Beginners Guide to Power Supplies... How to understand the ratings

"Power supplies are important because they supply power" -Jay 2021

as someone who has more experience with cars and modifying cars, than i have about computers, i appreciate you making analogies to the motor vehicle world, makes it a lot easier to understand

I upgraded my psu from 350W to 850W and it made a huge difference. My hard drives run smoother and there are no auto shut offs and BSODs anymore.

I always thought power supplies were pretty awesome. They're probably the hardest working component in your system with the highest build quality compared to any other part.

Your understanding of basic electronics and Physics helps. Most people don't really have background in EE and did not pay attention to physics. Good job in explaining it in a way a layman will "potentially" understand. Power delivery is overlooked and causes the most little issues. Even from the wall. I always recommend even a small ups to smoothen out the power the delivery into the PS.

Great video Jay, I have been building custom boxes for over 25 years with my first build being off the 386 DX66 CPU if that doesn't date me. Believe me when I tell you that even with all those yeas of building under my belt I learned a ton about PSU's. Thx for revisiting this topic as I believe you helped me figure out what my issues with my current build are.

Two additional factors to look into when choosing a power supply: Warranty length, and MTBF - Mean Time Between Failures.
A Seasonic PRIME ULTRA TITANIUM is going to have a 12 year warranty - it means the manufacturer REALLY believes in their product being high quality and lasting you a long time. It also has a MTBF of 150,000 hours - which is a lot.
Be Quiet gives some of their power supplies 2 years warranty, some 10 years, some 5 years. Anything 5 years and above is probably worth buying, 8 years and above is probably pretty high quality, less than 5 is probably trash.
MTBF of 100,000 hours is good - but if they show numbers far below that, you should probably be worried.
If they don't list MTBF or advertise their warranty - it's probably shit, and you should stay away from it.

As someone who has been watching this channel for almost two years being a die hard console guy, these guides you do Jay have been amazing! I’ve just ordered parts to build my first one. By far my favorite tech channel especially cause I can relate being nerd about this kinda stuff but also being a car guy! The car analogies help so much 😂.

It would be interesting if Jay talks about multirail PSUs; how to load balance them and when one should choose them over single rail

Great video, So much useful information that people need to know about P/S vs Wow look how big or how cool it looks :)
I always find your videos very helpful and enjoyable to watch. I have been building systems since 1997 and would of loved having these videos back then. So many people don't no what it was like in the early days of dial-up hell to get info. Keep the Videos coming !

The blutness of your intro is so great. Your entire video channel is brilliant! PSU always troubled and confused me especially with how scummy marketing can be.

I have some other advice: always check the amperage on the 12v rail which is what your graphics card will use. I think my rx570 needs 30/35 and my 80plus 500w evga provides about 45. Also, always check at what temperatures manufacturers check performance: some may show promising performance at 45°c but that may be too low if you consider time of the year, room temperature, system temperature, etc. I don't agree about the rating: 80 plus is (usefull) efficiency marketing, not quality ensurance.

I'm a 38 y.o. PC newbie. Thanks to channels like yours, I'm even surprised I owned only Apple computers.
Thank you for all the info all the time, you do an excellent job.

I’ve been into car audio since 2018 and my pet peeve is that if you can get a power supply that is 3/4 more or double what your PC is pushing (especially if you’re just owning your first PC) is the better because you can guarantee that (if you chose white or bronze rated) you won’t under power your PC and having a higher power supply will no way shape or form damage your component unless you have a shitty power supply. in the case of amplifier it’s the same thing, the only difference you have to tune your Amplifier to match what your speakers can handle

Very nice one! Please in future can you go more in depth about the cables and connection interfaces on power supplies. They are so many, sometimes it hard to tell what goes where, what you need and what you don't need

A very informative video, thank you.
Also another must-have is surge protection, either on a power board or in your Electrical switchboard for your home like I have.

