Question about the RTX 3080 power demands

[JansenSensei]

So.... nVidia says "Get at least a 750W PSU"
People who tried running benchmarks on it and really pushing it to try and break it say they hardly ever went over the mid 400W mark
Linus says "Usually they are way OTT but for once I would say go at least 15% OVER the minimum they recommend due to it's tendency to spike"
The guy at WootWare tells me I will absolutely have to upgrade from 550W to 750W
...and yet I went gaming @ 4K on full ultra settings on my 550W and everything was just fine...

But here comes the kicker... I kept reading/hearing about the 20 pin connector and how you will need a new PSU for it... followed by the announcement that only the founders edition has that 20 pin connector and they also provide an adaptor for that so you can just use two 8 pins and you are golden... Great.

So then I recieved my Palit RTX3080 and I noticed something weird.... My card has 2x 8 pin connectors on it. That makes sense. I kept reading how people say not to use the same cable for both sets of pins so I knew I had to use the pins from 2 cables and I knew I had two cables and eachcable had 1 set of 8 pins on it so everything so far meshes well.... but inside the box there is also a splitter cable to turn 1x9 pin into 2x 6pin cables. So now I am confused...

Do they then want me to use only 6 pins of each of my 8 pins and plug those both into my one 8 pin socket while leaving the other 8 pin socket open??? Or should I stick to using the two 8 pin cables into the 8 pin sockets and just ignore the adaptor???
But then I did the math... 8 + 6 + 6 = 20 so if I connect 2x 6pins to the one 8 pin socket and then connect 1 8 pin to the other 8 pin socket then I am providing 20 pins of power to the card.

So is THAT what I am supposed to do? Am I supposed to connect 3 power cables to the card? If so, wtf? My PSU only has 2 cables and to the best of my knowledge each only has 1x8 pin connector so where do I get the third one from? Do I need to upgrade to a modular system so that I can add an extra power cable? Or.... what? I am completely confused!

Fortunately, the card DOES come with a booklet... that tells you "Go to our website for setup instructions" in multiple languages. And when you get to the website you get a PDF which is a digital copy of the booklet that tells you to go to the website for setup instructions...

So.... confused I am staying
...unless someone more clever than I can shed some light on this for me... please?

 

[durimotara]

2 x 8 pin from PSU is fine forget the adapter.

If your psu is only 550 watt you definitely need to upgrade. Considering your PSU is at least 80+ certified you`re pulling around 690 watts from the wall and the extra over 550 is just turning into heat. The 3080 alone can take up to 380 watts and you aren't leaving a whole lot for the rest of your system to make do with...i cant imagine you aren't leaving performance on the table.

 

[JansenSensei]

I did not understand a single word of what you juts said 🤣🤣🤣
My 550 is pulling 690 and wasting 140 therefor I am leaving performance behind by pulling nearly 150W more than my max?

Nope, nope, I did not understand that one bit. Here is what I read: "Nah, keep doing what you are doing. Ignore the cable. Also, you are doing it all wrong. No, no, no to the very big no".

I asked for someone more clever than I to explain it to me. I forgot to mention they need to dumb it down for me also 😅 Sorry, my bad...

 

[martihal007]

I have a Palit too. As said above forget you saw the adaptor and use the two 8 pin cables from your PSU. 550 W is not going to cut it. The Palit can draw 350 W top boost. Depending on your CPU another 65 -150 W plus fans and other items.

Your PSU is rated to supply 550W to your PC , your PSU looses power during that process and thus pulls 690 W from the plug in the wall.

 

[durimotara]

I did not understand a single word of what you juts said 🤣🤣🤣
My 550 is pulling 690 and wasting 140 therefor I am leaving performance behind by pulling nearly 150W more than my max?

Nope, nope, I did not understand that one bit. Here is what I read: "Nah, keep doing what you are doing. Ignore the cable. Also, you are doing it all wrong. No, no, no to the very big no".

I asked for someone more clever than I to explain it to me. I forgot to mention they need to dumb it down for me also 😅 Sorry, my bad...

I am saying that although your card is running (as you seem to be implying), you are short on power big time and definitely leaving performance on the table because of it.

 

[durimotara]

GPU at 350 watt and can spike higher
CPU at 125 watt

Those 2 alone have you at 475 to 505 watts.

