Power! It’s a good thing…

This has surely been written about somewhere, but I felt compelled to bring it up here: Power.

I’m talking about the power supply unit (PSU) in your computer. If you’re like me, you probably didn’t give much thought to that part of your hardware when you bought it. If you never open the case to add memory, disk drives, or extra cards, and only use USB components that have their own power source, then you are probably just fine.

But, just in case you are one of those folks who like to tweak things up a bit, I’d just like to add my two cents; check your power supply wattage.  Here’s why:

Every component you add to your computer, unless it has an external power supply, draws current from the PSU.  The PSU is rated for a certain number of watts, and the components use a certain number of watts (there are also amperage and voltage considerations, but those points are for another discussion).  The add-ins can use up a lot of watts quickly, and overloading your PSU can cause problems that may leave you wondering what is going on.  What’s more, you can permanently damage your computer!

You may think “But Jeff, I’ve got the best computer that (insert company name here) has for sale.  Certainly the PSU thingy will handle whatever I need it to do”.  Au Contraire, mon ami. Most computer manufacturers use the lowest wattage PSU they can get away with.  Why?  Cost control.  A 750 watt PSU from Newegg (great company, by the way) can cost up to $129.00.  A 300 watt PSU runs less than $30.00.  With economy of scale, it’s probably much less.  Besides, if a lower watt PSU can slowly erode your system’s innards, it won’t be long before you’ll be buying another computer; job security!  Don’t take my word for it, read your PSU tag yourself (yeah, you’ll probably have to open the case).  And, just to get an idea of how close you are to overloading, pop over to Newegg’s Power Supply Calculator and put in your system components as they are now, then re-calculate with one extra something (hard drive, video card, etc.) and see how much more power you’ll need.  The Antec site has a more technical version of the calculator.

Now, I’m not trying to make computer manufacturers out to be bad.  They have a business to run, and part of the ability to remain competitive is to contain costs.  Every penny counts, so matching PSU wattage to what is in the box is a reasonable way to save money.  And, it is likely that a considerable number of users will never add anything that overloads the PSU.  However, if you need more space for your family pictures or rapidly-expanding ITunes collection and decide to add an internal hard drive to your “Off The Shelf” computer, or you want to add a graphics card so you can watch YouTube videos on your flat-panel television, you should probably spring for a bigger PSU.  It will save you from problems later.