Thread: Shouldn't SLI require more watts?

Its probably because they don't actually use 480W. I think its the minimum PSU needed to run this, not the power consumed by the card itself. Anyway just my theory.

I suppose, thanks. Still you'd think that if they wanted you to have a 480wt PSU than the card would require near that. Maybe SLI has it's own set of tricks, I doubt it but possibly since the cards only run in 8x mode maybe the power consumption is cut some??

And possibly because it doesn't use that much anyway, only comes close on load which would make sense.

While I wouldn't suggest running a 300W unit, you're going to find that wattage really doesn't mean very much. It's the amperage---the current itself---that's what you want to have your eye on. I've said it before, and it's not gonna hurt to say it again: I've got two 350W PSU's from Sparkle and Antec. Now I've also seen some brands with a supposed 500-600W that have the same, and sometimes quite a bit less, amperage as these 350W units. The thing that's missing is heat being factored in...which is a problem, because companies can use math without the heat factored in. You introduce heat into the equation and you'll see many of these 500-600W units run on the same level as a quality 300-350W unit.