My psu is a platinum 460w (fanless). I keep being worried that it will be able to handle upgrades, but luckily so far, newer tech also seem to have better efficiency. I went from 960 gtx to 3060 rtx. That pulls 20 extra watt, according to the specs, but when I eventually get around to upgrade my 4690k to, possibly a ryzen 3600 or 5600x, I should be able to see a lower wattage there, right?
In any case, the psu has hit its 6 year mark, with a 3 year guarantee, so it will probably get replaced with something a little stronger next time I do a major system upgrade

Indeed, this was straight forward and simple to understand. I am by no means an expert in this field, but I have built one PC and regret not paying $50 more to get a higher watt PSU. Lesson learned

That point about not using the modular cables supplied and not from another psu leads to an important point that is often overlooked - whether its a mobo, cpu, gpu or psu when you buy a high end component KEEP THE BOX and keep all the documents and unused accessories in it. You may need them later, and you'll know where to find them. It also makes it easier to sell on the part in the future, or store it if you're not using it but don't want to let it go.

When the PC first came out, efficiencies were around 70%. Now days they are up to 80%. I 1981 the power supply I designed was 97%. Teslaco boasts 98% using synchronous rectification. The Ćuk converter can be tuned to cancel both ripple and EMI resulting in a true DC-DC transformer. It also puts less strain on the components than an LLC converter. Efficiencies can be increased by using Germanium Nitride (GN) FETs with integrated controllers like the ones from Texas Instruments. There is a vast difference between what the best companies (Teslaco) build and what most PC manufacturers build.

Just EXACTLY the knowledge I required - Thank You! I now have to upgrade the power supply I got to a 850w I'd say. (I was going to use the 550 I already had and the calculator said it would run 85% efficient as Corsair are good and it was a Bronze 80). But having seen this and thinking the work that machine is going to do, I'm erring on the side of caution 850w it is!

Great video. Was just checking out PSUs for my new build and was absolutely confused. Now it all makes sense. Thanks a lot!

I love videos like this, very informative, I also look at the AMP output on 12v rail and 5v rail, like EVGA 600w W2 80+White 3.3v + +5v = 18A @130w 12v @49A @588w whereas Gamemax 600w 80+ Bronze 3.3v +5v @18A 115w 12v 40A @480w,, that 80+Bronze should be on the EVGA, Can you explain more about this and how it affects us the consumer PC builders

For anyone in a market where it is avalible I recommend the Fractal design ion+ line (mostly 760 and 860W versions). They are platinum rated at a good price compared to the compitition.

9:00 the “proprietary” connector is a standard “IEC 320 C20” socket. Well known on heavy duty PDUs and by some gear such as the PSUs of Cisco Catalyst 6500-E series switches. They are usually combined with a NEMA 5-20R on the wall socket side of the cable, which has one of the prongs sideways (so it won’t purposely fit a 5-15R receptacle and therefore not be limited to 15A).

With sub 800W psu’s pay attention to the advertised qty of pci-e connectors. They are indicated almost always as the total count of 6+2pin heads, however these are mostly daisy chained. All higher end gpus require 2 or even 3 connectors on dedicated cables.
Divide the total count therefore by 2 to be on the safe side.

Great advice.
I try to stay within the 1/3 and 2/3 power rating of the PS for today's system. That leaves lots of room for growth, and the system can run without the PS fan kicking in until you go over about 40%. Nice and quiet.
I bought a Corsair AX1200i for a previous build several years ago. OOO-VVV-EEE-RRR-KKK-III-LLL exemplified. And it's gone through a few upgrades/rebuilds. But I've never had any problem other than having to unplug and reinsert the cables to the 'puter occasionally. I guess that is to keep the contacts extra clean.
Back in the days test reviews usually included all kinds of things such as ripple, operating temperature, and others that make a system smile because of the stable, well-regulated juice coming in. I looked at probably 8-10 different units before deciding.
Quiet, stable, it just sits there and does its thing. Would do the same again if starting over.

Nice refresher for an older PC builder. My last build was 8 years ago and only updated RAM and GPU 3 years ago. I'll build a new system when video cards come back from scalpers pricing. Might even sit it out till next year. My GTX 1650 seems to handle the games I like.
Thank you!

Jay, I'm a first time pc builder and came across your video series yesterday. Just wanted to take a sec and tell you how extremely grateful I am for the work you do.
Thank you sir.

