on it. At 300W usage, you're dumping 60W worth of heat, effectively cooling an additional i5.

http://www.psdevwiki.com/ps3/Power_Supply
 
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