Power supply question

Crazy Puppy

Member
SoSH Member
Apr 8, 2006
1,887
Can someone recommend a power supply unit to replace what comes with this PC?
 
It has an Intel Core i5-4670 (3.4 Ghz) processor and 8 GB of RAM (DDR3 1600 Mhz). The product page doesn't list the power supply and looking at the HP site, I can't even find the exact machine -- all the HP ProDesk 400 machines listed on the HP website only have 4GB of RAM and show an i5-4570 processor, not 4670. Still, the power supply listed for those machines at HP is 240W, so I suspect that's what I'm getting.
 
I don't intend to add anything to this PC (more memory, graphics card, anything), but from everything I've read, it seems like I need to upgrade the power supply.
 
Do folks who know more about this stuff than me (pretty much everyone) agree, and if so, what should I be looking at in terms of wattage?
 
 

 
 

Couperin47

Member
SoSH Member
Crazy Puppy said:
 
Can someone recommend a power supply unit to replace what comes with this PC?
 
It has an Intel Core i5-4670 (3.4 Ghz) processor and 8 GB of RAM (DDR3 1600 Mhz). The product page doesn't list the power supply and looking at the HP site, I can't even find the exact machine -- all the HP ProDesk 400 machines listed on the HP website only have 4GB of RAM and show an i5-4570 processor, not 4670. Still, the power supply listed for those machines at HP is 240W, so I suspect that's what I'm getting.
 
I don't intend to add anything to this PC (more memory, graphics card, anything), but from everything I've read, it seems like I need to upgrade the power supply.
 
Do folks who know more about this stuff than me (pretty much everyone) agree, and if so, what should I be looking at in terms of wattage?
 
 
 
 
 
Read where ? HP, like Dell, is fairly notorious for using power supplies that are just barely sufficient for their low end boxes and of minimal efficiency and quality, but if you're not going to add any serious load... their supply should be OK. What concerns you ? Alternatively, you can easily build an equivalent box with higher quality for the same or less...why are you considering a prebuilt whose basic construction you find dubious ?
 

Crazy Puppy

Member
SoSH Member
Apr 8, 2006
1,887
Couperin47 said:
 
Read where ? HP, like Dell, is fairly notorious for using power supplies that are just barely sufficient for their low end boxes and of minimal efficiency and quality, but if you're not going to add any serious load... their supply should be OK. What concerns you ? Alternatively, you can easily build an equivalent box with higher quality for the same or less...why are you considering a prebuilt whose basic construction you find dubious ?
 
Thanks for the feedback. I'm not sure "barely sufficient" eases my mind much but I suppose it's better than "woefully inadequate."
 
To answer your questions -- I've never so much as opened the case of a PC, so building a machine myself is way out of my comfort zone. I just don't have the aptitude for that sort of thing. I don't find the box I linked above to be of dubious construction -- I'm actually quite pleased with the specs -- but when it didn't list the power supply, I started looking around and got a little nervous when I saw 240w on similar machines at HP. There have been threads here and on sites like Tom's Hardware where people have talked about power supply and have generally recommended something in the 350-450w range for a machine like the one I'm looking at, but I'm not nearly savvy enough to understand what's optimal and which pieces of the build I'm looking at might make 240w adequate. So that's why I asked.
 
I am willing to spend another $50-$100 if that gets me from "barely sufficient" to "good" or better. If you were building a machine and all the specs were as listed above (please suspend your disbelief for a moment), what would you put in for a power supply?
 

Couperin47

Member
SoSH Member
Crazy Puppy said:
 
Thanks for the feedback. I'm not sure "barely sufficient" eases my mind much but I suppose it's better than "woefully inadequate."
 
To answer your questions -- I've never so much as opened the case of a PC, so building a machine myself is way out of my comfort zone. I just don't have the aptitude for that sort of thing. I don't find the box I linked above to be of dubious construction -- I'm actually quite pleased with the specs -- but when it didn't list the power supply, I started looking around and got a little nervous when I saw 240w on similar machines at HP. There have been threads here and on sites like Tom's Hardware where people have talked about power supply and have generally recommended something in the 350-450w range for a machine like the one I'm looking at, but I'm not nearly savvy enough to understand what's optimal and which pieces of the build I'm looking at might make 240w adequate. So that's why I asked.
 
I am willing to spend another $50-$100 if that gets me from "barely sufficient" to "good" or better. If you were building a machine and all the specs were as listed above (please suspend your disbelief for a moment), what would you put in for a power supply?
 
It's not that simple. If we opened this box, we'll probably find a power supply with a label that rates it as 300w (that's what I'm seeing for ProDesk 400 G1 microtower models spec sheets) and that's probably accurate and sufficient for such a box, unless you load it up with additional components. I can take you to Newegg and, sorting the listings in ascending price, the first 4 pages of 450w to 500w power supplies will all be units that actually deliver less clean power than the unit in your HP, all by no-name or bottom feeder companies. Those who build boxes and do it sensibly normally start with known brand name 450w supplies from companies like Corsair, Antec, Seasonic and others...these can be had on sale for as little as $35 on sale and it makes no sense to go lower when you build, given those prices.
 
None of the major box makers (HP, Dell, Asus, Lenovo etc.) uses name brand power supplies, they all have custom units made for them, by the same factories that produce many of the name brand supplies... while their supplies are uninspiring, they are never complete junk, the consequences of that would come back to bite them badly... especially since the box you are buying includes 3 year on-site warranty. The only way you are going to get better quality at this price point is to build yourself..since that's not an option you're comfortable with... buy the HP, it's a good not great price, it's a sensible spec (best bang for the buck cpu, enough RAM to work well, decent size HD, optical drive) if you really want it to fly, add a 120/128 Gig SSD boot drive and the box will fly (and yes, the power supply wouldn't even notice the additional load this would draw).
 

Crazy Puppy

Member
SoSH Member
Apr 8, 2006
1,887
Thanks, that's extremely helpful. I do see now that the spec sheets say 300w for the microtower. Looks like it was the small form factor versions of the ProDesk 400 that list 240w psu.
 

Couperin47

Member
SoSH Member
Crazy Puppy said:
Thanks, that's extremely helpful. I do see now that the spec sheets say 300w for the microtower. Looks like it was the small form factor versions of the ProDesk 400 that list 240w psu.
 
Right, that form factor eliminates the possibility of adding anything except perhaps more memory so they get to that form factor by using a miniature supply, which is also reasonable.