I upgraded my system a few months back and bought a SeaSonic FOCUS PX Series 750W 80 Plus Platinum Modular PSU. Based on this I should have gotten an 850W Gold instead, and the price would have been about the same. Thanks for the video Jay!

Keep going around the pc with all the parts with analogies like you did for everyone to understand. You already have great content for the deep dive. Sometimes I just want a quick overview refresher on ram timings vs ram frequency without going cross-eyed on physics.

The silver Seasonic PSU's do come with 80 plus ratings and are quite solid. As a budget option or lower power draw system they are fine.

Thank you for your video, it was really informative and easy to follow along!
Can you do videos on understanding the power supply cables for modular power supplies? God bless

Is there a way of knowing if a switching power supply like these, especially with the higher efficiency rating, is known to be lower noise in the context of audio/EMI? Seeing a lot of people saying to go with an expensive linear supply to help high-end audio setups. Others say those are actually worse.

Awesome video, very confident, great presentation! I'm grateful, thank you! (Y)

Found this video as I am searching for a psu for my computer. This was recommended by youtube and I am really happy that I clicked the link - fantastic video - very simple, to the point and easy to follow - love the decision at the end too - that is what I found helpful because it aligned with what I was thinking - helped me with knowing that I am heading in the right direction. Thank you very much once again.

"Gold-rated is quite affordable these days." *cries in European electronics market*

What I learned the hard way is that if you plan on doing upgrades to your PC in the future, it's best to go with a good quality higher wattage PSU than what you need, in order to not have to get a new one when you're ready to drop some dough on better, more power hungry components. The same goes for the case. Don't cheap out on these 2 things. Just my 2cents.

Thank you so much for sharing this useful information. I recently got an ASUS pre-built system (G10DK) and looking to do some upgrades including the PSU. This is actually the first desktop (been using laptops for most of my life) that I plan to work on. And it's very useful to learn that do not to reuse the cables because that's what I was planning to do to avoid rewiring. My system is 5700G+3060 on a B550 board. The current PSU that ASUS use is a no-name brand rated 500W Bronze. I'm getting a Seasonic modular 650W, would it be powerful enough to handle the whole thing? It did shut down on me once when I opened up the battlefield V. When I clicked on the game, the whole system shuts down. And when I get back into it, it appears to be that I've never played the game. Everything goes back as if I was the first time playing it. I didn't know what's wrong, but after watching your video I guess it might just be the PSU? Also that the ASUS case is very bad on airflow, could it be the PSU overloaded or overheated? I also plan to replace the no-name CPU cooler with a better brand, although it didn't run too hot (about 78-80C on CPU and 65-69C on GPU).

Just so you know, the inlet on the EVGA 1600 T2 is not a "proprietary type of plug..." (as you state @ 9:00) but actually *does* accept a *standard* IEC C19 cord, which (in other parts of the world, at least) is almost as common as the the IEC C13 we're used to seeing for 15A circuits. Not a big deal; I just wouldn't want someone to think they'd have to get some "special cord" from EVGA if they lost their power cord.

That was very helpful and taught me a lot more than I knew, it showed me how little and wrong my knowledge on the subject was, thanks again. U saved me money n time trying to decide what to do based on my best guess which it seems had little to do with the facts. I'd have bought based on the Wattage number and price but now I can go on what I'll likely need and quality, then price.

Hi Jay, your video have helped so very much. I thank you. In the last 2 mins of this one you may have saved me. I will be going from gtx 1070 to rtx 3070 ti & will, need power supply changed ( 600w atm ) . I was going to prob use the existing cables... I will now be using the ones that come with the new psu. Thank you

Beginners guide to power supplies: You'll need one in a couple of years when you can actually buy the other parts that go in a PC.

These beginners videos are so helpful thank you for this :)

Thanks for the video. On longevity, I'd add that I have to replace a 10 year old 850W Cooler Master because it doesn't have the 8-pin PCIEs required for the new GPUs, 3080s and the like. So the PSU has done well, there's nothing wrong with it, it just doesn't have the right stuff for newer hardware.

