My Dream Machine

Your video cards are rated at about 180W a piece. Your CPU needs about 90W. Taking into account the other components and spare capacity, I'd go for a PSU in the 600-700W range.

Yes what dmantione said sounds plentiful. 2 more tips:

1. If you want to overclock anything in a later stage, get 100-200W more.

2. Buy a good brand PSU! Do NOT safe on money with PSUs. Read lots of reviews.

Rnick, to be safe i would go for a 1000 watt PSU, it may be overkill, but what you have are rather powerful components and you DO NOT want to risk starving them for power or blowing them by over-extending a lower rated PSU.

Also, watts are not what is ultimatley important, Check the Amps too. Look for enough amps on the 12v rail and make sure it has enough connectors for both of your cards.

Finally, your cards will get mighty hot depending on what you are planning on playing, you may want to look in to after-market coolers for them.

Other than that, your rig looks like a beast.

Good Luck!

Exactly. 1000W is your minimum requirement. On such a good system anything lower than that is false economy.

That would be the bigger=better mentality, which in my experience is not true; when a PSU runs at only a small fraction of its capacity both its efficiency as its cos(phi) drop to bad levels. When designing HPC clusters (part of my job), I tend to use a 1000W PSU only for GPU clusters that have a dual cpu board, i.e. if you have a dual Opteron 2380 and 2 Nvidia 295's or even Tesla's, then it becomes interresting. If the customer wants just single CPU I always use much smaller ones, good power efficiency is an increasingly important quality aspect of a machine. My rule of thumb is that you need to take the maximum power consumption of a machine, and make the have PSU at minimum 15% extra capacity and at maximum 30%.

Ha, thanks. Hopefully I can afford this eventually.

dmantione is once again exactly right. Getting a 1000W PSU means it will run a lot in its 30-40% capacity range. In this range the PSU is very inefficient. We could argue about it in this thread, if you really want to know just google it.

Just get a PSU to fit your consumption needs, maybe a bit higher if you want to overclock and/or upgrade to heavier stuff in the future - remember that newer faster hardware can actually be quite low in energy consumption, faster stuff does not always mean it uses more power -, get a good brand, with stable rails (read reviews!) and I recommend modular PSUs to keep the mess in your case at bay.

When I was looking for a new PSU I actually found some great info on review sites. There are some great tests out there, so have a good look around.

I do plan on overclocking once I get it eventually. What sites have good reviews?

I can't link you anything at the moment but what I did was look for a PSU with enough wattage within my pricerange and then just type that name plus the word "review" in google. Results may vary depending on how widely sold the product is (for example, products only sold in africa will usually have few results and reviews, popular products sold in the US will give lots more results). Usually the top 5 results will get you one or two decent reviews. If you hit a decent site that doesn't recommend the product you searched a review of they usually give you tips as to which PSU is a better choice. So read that review and also search for that product on google to see what other sites think. Sites with a good reputation usually have excellent reviews too, but I prefer quantity over quality here, sort of. So I'd rather read 8 reviews of a product and draw my own conclusion from them, instead of relying on one review. Also, after chosing a PSU that you like check back with the local price. Sometimes a product will get a good rating because it offers good value for money, but that same product could cost 50% more in your country, making it only average value for money.

Above little story goes for pretty much any piece of PC hardware you buy.

Also, read customer reviews. Forget the rating, people that like the product will give it a 10 and people that have bad experiences with it will give it a 1, those numbers mean nothing. Instead, look for what people list as pros and cons, they will tell you more. Also, sometimes you get excellent tips from people, like <product x> is not compatible with <product y>. Review sites usually only test on one system and won't give you these tips.

Efficiency of a 'decent' PSU......note...from a DC load of 40% and up [in 240 VAC - my requirement] it's near enough to 1.00.

The results if you're using 115 VAC is significantly closer through the entire load range.

A good PSU will give you good results....it's why they are called 'good' ....;)

While these numbers are excellent, I think you are confusing power factor with efficiency. A good power factor means a low blind current. Efficiency is a different thing and in current state of the art PSU's the peak efficiency is about 95% while at 30-40% it still drops below 80%.

Again, still not all of them.

Whatever your criteria there will still be 'good' PSUs that are better than others.

Again mine

I'm on 240 VAC ... so as long as I'm somewhere between 200w and 1000w I'm gonna see bugger-all difference in 'efficiency'.

Splitting hairs sees my most likely power range.....over 200 and under 600 to be in the 'sweet spot' for a TruePower Quattro 1000.