What about your motherboard, ram, drives, rgb etc etc..you see where this is going. You are short on power

 

[martihal007]

GPU at 350 watt and can spike higher
CPU at 125 watt

Those 2 alone have you at 475 to 505 watts.

What about your motherboard, ram, drives, rgb etc etc..you see where this is going. You are short on power

Not the Palit hey , its locked at 350 W no matter what I try short of a shunt mod. But , fair point should a Strix or other GPU be used

 

[JansenSensei]

Now THAT is what I called dumbed down. Thanks

One question, though.... With that extra power being turned to heat, does this mean that if I buy a larger PSU then it will produce less heat ?

 

[JansenSensei]

Not the Palit hey , its locked at 350 W no matter what I try short of a shunt mod. But , fair point should a Strix or other GPU be used

Say what? :O No spiking? :O

 

[martihal007]

Say what? :O No spiking? :O

No , max 350W and thats it. Your CPU could spike. What chip are you using out of interest ?

 

[JansenSensei]

Ryzen 7 3700x

 

[martihal007]

Now THAT is what I called dumbed down. Thanks

One question, though.... With that extra power being turned to heat, does this mean that if I buy a larger PSU then it will produce less heat ?

Yes , PSU's are more efficient when not run at max capacity.

 

[durimotara]

Now THAT is what I called dumbed down. Thanks

One question, though.... With that extra power being turned to heat, does this mean that if I buy a larger PSU then it will produce less heat ?

Depends more on efficiency rates than anything else. The more efficient a PSU is the less power pulled from the wall and the less heat produced as a result. You get 80 plus bronze all the way to 80 plus platinum...the higher you go up that certification the less power pulled at a certain load and even less heat produced due to lacking efficiency.

 

[martihal007]

Ryzen 7 3700x

That could do up to 100W over clocked.

 

[JansenSensei]

Busy watching a video from the guys at Corsair and they guy is saying you will save like 2c per month by upping from Silver to Gold etc... but if it keeps my case cooler then, hmmmm....

 

[JansenSensei]

That could do up to 100W over clocked.

I am a Mac guy. Coming to PC I know wayyyyyyyy too little about overclocking to ever attempt it. All I remember of overclocking is from the days of pentium 1 when ppltold me you can make your CPU work better than it is supposed to but it might melt through your mobo. Thus, from day onward I have never overclocked anything, ever!

 

[Nyt Ryda]

Busy watching a video from the guys at Corsair and they guy is saying you will save like 2c per month by upping from Silver to Gold etc... but if it keeps my case cooler then, hmmmm....

What's more important is that it prevents your PC shutting down due to your PSU being unable to cope with the power demands.

Under load my 5GHz 9900K (180w) & RTX3080 (350w) draws 650w.
For your 3700x you can subtract 80w from that figure, if you run the 3080 stock subtract another 20-30w.
So you might just-just be fine with 550w but you're pushing it hard.

R1749 gets you a 750w Super Flower PSU from Wootware, your PC won't crash due to power usage spikes, it will run cooler than the 550w being pushed hard, and it will be slightly more efficient so you save a few rands.


Or just undervolt it to 1800MHz at 0.825v and have it draw 240w instead of 320w, but you are leaving some performance on the table as it will be slower than stock unfortunately.

 

[JansenSensei]

Yeah, it is quite clear that I need to upgrade. I was trying real hard to avoid that because upgrading my PSU means also upgrading my 650W UPS... MORE money

...but if it can't be helped then it can't be helped. That popup telling me my GPU is running too hot so I should check my ventilation, that scared me enough to take heating a bit more seriously now. If I can make my PSU run cooler then that is one more heat source I can cut and one I didn't think about till I made this thread.

So thanks for the info, all:

Let me summarize that I took away from this thread:
My 550W is enough to run my system. My GPU is one that does NOT spike so as long as I keep everything at stock levels then I should be fine.... only barely. I will be fine but I will be running my PSU as hot as I can and adding heat to my case so for the sake of preserving my PSU, keeping my case cooler and maybe, just maybe avoid that circumstance when my 5 connected HDDs or one of the two 4K monitors or the V headset draws just 1W too much... stop being cheap and upgrade that PSU.

It sounds to me like I could get away with getting a Gold 650W but maybe a Silver 750W is a better way to go... Then again, for only R150 more I can upgrade to a 850W so maybe I should just get that and not worry about my PSU any longer.