I would agree with most of this, just not the obsession with wire visibility, I don't worry about what color the wires or sleeves are because I can only see them when I open my system up.

thx Jay. im running a thermaltake silver 750watts in my ryzen7 3700x / vega 64 build and its doing great. amd suggests a 750w psu 4 the vega 64 and i have had no issues. i even had a 650W corsair psu before that and it did fine as well. great vids keep it up!

12/10 video!! Thank you so much for explaining this so thoroughly!

Super Flower now sells directly to the consumer. They were the OEM for some of EVGA's high end PSU's. So if anyone is looking for a good quality 80+ gold PSU, check them out. Their prices are really good!

I'm really glad the first thing I researched when I decided I wanted a new PC was power supplies. I didn't quite understand why, but I figured the best thing I could do for my system was research max power draw for the components that I was planning to get, and what I would potentially be willing to upgrade to. I'm not big in to OC, water cooling, or "high end" graphics cards, so for me a 750w PS was perfect for both now and any upgrades I plan. My max power draw in my current system is about 550w, so the overhead will let me reliably use this thing for years, upgrades be damned.

I'm not sure if anyone mentioned it already, but it would have been nice to include the SFX power supplies since many people are building Mini-ITX PC's which can only fit SFX...

Very helpful video. I upgraded my old AMD Phenom II. yes i know its old... but it ran like a champ for over 10 years. Now running an AMD Ryzen 5 5600G. The old PSU is a 700W Thermaltake Toughpower. thought it would be fine until the system just randomly shut down and it wouldn't power back up until I unplugged/plugged back in. Guess I need a new PSU.

For some reason I find that my decision to chose a nice 850watt Seasonic feels great! The heart of your PC (the PSU) is just as important as the brains of your PC (CPU and stuff)

Very cool man, that last bit about the cables has got we ancy now as I bought some 3rd party sleeved 16awg cables to upgrade over the stock included 18awg. If you could do another piece on the cabling, I’d like to hear your thoughts and experiences.

The most important part of any PC build.Well said.

Great video and clear-cut content! Thanks for the information!

"Using a too small power supply is like running a race car lean" is an amazing analogy, my friend!

I have an EVGA G2 but it's nearly 7 years old now. I finally wound up replacing it with a Corsair HXi 850W and my system has been smooth sailing ever since.
Also too, efficiency does not always equal quality. I've seen some 80+ Gold units in my years of building systems that are absolute garbage.

I want to thank you, your guides have helped me understand pc's and are helping me select my parts for my own first build and i have seen the video for beginners hopefully i remember what you said in that and don't have to go back lol

Very good Video! For my current PC i went for a 650W 80+Gold. Thats more than enough for my i5 10600 and RTX 2060. It will also be enough when i Upgrade the GPU in 1-2 years, aiming at a 3070 for example. Plenty enough performance for everything im doing until i build a completly new system again

I just have to say I love that Jay is into cars too. The comparisons to automotive stuff are always just spot on

Love what you do man, it’s sad it’s so hard to get any type of GPU And PSU at all,

I think that all of their spec sheets should list the cable lengths and how many Sata plugs they have.

I bought a CV650 80 plus bronze to replace my 6-7 year old VS450 recently for 66$ and was amazed by how small the new one is.

Bought a p650b for i5 10400 as you recommended for Ryzen 2600 budget build back in July 2019 @Jay.. sizing more than what I need now so it meets any max possible equipment to it. P.S. I am yet to add any GPU due to current situation 😀 so it is only about 100W~ of total power draw.. Thanks to you tons!

I like that you compare the PSU to a fuel pump, using rich and lean comparisons... Some components could be overdrawing current already, but then what happens when something peaks? I went with an additional 350 watts overhead with a RM850x powering nothing but a Ryzen 7 3800x, a 1030 and 1050 GPU (mostly for aesthetics inside a case Crystal 680x case), 4 fans and a CPU cooler fan. I'm not touching 500 watts, but I know my components won't peak out PSU at all.

