Monitoring power supply

[John99]

Any programs that do this?

[draqon]

heh? a PC software?

http://www.tufts.edu/tie/tci/pdf/Com...0brochures.PDF

here is a nifty device that monitors power usage of any appliance



http://www.seasonicusa.com/power_angel.htm

[RubiksMaster]

But that won't work for measuring the power going into the PC internals.

You could try SpeedFan. I don't know exactly what you're looking to monitor, but it does display the actual voltages put out by your rails. Right now I can see that my +5V is actual 5.10. The program is mostly for temperature monitoring and fan speed control, but it's pretty nifty.

[MacGyver1968]

You have to actually have the sensors on your motherboard to read voltages. A quick look in your bios settings will let you know if you motherboard supports it....or you can just post the brand and model of the computer, or the motherboard model if its a "built" system...and we'll look it up for you. If it does, there usually software that is included in the motherboard drivers disk that will let you read the voltages.

[John99]

Thanks. I want to see if i have too many hardrives and other stuuf for my power supply. I am not good at electrical stuff so it needs to be easy to understand.

My motherboard is Asus.

http://support.asus.com/download/dow...ap&mapindex=11

[ashura]

Do you know what your PSU is? If so, you can just post the specs of your machine and it should be easy enough to judge. The average user never has to worry about not having enough power.

[MacGyver1968]

Try clicking on that motherboard link, and look for the tab "utilites" scroll down and look for

"ASUS PC Probe II V1.01.05 Install Program for Windows 32bit 2000/XP/2003 & 64bit Windows XP/2003."

I bet this a program that will let you check out what you seek.

[John99]

I am helping my friend fix his computer and it has four hard drives and DVD drive with four fans. The power supply is probably 500 watts. How many watts does a hard drive use? Why do they sell 750watt PSU's? Seems like overkill.

[ashura]

500 watts will most likely be fine, depending on the quality of the PSU. Chances are he's safe.

And yeah, it's mainly for bragging rights, although some people do legitimately need all that power. When I built my current PC back in 06, I wanted the best of the best so I got a 1kw PSU with the rest of my stuff.

[MacGyver1968]

agreed....unless your running like..two video cards, or seriously overclocking...500w should be plenty to support any system.

[John99]

500 watts will most likely be fine

500w should be plenty to support any system.

Thats good to know.

It is name brand like thermaltake or something like that but there is a hard drive bay in front of it and dont want to take the cahnce of taking it apart and not working anymore.

[cosmictraveler]

I have a Belkin UPS which I recommend for anyone to have in case of power surges or no power at all. It gives me up to 30 minutes with a battery back up and software that gives me everything I need to know about my power levels both input and output.