I can't help it if there's practical reasons for a particular choice...;)

In that case you made a good PSU choice, congratulations. That doesn't mean all PSUs show these figures. Most of them still drop significantly at lower wattages. All the more reason to get a good PSU.

The good news is that PSUs are more and more under the critical eye of large err counsils or whatever you call them, that push them to make them more efficient. They have to become more efficient at every specific usage range (80% load, 50% load and 30% off the top of my head, but I could be off a bit). In order to earn the gold rating they have to be more than 80% efficient at each of these ranges iirc. Don't be surprised if your old it-came-with-my-case PSU drops below 50% on those ranges.

Yes....it's called the 80 Plus Computer Power Supply Program.

As I said...here and elsewhere....pay a good price...get a good product and ignore the armchair 'experts' who claim it's all a waste of money...;)

i knew i liked jafo

Well call me an "armchair expert" all you want, unless you work for a PSU company you are one yourself.

The thing is, I'm not saying powerful PSUs are bad, but

1) buying an overly powerful PSU with wattages you'll never use ALWAYS is a waste of money, simply because they are more expensive to purchase. If you will use a max of 700W and get a good one there is absolutely no use in the world for all eternity whatsoever to buy a bigger one. Ofcourse, the question is, what is the max wattage you'll ever use. Some just prefer to buy higher wattages just to be safe.

2) I am warning TS about PSUs with bad efficiency. Sure a 1kW PSU which is good will have good efficiencies at lower wattage range. So do good 600W PSUs, so what is your point? I'm all for the TS getting a good PSU, I just don't understand why you want him to buy an overly powerful one.

Can you tell me the benefit of a good 1kW PSU over a good 700W PSU, if the one buying it will never use those wattages?

This is why Jafo is awesome.

The list has been revised, check it out.

Just one less thing to buy for the next upgrade.

You also have to keep in mind that a system will not always run at a constant consumption, there will be spikes and drops. If the power supply is just enough to run the system and no more, it is rather dangerous during those spikes. And as it ages it will not be able to power the system anymore. Since this is classified as a DREAM system, the cost of the components is not the primary factor in deciding what to get, sheer power is.

@OP the choice is ultimately up to you, but the PSU is the last thing in a system (especially one with such expensive components) that you want to skimp on because it can fry anything, usually the GPU first. Read reviews, do research, and good luck

Thinking about a Antec Quattro 1000W (same as Jafo) or a Antec CP 850W. Both are 80-Plus.

I really hope my new build will not need such a big PSU.

Meh, this is all hypothetical, more of a dream computer than anything, but I hope to build something similar eventually.

Re the Antec options...go here for a review ... http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=465&type=expert&pid=1 

Interestingly there's always some detail or other that testers will find fault with...ie. that which the good product is 'least good' at, whether passing specs or not.

The Quattro's 'failing' is...

" the relatively high AC ripple on the +3.3V output, while still in spec, gives rise for concern.  And the very noisy +5VSB output is unacceptable.  The majority of users probably won’t encounter problems when using the Quattro 1kW PSU because of the AC ripple, especially if they don’t push the unit too hard.  On the other hand, outputs with high AC ripple can cause intermittent system instability."

Bottom line has always been and will always be....choose your kit with the criteria of what you now, or may in the forseeable future  NEED.  Budgetary constraints will always affect ultimate freedom of choice in the matter, but all else is plain bullshit.  When people tell you 'you do not need' a 1000w PSU...or a parachute...or to crap at faily regular intervals - just thank them for their input and ignore them.  They do not actually KNOW.

My jaw dropped in utter disappointment here, jafo. I do not comprehend the utter blind stubbornness you show here. That same attitude is probably why many americans still get a pack of sigarets in their 4.8 litre 4x4. Is that a bad thing? Nooo you are just raping the entire planet by doing that, but why should you care, right? Besides, you still fail to provide even one argument why a bigger PSU is always better. You just say "ignore the rest" but haven't given one solid argument as of yet.

I repeat, the same as you. You may question the knowledge of others but atleast don't be a hypocrit and be honest enough to acknowledge that you are no expert either.

Kinda falls down when I mention I'm not American.

It's probably not all that wise to alienate the majority of your audience with such vapid generalisations.

I wasn't arguing that a bigger PSU is better, but rather was arguing against those who claim they are worse.

It's a subtle difference, one which has been clearly lost on some...;)