Literally was in the process of switching my power supply for a new one while watching this. I was not planning on changing the cords but just the box. Jay you may have saved a component of mine from getting blown up since I was going to use the old EVGA cords not the Corsair ones. Thank you

I am still using a 12 years old Chieftec 80 plus, 750W PSU. Works like a charm. Now, I have built a second PC, that takes also a 80 plus Chieftec, but new, it is exactly the same price (after 12 years). Just think about it, how pricey was it back in the day!

your comparison to a 1060 was literally my exact case. recently I bought a prebuilt with a 3060 TI and a ryzen 7 5700g, the first thing I did was to replace the PSU in the prebuilt to my old PSU from my 1060 system I built back in 2017. since it's a corsair cx550m and was plenty for my old pc. And since the prebuilt had a cooler master 400w for that kinda gear kinda felt it was necessary. I did upgrade the motherboard, chassi,s and cpu fan in the prebuilt and that made it draw even more power. It is kinda loud tho but I guess that's because of the age and I know for a fact it isn't any of the other components because I had the same problem in the 1060 system and that had totally different cooling. It has been running without any issues since november, but I will upgrade it to a newer, higher watt and higher rating in the near future

It would be very important if you also said about that we also should consider about circuit breakers on electricity boxes.

Great video, thanks. I've been a very long time since I bought a PSU. I seem to have a 650 80 plus WHITE trying to run a Vega 64, it's probably responsible for my random black screen reboots. So I'm going for 850 80 plus gold now.

Hey there I just wanted to say thanks for the video. You have helped me me discover why my MB had a small ignition last night, Idk what that little box by my GPU is but I'm gonna guess my 2-3 year old PSU decided not to regulate the current and cause a small fire on my poor b550 tomahawk.

9:01 If I'm not mistaken that is not a proprietary inlet but one of the standard IEC ones for high current C20 (C19 for the connector) I believe it is called. The more common inlet we see in PC hardware is the C14 (C13 for connector) defined in the same standard.

As usual, with a sense of humor and content. Although it was all obvious to me - I watched it to the end. Thanks for another great video.

I'm really liking your informational videos. keep it up. love your content

See this is why I always get excited when JTC has a vid on a question I have, right to the point within 5 seconds

2 future changes coming to power supplies. 1) Intel is pushing for 12 volt only power supplies (I have seen some OEMs using this standard with low end systems) with the rest of the voltages being managed on the motherboard and 2) Nvidia is using the PCIe gen5 power plug with 12 power & 4 communication strands. (Side note 240VAC required for home computers to run the Nvidia graphics card???)

You know it's good quality if the man at the shop says "hello my friend, special price for you, good quality".

Fact check: PSUs are more efficient at 240v than 110v (it can be quite a substantial amount). Voltages being 'close' isn't a thing between DC and AC. Plus most fans and lighting use a negligible amount of power, so not really a factor.

Hey Jay! Love the videos! I came here because I’m looking to build my first PC and because of your thoroughness, I feel confident that I can pull it off.
Question: I haven’t seen anyone bring up using a power conditioner ahead of your power supply. Does the power supply have a built power conditioner regulating the voltage to a steady 118v? I’ve played music for years and I have always used a power conditioner to keep the grid power that constantly moves up and down as local demand changes regulated. From what I know, those types of changes are what eventually wears down internals of power demanding electronics.
Thanks again for the great content! You’re the GOAT!

Plugs haven't changed on power supplies much over the years, but the pin counts and stuff have. Was just looking at updating my system recently and don't think my power supply has enough pins for the newer processors.

One thing that started to confuse me at the time when graphics cards started to require more power was, the 12v dedicated rail. which was basically, according to what I was told, a dedicated power connection to one of the 8pin connectors going into the graphics card without overloading the wire for which the voltage/wattage was rated for. (ie: not using a splitter or a 1:2 8pin wire) which now we have either 2 or 3 of them.
it's getting a little absurd how many wires we need for these cards these days. the parts companies need to come up with a new power standard soon or before long we'll have to connect 6 different wires to a graphics card. and lets not forget about the mobo's that require a 24pin connection (ie: 20+4pin) some power supplies only have had 20pin and then a few builds ago I only started to become aware of a 8+4 pin connection to the mobo near the top left (11'o clock position) have no idea what it does as I'm still just a newbie.
I have a Rosewill 1100watt that has been chugging along since 2011 (yup, 11 years!) BUT they no longer make power supplies or for that matter, computer parts. I want to upgrade it (wires wise) because it's not a true modular supply and the wires just take up space. I am downsizing my hulking case to a Meshify 2 from a Customized Green Corsair 780T (too big for what I even use anymore, no need for physical HDD's, or disk drives)

I remember back in the day it was uncommon to even buy a power supply as most cases you bought included a super basic power supply. We just used whatever the case came with and put zero thought into it.

Does a higher watt power supply determine the noise coming out of a power supply?
Is there a noise difference if you're using a 450W compared to a 650W or higher for example

I love Jay's Beginners Guides - I may not need them, but I love being able to help those who may be new to PC building :D.

80 Plus Gold are considerably more expensive than 80 Plus and not everyone can throw down $150+ for a PSU. I have used 80 Plus whites from reputable brands that worked fine for years, and a Gold Corsair that died. I think proper wattage, a reputable brand and basic maintenance like cleaning dust and ensuring proper ventilation will work well enough in most cases.

Never heard a pc guy correctly reference rich/lean and talk about air/fuel mixture before. Respect Jay 🤜 both my parents drag raced and and whenever I’m explaining anything to my dad, I have to use motor analogies so that power supply:fuel mixture analogy was speaking my language haha

Learned so much... Now I know what PSU to go for. Thanks Jay! ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

If theyre gonna use standardized connections, they really need to make them interchangeable cause I can see how easy that would be to overlook

Could you do a video on small-form-factor components? Like low-profile devices, SFX PSUs, etc

Jay did a great simple explanation for picking power supply, but I would also like to add that the efficiency of the power supply is not the only thing that makes up a reliable power supply. In fact, the efficiency rating pretty much only tells you how much electricity you saving (how much power is lost & left when the PSU converts AC to DC).
Intel has a whole documentation on the standard guidelines (which you can find here: www.intel.com/content/dam/www/public/us/en/documents/guides/power-supply-design-guide-june.pdf) that manufactures need to follow when designing their power supplies.
One very very important thing is the DC Voltage Regulation, which is stated in Chapter 3.2.1 of this document. During different levels of load (how much power the components hooked up to the power supply is drawing), the output voltage (3.3V, 5V, 12V) should all remain within ±5% (because in reality it's not possible to get exactly 3.3V, 5V and 12V). If a power supply fails to do so, components that are connected to PSU could fail.
There are also other different standards written in the document, but the general idea is that those cheap Chinese power supplies often skip these standards and lie about the specs on the labels, or they will use a concrete block to or something inside to make the power supply heavier. So make sure you choose from reliable brands.

Thanks. It's been more than 10 years i didn't touch my pc since it's spoil. Just imagine during DDR2 times till now. I was so shock there's alot of changes. Subscribed already.

Great job Jay. Working on a new PC build and modular 850 Gold is the way to go. Thanks again.

Please do a follow-up video about the next level. Old PWM power converters, LLC converters, Ćuk converters. Also, new technologies that manufacturers are ignoring. Synchronous rectification, Germanium Nitride power FETs with integrated controllers, canceling (not attenuating) ripple and EMI. Everything manufacturing are NOT doing, so they can reuse the same old obsolete circuits.

Very basic question : with the same system does a 1200 PSU consume the same watts as a 850 PSU? I think the answer is yes. I think of getting a 1200 PSU in case I add a second heavy gpu.

Thanks Jayz this is what I really need to know more about the power supply.

really appreciating these recent videos aimed at beginners and at dispelling common misconceptions

Brilliant!! Thanks man. This really helped with my friend's daughter's build. Great channel.

im using my 14 year old dell business pc that i still maintain regularly it works great and im having the defualt dell monitor at a bit lower res like 1024 x 768 75hz it works really well with the stock igpu that came with it :) it does it things well and im still happy about it but im going elsewhere for studies im saving up for a good laptop

Thanks for the great video. My current one has a fan thats making the most annoying noise in the world. I tried to figure out how to fix it, but accidentally stripped two of the screws so I can't open it to try and oil the fan. I looked into it and its a OCZ-ZX1000W from 2013, so I think its safe to say that I got my moneys worth. So thanks again, now I know what to look for and learned something new because I never even knew about the 80 plus rating.